Cognitive Overload, too busy to be productive
There is too much to process in this day and age and so our brains experience overload which stops us from being productive.
Getting down on yourself because we haven’t been productive and finished what we set out to achieve is common when we have several things on the go at one time and our experiencing cognitive overload. The overload can create noise in our heads, or weigh down our shoulders, or tie knots in our guts. As we find ourselves constantly thinking about how much there is to do, falling peacefully asleep at the end of a day is something that belongs in fairy tales…or at least to a time long forgotten. Perhaps we believe we are undeserved of stopping, undeserved of switching off. Or perhaps we fear we may miss out on the social banter, or extra work that could lead to a promotion if we dare to switch off. Whichever way we look at it, switching off could affect our status, socially and professionally. However trying to do EVERYTHING, forgoing quality sleep and not switching off describes a standard day of overload for most of us and so we find ourselves falling short of our potential. We may even find ourselves experiencing “distractibility, inner frenzy, and impatience”. These are all symptoms of a new phenomenon that Edward Hallowell has coined Attention Deficit Trait (ADT). (See Harvard Business Review, ‘Overloaded circuits: Why smart people underperform’). Welcome to the age of cognitive overload.
What is cognitive overload? Our modern world exposes our brains to a number of choices that we must sift through everyday. We can be paralyzed by choice even completing the simplest of tasks such as buying milk, through to choosing where to stay on our holiday. The amount of information we have at our fingertips via social media, emails, the Internet, and the number of ways to access it (24/7) is overwhelming. Why do our incredible brains get overloaded? We have done a lot to change our environments but our brains have not been so quick to adapt. Our brain are limited to holding three to five chunks of information in our working memories at one time (Cowen, 2010). Most of us expect to hold a whole lot more on a daily basis. Perhaps in this case, you could think of our brains as a horse and carriage traveling down a speedy European Autobahn.
It’s therefore no surprise to learn when dealing with every day modern-life pressures we are probably incapable of holding any information in our working memories at all. The fast pace of today can also accustom our brains to frequently receiving new stimulus, which can make everyday slower paced activities such as eating a meal, reading a book or going for walk, hard for our brains to adjust to. As a result we continue to overload our brains constantly, just so we feel we are DOING something. Achieving something. Going somewhere. In reality, the only place we are going may be around in circles. It’s no wonder Hallowell suggests the modern environment is the sole cause of ADT.
The accumulation of demands on our time and attention and the pace at which we live, dampens our ability to focus on completing a task and leaves our brain powerless to make decisions on the more important things in life. Although limitations of our brains may mean we will experience cognitive overload and hinder our productivity, our brains are still our most valuable resource. Learn how to manage cognitive overload and get the most out of our brains by reading my post on optimizing your brain.
