Humour

Your full attention, please

T A Balasubramanian explains why it is necessary to not let one’s attention get divided

Once again, we are up against the intriguing inner life of Bobo Jitter, the perennially dithering, but ever-hopeful CIO of Bazooka Company as he settles down with Dr Don Jong for another curative session. Called ‘The Oddfather’ because of the fabulous insights that he happily manufactures, Dr Jong has a special affinity for probing into the hushed cubicles of computer technology and it’s inhabitants.

“Not much relief, I see, Bobo, from the pressing matters of last week?” says Dr Jong, lighting up his pipe with a flourish.

“Yes, you could say that, Doc. I have been noticing the Busy Demon, as you pointed out, but there is another problem—I do not seem to notice it long enough.”

“You mean that the Demon goes away? That is good, very good.”

“No, no. I mean that I cannot be focused long enough to see that I am, indeed busy being busy.”

“Ah, so you are getting bored with all the nonsense that I tell you?”

“Well, I don’t know, Doc. Nothing stays in focus. I seem to lose interest in conversations even while someone is earnestly speaking to me. Last week, it was my CEO, Mr Bazooka Zinca telling me something vitally important, but I lost him halfway.”

“This is, indeed, a solemn development. But, not to worry, I do comprehend what is troubling you.”

“What’s happening to me, Doc? Am I getting senile? Is my memory snapping?”

“Ah, no. But let me tell you what I learned a few months ago in a seminar, where I met the lovely Dr Nancy Button of the Button Research Institute of the Curious Kind, or BRICK, in short. She is an articulate and persuasive exponent of a new technology frontier, one that we psychiatrists find invaluable in our work.”

“And what is that frontier, Doc?”

“It is called buzzology, which is essentially the creation of new buzz around esoteric research findings that are often otherwise lost in reams of starchy academic papers that nobody bothers to read because … well because they are so dense with obscure language.”

“All right, so what was Dr Button’s latest … er, buzz?”

“Ah, you mean what was she proposing? Nancy is well-known for coining the term ‘constant divided attention’ (or CDA). It describes the condition you seem to be afflicted with—an inability to focus on any one subject of thought at a time.”

“Wow. It does sound like me, Doc.”

“Hmm. But let me elaborate—Nancy’s thesis is that CDA is both a blessing and a curse. She postulates that CDA has evolved from our primitive hunting ancestors, who, even while sitting in the shade of a tree, had this instinctive need to constantly scan the horizon for prey and predators, while half their attention would have been on weaving baskets or grooming each other.”

“I doubt if I can weave baskets, but I see what you mean, Doc.”

“So, the latest buzzology from BRICK informs us that CDA is a behavior that is deeply wired into our brains, one of the most basic of our ancient psychological reflexes.”

“Wired in our brains, eh? No wonder it makes me act in ways I can barely recognize as my own.”

“As Nancy puts it, CDA is an outcome of our immersion in the always connected, always media-exposed, non-stop world of electronic stimulation—the Internet, TV, radio, mobile messages, billboards—the entire singing, dancing techno-commercial cyber highway which prompts us to switch channels endlessly. She started by trying to clarify her thoughts on constant divided attention, stating that CDA is not the disorder that is besetting us.”

“Then what is the real thing?”

“Attention deficit disorder, or ADD, she says, is the real culprit. And CDA is—in small doses, anyway—a sensible adaptive behavior to protect oneself from the always-on, Busy Demon world we live in. But if we surrender to CDA, we lose something significant, she maintains, and an excess of CDA means we start to live life in a crisis management mode. All kinds of perils pop up when we switch off from what is present in front of us, and instead go jay-walking into our dream world of imagination, or, what is more likely and common these days—break off and start conversing with  someone else on the mobile phone.”

“Well, I certainly encounter a lot of people who do that a lot—they prefer putting me on hold when I am right before them.”

“There, you see? In the present age, where we do not actually have to be on red alert for prey and predators, CDA ends up draining our energy away from the task at hand, and thereby degrading our interactions. In particular, Nancy focused on paying attention to people as an important aspect of building relationships. She rattled on about relationships being the key benefit of physical meetings. When people turn off their phones, shut the screens of their PCs, and pay attention, she swears that it brings a different quality to the meeting, because people are incredibly responsive to the personal attention of others.”

“I know, Doc. One of my friends, an actor, says she loves doing plays because the audience gives her a buzz far greater than the camera ever does.”

“Even so, Bobo, permit me to hold you back a little from—how do you put it—jumping to a hasty conclusion?”

“You think that the buzz on CDA is overdone, eh?”

“Let me put it this way. Nancy’s counter for CDA is to cultivate mindfulness—or, in other words, do not let your attention get divided even if it keeps urging you to get away from the occasional bore who is determined to get your brain fully scrambled. To me, that appears to be a cure worse than the affliction—and it resonates with other tortuous trends, like the ‘Do It Now’ evangelist movement which makes you feel guilty about procrastination.”

“But isn’t that good for some of us CIOs, Doc? I mean, we do need to develop attentiveness for the times when we need it most—like I did when my CEO was addressing me.”

“Even so, you must be careful with the buzzologists. I can see how working against the natural impulse of CDA would be instantly attractive to those who are focused on personal productivity instead of the much-harder-to-quantify benefits of group solidarity and identity. My disagreement with Nancy’s CDA antidote is based on experience. I recalled my early years in a science class, where the professor talked much too slowly for me. This was in the early 1970s so there were no laptops or mobile phones with SMS to help me pass time during the seemingly endless gaps between his words. So I gave in to my CDA impulse and listened to music on a cassette player, or reviewed the text from my geometry class. The professor caught me after the third such interlude, and asked me what I was up to. I told him that he spoke so slowly that I was falling asleep, and I used this stealth technique to remain—paradoxically—focused on the class. After I started to turn in ‘A’ grades he stopped bothering me about it.”

“You are a cool customer, Doc,” says Bobo, admiringly. “And all this time, I had you slotted as a fuddy-duddy old timer.”

“Voila, you comprehend, eh? But remember that I am your doctor, too?” says Dr Jong, with mock seriousness.