How many kinds of dishwashing detergent do we really need to keep our dishes clean?
Pick up your cell phone. Then pick up the manual for your cell phone. Which one weighs more?
Try to guess how many features on your cell phone or your computer or your microwave or your television you do not even know about, let alone use?
If you're wondering why you feel stressed out, nervous, frustrated, and cranky, you have to look no further than the array of choices that confront you on a daily basis. We've built so many choices into our gear and into our lives and spent so little time on making the ones we have work well, that we're confronted with a world overflowing with options and no way to make sense of it.
The best way to illustrate this is to take a walk through your local supermarket. In mine I counted eight different kinds of a single brand of detergent. That was just formulas, not different sizes. There were several brands of dishwashing detergent on the shelf, and each one came in lots of different formulas.
The average grocery store carries thirty thousand distinct items. Two thirds of those are new every year. All those new products are probably why supermarkets just keep getting bigger and bigger. Now they're about the size of small countries, compared to what they used to be but they're not the only things that have changed.
When I was a boy, we had a telephone that stood on the table in the hallway. A cord attached it to the wall. You couldn't do anything with it except make calls.
Today I have a marvelous wireless phone. It weighs about a tenth of that old black handset. It has an alarm and an address book and caller ID and speed dial and a couple of other features that I use often. It also has capabilities I'll never explore and features I'll never use.
If I wanted to explore those features, I've got my wireless phone manual. It runs to a couple of hundred pages. It is impossible to imagine how fat the manual for my computer and programs would be if there was one.
I'm writing this piece using Microsoft Word. I've used Word for a long time now. I'm comfortable with it, but I don't pretend to even have a clue about all the sophisticated features nested in those pulldown menus.
All of this bothers me. It's not that I want to return to some idyllic, simpler time, but because all of those choices and options take way too much time and energy to sort out. Personally, I'd rather use that time and energy for something significant. So, here's what I'd like.
I'd like those companies that make some of this complex stuff to slow down and let their design and debugging catch up with their sophisticated ideas. Microsoft could start by figuring out a way to stop your computer without clicking on something labeled "Start."
I'd like companies that make the gear and services I use to offer me some simplified options. I ought to be able to buy a wireless phone without games if I that's what I want.
I'd like someone from the company that makes Cheerios cereal or Dawn dishwashing liquid or Ritz crackers to prove to me that they actually make more money with all those versions. Last time I went to buy Ritz crackers, I couldn't find the original version amongst all those flavored, de-fatted, and improved versions. I bought another brand instead.
I'd like for companies that make the gear I use to spend just a little time on getting things to work together. I was at a friend's home recently and noticed a bowl in the den filled with remote controls. Each was for a different device. Surely if we can achieve space travel we can figure out that most people use their DVD player with their TV and would prefer a single remote that they didn't have to study to the manual to learn about.
I don't have much hope that any of this will happen, you understand. So while the world around us is getting more and more complex, here are some suggestions about what to do so you don't go completely crazy.
Make the automatic parts of your life automatic. Set things up with habits and timers and reminders, so that you don't have to spend a lot of time thinking about routine activities or depending on your memory to make sure they get done.
The fact is that as much as our brain is a great connection-making engine, we have precious little concentration and brainpower to spare. The less you have to devote to the routine tasks of getting through the day and making routine choices, the more you can devote to more creative pursuits and on your relationships.
That's one way to cut down the complexity of your life. Another is to cut down on the amount of multi-tasking that you do. Multi-tasking is the extreme sport for the 21st Century. But the fact is that the more multi-tasking you do, the less effective you are at the tasks that you're trying to accomplish.
If you must multi-task, here are some rules. Switch among as few tasks as possible. Choose tasks that are as simple as possible. Choose tasks that use different areas of the brain. Spend as much time on each task as possible. It's all about giving your poor brain a rest.
Take breaks. There's pretty good research that tells us that most humans have a natural cycle that runs somewhere between 90 and 120 minutes. Part of that period, say 20 minutes to 30 minutes, is best used for breaks.
Consider that as a work pattern. Move into an intense period of work and out into a break or less stressful time and then back into another period of work. You'll find you're more effective.
Take time off. Don't just take small breaks. Take a real day off. You'll probably come back rejuvenated and more effective at what you want to do.
There's one more thing we should talk about in a world that's this complex and crazy. Figure out what it is that's important and spend time on that. Do things to feed and enrich your mind, your body, your spirit, your relationships, and your work life.
There's not a whole lot you can do about reducing the number of choices that are out there in the supermarket or to change the options you're faced with in all parts of your life. What you can do is take control where that's possible. Then, pay attention to making the choices that truly improve your quality of life.
