Normalize SINGLE-TASKING & Being Present Over Productive

Are you constantly finding ways to multi-task, habit stack, and "make the most" of whatever you're doing? SAME!

I've recently realized that this is something a lot of us struggle with and CAN be a good thing in a way, but often just leads to us feeling frazzled, disconnected, and unable to fully relax.

In this episode, I'm giving you permission to SINGLE-TASK by choosing ONE thing at a time and just doing that thing as FULLY and WELL as possible. This will help you feel more PRESENT, FOCUSED, and likely will lead to better RESULTS as well.

In this episode, I referenced:
Founders Podcast
Pennypenguin (in the iPhone app store)

Follow on Instagram LINK
Apple Podcasts LINK
Youtube LINK
Spotify LINK

Transcript

0:00

Hello. Hello. Welcome to another episode of the podcast. I'm so glad that you're here today. I am talking about, I don't think I've heard this term before, but in my head, I'm just calling it single tasking, but basically the opposite of multitasking and sometimes I come on here, I've told you before that I think about conversations that I would have with like a girlfriend or a friend or someone over coffee or at a happy hour you know, just those moments when it's just you and another person and you kind of get into something and not, not like get into it, like you get into a fire or something like that. More so just you start to talk about something and really unpack an idea together. And recently I've been noticing a theme of some of those conversations that I've been having, or thoughts that I've been having with people in my life about multitasking or doing so many things. Just feeling frazzled and you're just trying to do too many things. And in general, I notice that I'm definitely guilty of this, of where I think that if I'm doing two or three or even, or four or five things at once, then I'm getting more done. But a lot of the time I'm actually not. I'm just not doing anything very well. And so I want to normalize this idea of singletasking instead of continuing to glorify that idea of multitasking. Because I think on this podcast I share ideas about how you can achieve your goals and Ways that you can rise to the occasion and really feel more energized in your life and energized to do the things that you care about and accomplish the things that you care about, and then kind of let the rest fall to the side and I think that's great to have goals that you are aiming for, but sometimes we get swept up in this notion that doing more is better and that productivity is the same as value. And the thing is, we only have one life here. And so if we are constantly hustling and not enjoying that hustle at all, then what's the point? So I do wanna give you some context as to why this has come up because. I notice, I notice themes, like whenever I'm thinking of podcast ideas, I will notice themes when I'm talking with people of. Just what people are feeling in their own lives. And then also what I'm feeling in my own life, and this has been a theme that has come up. So one example, and this is a pretty silly example, but one example was my husband and I, since we both work from home, we started doing what he calls quote unquote. Coworker lunches, we don't work for the same company, but we just go out once a week and we, it's kind of a way to get in front of a real person, like interact with a real person during the workday because both of us, if we interact with people, it's over teams or Zoom, and so we're interacting with a real person and then also just kind of getting outta the house since we don't. Do that since we work from home. And so this last week we went to Cane's. I kind of pre-gamed with a salad at home before going to Cane's because I'm a big veggies girly, and Cane's literally does not have veggies on their menu, I guess they have coleslaw. So if you like coleslaw, then that counts as a veggie. Surprisingly, this is actually part of what I'm talking about today. So Cane's, they have a very, very limited menu, very simple, like you can get chicken fingers, you can get a chicken finger sandwich, you can get fries, and you can get coleslaw and Texas toast. That's everything like Texas toast, fries, coleslaw, those are their sides. And then chicken fingers or chicken finger sandwich. And that's pretty much it. They don't really do anything else. And when we were at Kane's, we were talking about how limited their menu is. And Jared was talking about how he had actually listened to a, it's called the Founder's Podcast, and it's about different founders of different companies and they had the founder of canes on raising canes at one point, and the founder was just talking about how. Yeah, they decided to just really do chicken fingers. Well, they're not gonna get into burgers and they're not gonna like get into sandwiches and they're not gonna get into salads and like all the other things. They're just gonna really do chicken fingers. Well, and the, and then do a couple of sides. Well, so. Instead of trying to have a huge menu, like I think of like Cheesecake Factory. You know how when you go to Cheesecake Factory, their menu is basically a book, like their menu is basically like the Throne of Glass series. Just kidding. Not really, but it's just huge and. I feel like some of the criticism that Cheesecake Factory gets is that they have so many menu items, like there's literally something for everybody, but all of them are pretty average. Like when you get. When you order the mac and cheese, or you order the steak, or you order the, I swear they have like Asian stir fry and things like that, like orange chicken, just random things. When you get it, I mean, it's good, it's solid, but it's not like if you were to go to a place that specializes in orange chicken, that place is gonna be way better than the orange chicken that is on Cheesecake Factories 20 page menu. So. don't know if that's making sense, but that came up recently on a week that we were doing coworker lunch, and he was talking about, the founder was saying that he finds it better to do one or a handful of things. Well, rather than trying to have everything possible on the menu and just kind of do everything Okay. And I thought that was really interesting because I've been thinking a lot ever since I went to this remote job. I've been able to, I wouldn't call it multitasking because it's not really multitasking, but I sometimes will put on music or I'll put on some trash TV that I don't have to pay much attention to, like Love Island or something like that. And I was talking to Jared the other day he asked me, oh, are you gonna watch the voice tonight because I'm a big voice person and they had their first season of 2026. They just finished it, and I love watching the voice and he said, oh, are you gonna watch the voice tonight? I said, well, I don't know. I almost feel like watching TV in the evenings now is a waste of my time. Or I feel like I'm not being productive because I could just put it on. During work while I'm processing invoices and that way I'm doing two things at once and, and I just was like, that's so silly that in my free time I'm not gonna, I'm like not allowing myself to do something that is fun and life giving for me because I think I could kind of have it, stack it with something else make it more productive. And I was just realizing that this is kind of how I think about everything these days. Like if I'm gonna go on a walk and Jared's not coming with me, okay, I need to have an audio book or a podcast. I need to be learning something on my walk. I can't just go and not have my phone and just enjoy the birds in the sun and my dog and how cut he is and all of that. Or I feel like we do this a lot. When we sit down to eat a meal, like today I ate breakfast and I made the outline for my podcast and was kind of multitasking. Doing that, instead of just focusing on, oh, this is a delicious, nourishing meal. Or another example with the TV thing, you can probably tell, I've noticed that this is a pattern for me that somewhere along the way I just, I mean, TV is not great for you. I'm not gonna say that, but definitely in my brain, TV Equates to lazy or something internally for me, because another one that I used to do before I worked from home was I wouldn't watch tv. It was the same thing. It was always the voice, but I wouldn't watch tv. I would feel bad watching TV and not like doing folding laundry or meal prepping or something. At the same time, I would feel guilty if I was just solely watching tv, Because I would feel like I wasn't being productive. So those are the, some of the things that have brought it to my attention. And then another one is my husband, Jared and I were on our, one of our walks and he just released an app. It's called Penny Penguin. It's a personal finance app, which you can download. If you have an Apple phone. It's a little harder to get into the Android store, I guess if you have an Android. So he, he does need like 12 users or something that are Android. So if you have an Android phone, let me know and we can send you the thing to test it. He needs like 12 testers before he can release it to the Android store. But That was kind of a tangent, but. Anyway. The reason I bring this up is because he was talking about how he is going to try to just really work on improving the features and improving. I mean, he is been working on it a long time, but. For a year, he's giving himself okay, until, let's say May, I guess, of 20, 27, penny Penguin's gonna be the focus, and he's just gonna really work on streamlining it, improving features, improving the way that it looks and feels to the user. All of that, instead of trying to work on this project and this project, and this project. Because typically when you put. A lot of time and effort and energy into one project. Instead of splitting that across five, you're gonna end up with a better overall result rather than having five kind of half-assed attempts. And then the last, again, silly example, the reason that I was like, okay, I have to talk about this, was I was with some girls. We were doing a scrapbooking party and one of our friends was talking about how she's kind of a perfectionist and all, all of us can be in certain ways. I don't think that I typically am, but she was talking about how. They, she and her husband, they host this really fun, they do a ton of decor, a ton of food, a ton, just really fun Halloween party every year, and they go all out. And she was talking about how if they did that for every single party, it would, it would no longer become. Fulfilling, like it would become exhausting, overwhelming, like would cause stress, anxiety, you know, like if they were doing that for Christmas and they were doing it for 4th of July and they were doing it for Easter and just every single thing, but they kind of let themselves go all out. On Halloween because that's their one thing a year, and when she was saying that she just feels like it would be overwhelming to do that for every other one. I was like, yeah, that makes sense. It with everything that I've been, thinking about and talking about and listening to that makes sense. Like let's do one thing. Well, instead of trying to do all of these things kind of half-assed, in all honesty, so. I thought it would be helpful to come on here and talk about that because if you are like me and you are a hustler, or I won't even say I was, I'm a hustler, but in your brain, you feel like you are not providing enough. If you're not doing several things at once or you're not habit stacking I am here to give you permission to single task to just do one thing well and appreciate it, and be present with it and be intentional about it. So before I get into, I do wanna give you guys some action items and some things to reflect on, but before I get into that, I do wanna talk about like, why do we do this? Because I think a lot of us can relate to this feeling of being busy is better, or wearing busy, like a badge of honor, and just feeling like, oh, if I'm doing the most, if people see me doing the most,, then I'm valuable. My production equals my worth or my value. And it can be kind of kind of confusing, like, why do I even do this to myself? But for one, we definitely live in a hustle culture. Finances are a lot different these days, so everybody seems to have a side hustle or side business or something going on. And even just like I've shared a lot that I'm making sourdough. I can't tell you how many people are like, oh, you could sell that. You could sell that. How much would you, and I'm just like, I just want to enjoy it. I do not want to turn it into. A financial gain thing because then I honestly, once it becomes work, I probably won't like it anymore. So I don't wanna do that. But I think that we have just such an emphasis On payout in our culture, and part of it is just being in a capitalistic environment, which is good for a lot of reasons and sometimes can make us feel like this, where if I'm not gaining something from what I'm doing, if I'm not gaining something tangible, then it's not worth it. Or if someone else isn't seeing that I'm doing it. Because we're also in a very image conscious culture where social media and being impressive on social media and people seeing that, oh, I'm a great mom, or I'm a great homeowner, or I'm a great employee, and I'm, I'm constantly hustling. I'm constantly working. I'm constantly. Um, doing this thing for my kids or go running from A to B and it's like none of us actually want that life because it's exhausting and draining and are you actually living it to the full? but it is this almost secret competitiveness or comparison trap that we get into on social media. So it makes sense with the emphasis in our culture on money busyness and. Productivity and like hus, that hustle culture, it makes sense. And then also with the fact that we are so consumed by social media and there's that comparison game and competitiveness. So honestly, this might be your sign to set some limits on social media and chill on social media for a little bit. Might be, I don't know, I don't wanna speak for you, but just an idea. So there's lots of reasons that we do it, but overall, being present is always going to feel better than being efficient. And I feel like us constantly having so many tabs open, I think of it as like a computer. We've got this tab, this tab, this tab, and we have like 27 tabs open. And we don't, we can't even remember what the first one was that we pulled up or anything like that. But I feel like constantly having that many tabs open is why we overthink, overeat, and over commit. We just aren't focused on any one thing enough to appreciate it, that it makes us overthink and dwell on things and get anxiety about things overeat, because we're never actually paying attention. We're just mindlessly eating here and there, and then overcommit because we're just saying yes because we think that we need to. And so I just wanna ask you what would it be like if you went on a walk, which is good for you, that you are getting something done? Because one, you're giving yourself a break, you're getting some physical movement in, you're getting sunlight on your face, you're getting fresh air, you're getting grounded, all those things. It does innately seem relaxing. What if you just went on a walk and you didn't bring your phone and you didn't listen to a podcast, and you didn't listen to an audio book, and you didn't try to get something done, or you didn't catch up with your friend because you feel like you need to or call your mom because you need to. What if you just went on the lock? Purely just to enjoy a walk or what if in the morning you had your coffee and you just had your coffee and you didn't get on your phone and you didn't read your book? Honestly, reading your book, that does sound kind of enjoyable and relaxing, so maybe you could do that, but you had your coffee and you actually sat at the table and you just drank it for 30 minutes and you didn't say, oh, I need to clean this up while I do this, or I need to tidy this up while I do this, or. I need to answer emails while I do this, or same thing with sitting at the table. And just what would happen if you just sat there and you fully ate instead of just snacking off the counter or right out of the fridge or right out of the cabinet, you made a plate, made a bowl, sat at the table, and just allowed yourself even just like 10 minutes to fully do one thing. So I have three kind of action items, or really, they're kinda like reflection items, but the next time that you're just sitting and relaxing, you're just sitting in single tasking, I'm calling it sitting and doing one thing, like fully enjoying your coffee, or you're sitting on the couch and you're watching your voice episode. It's kind of a guilty pleasure of yours Or you're sitting out on the deck and you're just getting 10 minutes in the sun. Whatever it is that you're doing that is relaxing. I want you to take note. If there is a feeling of guilt or shame, or almost like fidgeting this like busy, like I have to be busy. I have to get something done. Notice that and just challenge it. Just ask yourself why am I feeling this way? Maybe ask yourself, who has modeled this that. I've seen that maybe is part of the reason why I feel this way. Just, just think about that challenge it. Then on the opposite side of things, the next time you're stacking a task, the next time that you're like, oh, I could do this while I do this, I always think of, I don't know why, but at some point I had seen someone like, she's like, I always do 50 calf raises while I brush my teeth, and I always think about that habit stack. But the next time you're doing calf races, while you're brushing your teeth, ask yourself, why is this. And also, is this necessary? And also is this taking me away from the thing that I'm doing? I mean, no, brushing your teeth isn't like the most romantic thing that you do in your everyday life, but when your mind is elsewhere and your body is elsewhere and you're doing all sorts of other things, you probably don't get as good of a. Toothbrushing, so you might as well teeth brushing. I don't know. So you might as well just do the toothbrushing and try to focus on that and do it well because you don't want cavities. And the last action item that I would highly recommend that I need to do. Actually schedule some time to rest. Put this on the calendar. It doesn't have to be a long time. It can just be like two hours. You can make it recurring. Maybe it's like a two hour block of time each week, or you can just look at your week ahead and look at, oh, we've got a lot of plans on Monday, Tuesday, and Saturday, so. Friday night, I am not committing to plans. I am scheduling that time for me. Time or rest time, just time not to be productive, not to do chores, just time for me to do something that I enjoy and really fully enjoy it. That would be the third action, that action item that I really recommend. And part of the reason I recommend it is because I want to do it as well, so we should do it together. So I really hope that this episode empowers you to single task instead of multitask and to really just fully live in the moment and be present and intentional with the things that you're doing instead of feeling like you're constantly behind and you're a hamster on one of those wheels, not moving anywhere, but constantly busy and doing things and. Maybe consider cutting some of those habit stacks out. Maybe some of those things don't even need to happen. So I hope this is helpful for you. I always love coming on here and sharing some of the themes that I've been seeing in my life and other people's lives, and just how I think it could benefit anyone overall. Thank you for listening. Love you. Thank you.