I always feel guilty about multitasking, usually during class or while listening to a talk. I feel like I’m breaking a rule or doing something I shouldn’t.

But recently I realized something that I’d like to share with all of you multitaskers out there, to cleanse your conscience and assuage your guilt: there is no natural law or moral law that says you have to give something your full attention!

It’s important to have the capacity to do so, and make sure this capacity does not atrophy, for the times when it matters and for the things that deserve your full attention.

But for everything else, don’t feel bad about multitasking. Recall that it’s your life, time is limited, you will not have time to do everything you want to do, and you need to prioritize what’s most important for you.

In fact, when it comes to information transfer, multitasking is probably optimal because most talks, classes, podcasts, etc. will progress at a rate slower than what I like to think of as your “maximum grok rate”.