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Where your work meets your life. See more from Ascend here.

A few months ago, a friend recommended I sentinel Crash Landing on You (CLOY) — a Southward Korean drama that has been praised around the earth. I'm not a huge fan of soaps. They drag too long, forcefulness you to invest a ton of time (and emotion), and I, for one, can't wait to find out what the terminate is going to exist. I much prefer crimper upwards with your traditional ii-hour movie or an evening of truth with an observational documentary.

But now that I have more time on the weekends — no parks to visit, no grocery stores to frequent, no friends to run into because of lockdown restrictions — I took the plunge. I watched the starting time 2 episodes of CLOY on Saturday, and another two on Sunday. Then I was sucked into a blackness pigsty. I found myself constantly thinking almost the soap: What's going to happen next? How will the story unfold? Will she or won't she confess her beloved for him? Will they ever be able to run into again?

*biting nails and sobbing*

"Can I become to finish of this already?"

I finished the 16-episode testify (each episode ran for a little over an hr) in four days and began to question my unabridged being. Why am I this way? Why can't I just sit down with the unknown?

The more I idea about information technology, the more behavioral patterns I began to run into — especially when it comes to my piece of work. If I have an unread e-mail, I find myself constantly wondering what information technology says. If I have an article that however needs editing, I can't relax until I have a plan of execution. At the same fourth dimension, if yous ask me about that aforementioned article once it's published a calendar week later, I won't remember much about information technology — at least non compared to how well I tin can call back the ins and outs of something on my all the same-to-do list.

Curiosity is proficient they say. So I started looking for possible reasons to justify my beliefs (to myself, of course).

It turns out there is a name for this phenomena and it's called the Zeigarnik upshot. It was first observed by a Russian psychologist named Bluma Zeigarnik. One time, while sitting at a busy eating place, she noted that the waiters had better memories of unpaid orders (or unfinished tasks), but once the bill had been settled, the waiters had difficulty remembering the verbal details of the order. Zeigarnik suggested that failing to consummate a task creates underlying cerebral tension, which is what makes y'all keep coming back to it.

"That's interesting," I idea, only I needed some more explanation. I reached out to Dr. Roma Kumar, a psychologist with more than than thirty years of feel and the founding partner of Emotionally.in, to understand what actually happens inside our brains when nosotros accept unfinished tasks.

"One time our brain receives information, it stores information technology in the sensory memory for a very brief time," she explained. "Sensory memory is where information received through our five senses — sight, hearing, olfactory property, gustation, and touch — is stored temporarily earlier it moves to the short-term memory. It moves to our short-term memories only if we pay attention to the information. Many of these short-term memories are forgotten adequately rapidly, simply when a task isn't complete, our brains constantly rehearse it to keep the information active. That is what creates the underlying cognitive tension. Once we complete the task, the information is easily forgotten."

Basically, when we have an unfinished task, we can't help simply torture ourselves past recalling it, over and over again, to keep information technology in our short-term memories. Our brains can't let it go until information technology's done. This is why TV dramas utilise cliffhangers to end episodes and as well why I still call up about what could've possibly happened to Malaysia Airlines Flying 370 that disappeared en route to Beijing in March 2014.

I listened keenly, and equally I digested, I wondered: If I can't overcome this chore-specific cognitive tension, how can I put information technology to good apply, especially when it comes my to-do list, which is, in fact, much as well long. Dr. Kumar helped me narrow it down to four ways we can utilise the Zeigarnik effect for skillful (instead of evil):

ane) Reduce your tendency to procrastinate: If there is a task you've been fugitive for a long time, merely begin with the smallest thing to be washed — even if that means opening a Word document and typing out the championship of your report. Once you lot practise that, the task volition remain unfinished until you complete it. Since your mind needs to close the loop on that job, the constant reminder volition help you take small steps to become it washed and bring you closer to the final consequence.

2) Get people to pay more attention to what you lot're saying: Do you really want the recipient of your email to open up and read the message? Endeavour using ellipses instead of a full cease in your headline. The ellipses volition leave the reader feeling like "there's more to this," and they'll be certain to open your electronic mail.

3) Memorize more information: Whether yous are studying for a large test or trying to memorize a spoken communication or presentation, break your grooming down into parts. Or fifty-fifty better, spread your learning over several days. If yous cram all the information into your head the night before your large day, you will reduce the likelihood of retaining all of it considering it is not an incomplete chore anymore, and hence, information technology is easily forgotten. While memorizing large chunks of information, brief interruptions can actually work to your advantage — it will signal to your brain that something's not consummate. Earlier a large exam, try and take deliberate breaks when you're revising your grade content. It could exist every bit simple as reading two paragraphs, getting upwardly to go grab a coffee or taking a dejeuner break, and coming back to the residuum.

4) Remember tough names: Since the pandemic, all networking and events are taking place online, which ways you could be coming together with and getting introduced to people from different parts of the world. You might find some names hard to remember (they're long, the pronunciation is tough, or you're not familiar with the accent). A skillful way to remember difficult names is to learn them in parts (that is, introduce interruptions). Learn i part of the proper name, memorize it, and and then come up back to the 2nd part when you're done memorizing the kickoff. You'll detect it much easier to call up them this way.

So while those unfinished tasks will go along to haunt me, I at present know that I can put that energy to good use and actually get things done that I would otherwise struggle with.