Clemens v. Vogels @ http://www.flickr.com/photos/vauvau/
I know that I shouldn’t get so hot under the collar about interruption. I know that most are not intentional, and a few just can’t be avoided. This is part of life. Yet, I can feel myself getting up tight, anxious and angry when someone disturbs me when I’m in the middle of something.
I’m not a multi-tasker. If I’m doing something, that’s all that I’m doing – unless it’s something like listening to music playing softly in the background. You know the saying – music soothes the savage beast. I like keeping my mind on the task I have started until I am ready to quit or take a break.
One of the interruptions I have a terrible time coming to terms with is the telephone. When it rings, all I want to do is throw the stupid thing out the window. It doesn’t make any difference what the ring tone is or what I’m doing at the time. If I had to do without one thing and I could pick what it is, it definitely would be the telephone.
There’s one I hate that I pretty sure everyone else hates too. Being interrupted while I’m speaking. I know that in some cases it is purely unintentional. A person’s thoughts can get going so fast and feel so important that the person blurts them out during someone else’s time to talk. I’ve done it myself. I feel so embarrassed I want to crawl under the nearest rock until the blush goes away. And there are those few times when disrupting a conversation is necessary because of something urgent or even an emergency. Still, when it happens to me I can feel the anger start to build.
I don’t know if you can call this next one an interruption but it feels like one to me. I’m all set to go out the door to wherever I’m going. I’m not going alone. Someone is accompanying me. That person says he or she is ready to go too. Then, as I’m walking out the door, this other person says he or she will be there in just a second. I wait by the car thinking he or she will be walking out the door any moment now. The person takes a good five minutes before he or she is seen at the door walking out. When did a second become five minutes? Why did that person say he or she was ready when clearly he or she wasn’t? Why didn’t the person just tell me that it would be a few minutes more? In my opinion, either you’re ready or you’re not. There isn’t any in between on that.
And then there’s the opposite scenario. I’m going somewhere with someone and he or she has come to pick me up. I’m not quite ready; I need to make sure the cats have water or it’s something else. The person says he or she understands and is willing to wait. As I finish my task though, the person is constantly interrupting, asking me if I’m ready yet. If the person doesn’t shut up, I’m never going to be able to finish what I doing so that I will be ready to go.
I think I do try my very best to go with the flow of situations. Yet, there are these times when I feel a need to scream bloody murder at people when they can’t seem to see how ludicrous they’re acting.
Do you have interruptions that annoy you too no end?
A Scripted Maze 
I have problems with most of everything you have problems with. The telephone is also my number one. However, I know I have ADD, so when I’m doing something, I have to give it my full attention, or I will get distracted, and not return to the task. Interruptions, or making people wait, seems to be rude to me. Interruptions mean the other person isn’t really hearing what you are saying–maybe not listening–in my opinion, that equals rude. People with ADD have a tendency to interrupt, but it can be controlled.
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Uhmmm… I wonder if I may have ADD but have never been diagnosed. Oh well, at this stage in my life, I don’t think I’m going to worry too much about it. I’m happy with who I am and feel I should be able to feel disgusted with anything that bothers me.
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That’s really how I feel. I can unplug the phone anytime–or not answer it. 🙂
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Been there; done that. I don’t like interruptions either because I lose my train of thought. I cannot multitask anymore as well. Sigh.
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Don’t worry about it, Tess. We’ve earned the right to have a few flaws and want things the way we want them. 😀
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I agree with THAT. 😀
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Might I suggest Steve Carell and his Cone of Silence? I’ve asked for one for my birthday and Christmas for the last umpteen years. One of these days I’ll get one. Or build one. But I definitely want to BE in one.
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Shelley, I tried to Google it, well actually Binged it, but I couldn’t find anything that actually tell me what this cone of silence is. Gathering from the photos I found, it looks like something you wear to block out sounds. If this is true, I’m not sure I could use it. I’m a little claustrophobic. Thanks for the suggestion though. It’s sparked my interest.
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As I was reading your thoughts about interruptions I had to laugh. I could vividly remember that same irritable feeling when I’m interrupted when I’m concentrating on something in the kitchen, while taking pictures and on and on it goes. I find that if I take a deep breath and consider why it happened, I can relax and take care of the issue or whatever or whoever did the interrupting. 🙂
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I take a deep breath too, but I hold it a few seconds while I calm down and muster up a smile. That’s when I find out why someone or something is disrupting my concentration. That is, that’s what I do if it isn’t the phone. If it is, I, like every other fool in the US, run for the phone so it doesn’t ring more than twice and try not to sound too annoyed when I pick up the receiver. I wish I could be more European about the stupid contraption. Overseas, many don’t answer the phone unless it’s convenient to do so.
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I do have a strong preference for working with no interruptions, but like you mention, that can’t always be the case. I just took a weekend workshop on family communication, and a few of the articles went in depth about the role interruptions play in people’s communication styles when it comes to making power plays.
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I had forgotten all about that ‘feature’ of interruptions — the power play. I almost have gotten stuck in a few of those. I feel the tug though that makes me feel so uptight and I just give in and let the person talk his or her life away.
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