Does the way your mind works differ much during busy periods versus calm periods of your life?

When I’m busy, I’m task and job oriented, when I’m not busy, I’m observant and like to discuss life.

The recent three days have been very busy for me and my girlfriend too and yes, my mind works different (or it works the same but it has more troubles with coping) in those times.
I told my GF so when I came back from groceries some days ago; in the elevator going down I couldn’t, for a second, decide on which button to press, 0 or 8.
In the supermarket I was staring at the shelves distantly, not an idea what I was coming for.
On the way back, and back at home, I found out that I hadn’t bought several items something that usually doesn’t happen to me.

When I used to work in restaurant kitchens, the service periods were insanely busy. “Busy” doesn’t even really capture it. The French call these periods the “coup de feux”, the firefight, because that’s about what it feels like. It’s a transcendental experience because it puts you to an oddly serene frame of mind. There is no room for thought; there’s just the doing. You become exquisitely responsive and attuned to everything around you, vividly alive. It’s the state soldiers report from being in a firefight. I know lots of guys who adore the coup de feux because of that transcendence.

Ironically, that same transcendence is there when I’m doing absolutely nothing. In meditation, when there’s no activity at all and no thought of doing anything, there’s the same responsiveness and awareness.

It’s in the in-between times, when I have the idea that I’m doing this or that, and have the time to think about it, that it’s hardest to be in touch with the transcendence. Then I’m more likely to feel all the cares of self-concern.

Let me just put it this way, when all is calm and collected, I’m a cat. When it’s all chaos and confusion, I’m a dog.

I get very distracted if I am at odds with the people I am usually close to. It greatly effects my ability to do anything at a high level.

When life is slow, my mind is slower though it never really slows down, if that makes any sense.

Not really…my body will do what it needs to when stuff starts getting busy, and I guess that can’t happen without my mind adjusting itself to the situation. But it never really feels any different, for lack of better words. I seem to keep the same frame no matter what’s happening, what time of the year it is, whatever. When I’m drunk it’s different though.