There were a couple big conferences recently. Rather than go myself, I read notes of people who did attend. One of the gems is this how-to on keeping your inbox empty. I have been following the advice for a week and it’s worked well.
I have always had the desire to keep my inbox clean, but haven’t had a system. In the past, it’s been pretty brute force. While it has felt nice to be done, I never enjoyed the task. Also, I found myself feeling guilty for replying to friends and family when there were emails that were “more important.” So, I like that this system encourages me to take the time to respond to those first. It makes sense that if I am to keep relationships going via email that I not consider it a burden.
And the best part is that this system isn’t life-altering. It’s a simple (perhaps obvious to some) way of breaking down your inbox.
If you give it a shot, let me know how it works for you.
Being my inbox currently has 4222 messages, I don’t think I’m quite ready for this yet. 😉
Au contraire! You’re the perfect candidate. You could even use the system to get those four thousand down to a more manageable size. It might take a few weeks, though. I guess it depends on how many new ones you get every day.
This system does mention that it assumes you somehow got all your message to zero yesterday. I have heard of people declaring email bankruptcy and deleting everything. Your mileage may vary, of course.