 Why do folks seem to have a hate relationship with email? Everyone is determined to find some sort of Holy-Grail-quick-and-easy-elusive secret to managing it. Articles, blogs, books, and live presentations rage about its inefficiency and its sinister intentions of blowing up your productivity for days on end. It keeps you from “turning off”, messes with your protected time, increases anxiety… and so I dive in today with my own take. I happen to really like email. A lot. I check it in the morning (and also the afternoon), and I’ve never had anything close to Inbox Zero. It is one of a set of key communication tools I use, and I encourage my clients to make friends with it. You can call me old-school, but despite the rise of texting and messaging, I don’t believe email is going anywhere anytime soon. You may not use it as much for personal communication, but in the workplace, it’s still ubiquitous. I’m glad that it is. Email is a perfect opportunity to think through what you want to communicate - rather than blurting it out in a live conversation. Used effectively, email is a way to expertly craft and organize thoughts, questions, and ideas in a way that allows the recipient of those thoughts, questions, and ideas to do the same. It’s also an excellent way to create a timeline of information. Some are even sentimental about old emails (check out this neat website I found: https://mobisocial.stanford.edu/muse/). But still, I’m very aware that many of us have thousands of unread and archived messages, and that trying to read, respond, and manage them all can very easily spiral out of control. Aside from turning off those notifications (you all have your notifications turned off, right?), spending an hour or two a day processing it, or just ignoring it altogether (not recommended) what can you do about email clutter? Here’s what’s worked for me:
Sometimes people just want to be acknowledged.
For something a little outside the box, try improving your typing skills. Really. Watching some of my clients attempt to get around on their keyboards with the facility of a three-toed sloth makes me kind of sad, and it’s no wonder they hate email (and their computers, for that matter). For those of you who spurned high school typing class, check out: http://www.typingstudy.com/. Curious about your speed? Try www.typingtest.com. These certainly aren’t the only possibilities for staying in a healthy relationship with your inbox, but they’re a decent start. What tips or tricks do you have for keeping email organized and happy?
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I love metaphors, idioms, and analogies. Colorful language can help our brains rework a perspective and bring new awareness or understanding to a situation when a normal, dry description doesn’t cut the mustard (see what I did there?). A fun turn of phrase always gets my attention. And so one of those idiomatic expressions came to mind recently when someone shared with me that they had spent the better part of 24 hours just throwing things away. This person (I’ll call her Caprice) was telling me the story of how fed up she was with all of the paperwork and clutter in her home, so she just grabbed some trash bags and went at it. No review, questioning, or discernment regarding the usefulness or importance of any item - just tossed 90% of it all away. Now her space was clear and she felt great. The process was so liberating. It’s like minimalism, and that’s cool, right? As is often the case when people tell me stories about their adventures with "stuff”, I sensed she was looking for some affirmation. Let’s set aside my concern (horror?) about discarding things that don’t belong in landfills, or how paperwork should be reviewed for potential shred-ability. I was trying hard to stifle these thoughts, but after I stuttered a noncommittal “Wow,” I followed up with a question - “Do you think there’s any chance you might have thrown the baby out with the bathwater?" From Wisegeek.org: "Throwing the baby out with the bath water" is an expression that implies that an entire idea, concept, practice or project doesn't need to be rejected or discontinued if part of it is good. The baby, in this sense, represents the good part that can be preserved. The bath water, on the other hand, usually is dirty after the baby is washed and needs to be discarded, just like the parts of the concept that are bad or useless.” The phrase has apparently been floating around since the year 1512, so it’s clear we humans haven’t learned how to manage the impulse. There was quite a silence after I asked Caprice the question, and I immediately felt bad for possibly making her feel bad. I have my own issues with verbal impulse control, but I just can’t pretend a decluttering binge is a great solution to organizing woes. I know that they usually don't solve any of the underlying issues, and rarely produce lasting results. It’s too much, too quickly. If you want to lose weight do you best succeed by throwing out your food and starving yourself for a day or two? Or do you approach training for a marathon by heading out one morning and attempting 10 miles after months of inactivity? How long does that last? Sure, there’s a balance to strike - I don’t advocate agonizing over every stray paper clip and ponytail holder. But what if in the discards, Caprice’s long-missing passport was hiding in a folder? Or the diamond earrings she inherited from her mom were tucked into an old purse? I know they’re just things (and of course, they can be replaced), but the next time Caprice wants to exercise the positive side of her spontaneity and head to Madagascar, she’s going to have to go through wasted time, expense, and trouble. Those are the three things that good organizational habits should fix, not cause.  p.s. I’m open to the idea that maybe a fast, all-encompassing decluttering binge might create a re-set, and could open the door to improved organization, so if you have your own experience to share lay it out there in the comments.  I have a fair amount of catching up to do. We’ve all experienced it - a last minute appointment, lunch, or meeting cancellation that we’d pretty much planned a day around. Hey, it happens. But does it bug you? Put you into a time-challenged tailspin? Disappointment is just a part of it, as we often overreact and feel like a whole day of productivity is lost.
It happened to me today. A session was cancelled at the last minute, and it just didn’t seem to be in the stars to get someone else plugged in. Sure, I’d rather meet with a client, but a while back I decided to consciously look at these situations as opportunities. What else can I do with the 4 hours of time I had reserved (note - it’s only 4 out of the total 16-17 hours of awake time I have. It can’t wreck the whole day.)? This cancellation is the ideal opportunity for me to look through my list of “important but not urgent” items and see what can be accomplished. Here are the possibilities:
There are plenty of other things you could add to a “what-to-do-with-unexpected-time" list of your own - personal errands, cleaning out the email inbox, scheduling home maintenance, reaching out to a friend you haven’t heard from. You can probably look over a recent to-do list and see almost too many possibilities. So how to choose? The quicker you can focus on one or two, the less you’ll feel the day slipping away from you. When I think it through, I really have 5 hours open (if I count the travel time), and I can realistically fill that with two of my ideas. The potential of the day now has a whole new spin, all in service to making some kind of progress. Clearly I already chose writing, since you’re now reading this post. The closet has really been driving me nuts, so that’s likely what will be tackled next. And then…? I think I hear Netflix calling. |
AuthorSara Skillen - Certified Professional Organizer®, Certified Organizer Coach®, wife, mom, and serial list-maker. Learning to trust my intuition more every day. Shall we work together? Archives
October 2019
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Content copyright 2013-2019, SkillSet Coaching & Organizing. All rights reserved. SkillSet Coaching & Organizing is a division of SkillSet Enterprises, LLC. Photos of Sara by Mary Rice Photography.
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