Comments on: No, seriously, empty your inbox.

By: Ed Burnette

Ed Burnette — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 20:02:59 +0000

Step 5: Get yourself one of these: http://www.nerdmeritbadges.com/products/inbox-zer...

Step 6: If you have trouble with any of the above steps, read this: http://www.43folders.com/izero

By: mheerema

mheerema — Tue, 26 May 2009 21:45:38 +0000

done. :) check out my latest post.

By: mheerema

mheerema — Tue, 26 May 2009 21:13:39 +0000

Hmm… think i might post about this.

By: Ryan

Ryan — Tue, 26 May 2009 21:08:52 +0000

I did this about a month ago and it's been huge for me. The biggest thing for me was unsubscribing to all the email newsletters that had crept in to my inbox over the years. I had no idea how much static they created.

2 rules I had to make for myself were: 1) 99% of email doesn't require an immediate response. The "if you emailed me then I have to email you right back" was killing me. Some can be replied to and filed away just to get it out of the inbox but most can be applied to a todo list.

2) I don't have to have the last word. Just.Let.The.Conversation.End. LOL

Thanks for the post Matt. Great reminder to keep lots of margin in our lives.

By: ritcheyer

ritcheyer — Tue, 26 May 2009 21:06:32 +0000

I definitely agree here. I've had an empty mailbox (for my home/freelance emails) for a couple months now and i feel very much more productive. i've even gotten to the point where I don't feel 'clean' if there's mail that hasn't been filed away.

I struggle with how to file things for my work email because there are so many moving pieces that require attention. I'd be interested to hear what you have as your folder structure for filing things.

By: mheerema

mheerema — Tue, 26 May 2009 20:38:18 +0000

James,

I consider Twitter to be an "information luxury" and I DEFINITELY don't read nearly even half of tweets I follow. If someone DMs or @'s me, I will pay attention, and if I have a down moment, I will scan through the most recent stuff to see if there's anything interesting.

I'd suggest Tweetdeck and heavy usage of groups if you're interested in making sure you're up on certain people's tweets.

I think the cure here is a change in mindset. Don't feel an obligation to read everything.

By: James Carleton

James Carleton — Tue, 26 May 2009 20:31:48 +0000

Similar to a messy inbox, my new distraction is unread tweets in tweetie. How do you handle twitter? Do you put it off until certain times or keep up with it all day?

By: fwg001

fwg001 — Tue, 26 May 2009 19:12:15 +0000

Inspiring, Trying this today, just emptied my inboxes. I will have to learn to process my "to do" folder periodically.

By: Nathan Logan

Nathan Logan — Tue, 26 May 2009 18:46:39 +0000

225 "unread", 316 total. I'm off to take your advice, in chunks.

This has been a long time coming. Thanks for the prompting.

By: mheerema

mheerema — Tue, 26 May 2009 18:25:15 +0000

Chuck - Like I said, those bigger items become part of a to do list that gets acted on as I schedule them.

Someone said that "your email inbox is a to do list that anyone can write to". My whole goal here is to take back that control. Work in these things in MY timing, not theirs.

I usually have some time mid-morning and mid-afternoon set aside to pay additional attention to the "harder" emails. So rather than spending most of the day in with my email, i spend 5 minutes every half an hour or so, and then 45 minutes twice a day for the longer stuff.

Does that make sense?