Your inbox: the death spiral of reactivity
Posted by katya on Thu, August 07, 2008When I got back from vacation on Monday, I had more than 1,000 emails.
After two days, I finished answering all of them. It was a hollow sense of accomplishment - sort of like eating the whole box of Thin Mints.
This have been the worst two days EVER in terms of my mood and creativity.
Then I read what Seth Godin said on this topic. Read his whole post - in fact, read his blog every day - but here are my favorite lines:
Do you spend your day responding and reacting to incoming all day… until the list is empty? ... and then you’re done.
...Years ago, I got my mail (the old fashioned kind) once a day. It took twenty minutes to process and I was forced to spend the rest of the day initiating, reaching out, inventing and designing. Today, it’s easy to spend the whole day hitting ‘reply’.
Carving out time to initiate is more important than ever.
Then I read what Beth said:
According to a new study from AOL, 59% of people check their email in the bathroom. The study of 4,000 users also showed people check their email from the following locations:
• In bed in their pajamas: 67%
• From the bathroom: 59%
• While driving: 50%
• In a bar or club: 39%
• In a business meeting: 38%
• During happy hour: 34%
• While on a date: 25%
• From church: 15% (up from 12% last year)
This is warped. What’s worse - I think I have done most of these.
No wonder I’m in a bad mood - I’m in reactive hell. Read email - send email - react - react - and, as Seth says, forget how to initiate.
What’s the solution? Beth has some suggestions. They’re good.
Here’s what I’m going to do: Get out of the email weeds and look at the rest of the world. Tomorrow, I’m hanging over my desk the top 10 things I need to get done to advance Network for Good’s mission. I’m going to spend more time checking that list than my inbox. I’ll let you know what happens.
I’d hang it up now but I need to check the 10 emails I received while writing this post.
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