I rarely get to inbox zero. I feel like it’s worth putting that out there straight away. Every day my email inbox fills up with emails.
This morning I had 9 identical emails from different email accounts at around 2 am offering me guest blog posting – that’s an easy delete.
But not all emails come in that easy to disregard shape and size. A lot of them require my attention or my thoughts.
And this is where email is tricky. The thinking. Or so I thought…
I have a fabulous client who is at inbox zero for most of his life. He has a system where if it needs his attention, he makes he adds it to his to-do list and archives the email. Gone! Other things he replies to straight away.
For me, those tricky emails that I’m not sure how to respond to or that take some time just sit there, in my inbox forevermore.
So, before Christmas, I thought I would prove to myself that I could get to inbox zero.
I gave myself 2 hours and started ploughing through my emails. My task? To get rid of them.
Now, this is a different state of mind to answering emails. I literally wanted them out. Some of them needed a response or some thought and had been there gathering dust for over a year!
So I started going through them. I deleted emails. I made quick-fire responses to questions based on my intuition. And I replied to emails that were gathering dust to check if I could still act on it and deleted.
Within an hour all my email were gone and I was staring at an empty inbox.
It was then that a strange feeling came over me.
Who was I if I had no emails? What sort of business was I running if there were no emails to answer? Now I had no emails to answer what on earth was I supposed to do with my time?
These feeling shocked me a little.
And it was then it dawned on me that I am wedded to feeling busy. It’s part of who I am. It makes me feel successful.
Look at all those emails. Look how busy I am. Look at how successful I am.
Without them. Nothing?
And then another feeling came over me.
With these emails gone, I was liberated. I got the freedom I crave. I could do anything!
I could work on those parts of my business that rarely get my attention. Creating new products, planning out my game plan.
Or I could simply close my laptop and take myself off to the cinema.
We are not our sense of busyness. You are not your busyness.
Perhaps we cling to these outmoded models that makes us feel that we are running successful businesses because they hide what is going on underneath.
Our sense of self. Our confidence. Our relationship with others and our business.
But imagine if we could be at inbox zero every day? How liberating!
I thought it wasn’t possible. But the thing that made it possible was the focus to get it done and not dithering over replies.
Just reply. Trust your gut and your intuition. Don’t leave responses hanging there.
Thinking about what to write takes up valuable time. Good leaders are decisive. It feels good to be decisive.
What about you? How many emails are in your inbox right now? How does that make you feel? Could you dedicate a couple of hours this week to getting rid of them all and then taking a couple of minutes to see how that feels for you, and what it brings up.
You might be surprised?
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