Inbox Zero
Today is my first day after my holidays. Mails, chat messages and new tasks have flooded my inboxes. Sounds familiar? It reminds of a time when this state was permanent. How overwhelming it was. It also reminds me of the people I know who are still suffering from their overflowing inboxes on a daily basis.
Sure, we can ignore what comes at us. Napoleon did not open his mail for three weeks and assumed that unimportant things would sort out themselves. However, it takes a lot of courage and serenity to stay unshaken by looking at our crammed inboxes. There is an unconscious fear of missing out on important things that besiege our mind, occupies cognitive resources and keeps our mind in a rat race.
I don’t like that state and I’m sure you do neither. What I want instead is peace of mind. To accomplish that I practice what it commonly known as inbox zero as a part of the bigger practice of Getting Things Done (GTD).
Inbox zero how I’m using it is roughly summarized by these principles:
- Get to know all your existing inboxes. Realize when new inboxes emerge.
- Look at your inboxes deliberately. Have a regular interval that is suitable for the individual inbox. Experiment by extending the intervals gradually.
- Now that you look at your inboxes on regular intervals, remove all push notifications. Also, minimize any pushy communication channels like phone calls or colleagues disturbing you (e.g. by having time schedules, voice mail or by signaling your colleagues when you are focussed)
- Deal with an inbox item (mail, chat message, a note on a post-it etc.) just once
- Dealing with an item means reading it and decide now what to do with it
- Your options are: a) do nothing, b) create an event in your calendar, c) create a task for your work system
- Have a work system you really, really trust. Your subconscious will notice any shortcomings of your work system and will show you by a fear of missing out — and that’s the key thing we want to avoid.
- Reduce recurring items that are not important to you (e.g. by unsubscribing to irrelevant newsletters). Do this directly when you notice it.
- Reduce the number of inboxes that you are dealing with. Combine them (e.g. by using one mail app for multiple email accounts) or by getting rid of them entirely (e.g. by reducing your number of social media accounts). Do this directly when you notice it or create a task for your trusted work system.
- Inspect and improve your trusted work system regularly. Realize now and never forget that this is a lifelong task.
Maybe this is something you want to try for yourself. When you do, there is one more thing: There will be times when we are undisciplined or just need a break. Take your time and come back to your system when you feel like it again. It’s more important to come back again and again (and a little quicker every time) than to be perfect. Be kind to yourself.
