Do you feel like you could use some year-end relief? Usually, the end of a year fills us with hope for the new year, and for some, even excitement. But this year is tough. At least for me, and I am very blessed.
The events of this year are overwhelming. Without minimizing those events or feelings, let’s focus on a simple step you can take toward year-end relief.
Fire your inbox.
How Do You Spell Relief?
If your inbox is anything like mine, you have a ton of emails demonstrating their own work sit-down. Some you’ve read. Others you skipped. Collectively, they form a hoarder’s wall of stress.
Organization experts hawk the benefits of de-cluttering your life. But how often have you thought about your insidious inbox?
What if you fired your inbox? How would that help?
Fire Away
If you have been working for some time, you probably moved from one employer to another. Depending on the job, you may have felt tremendous relief to be letting it go.
Did you feel a rush of relief when the burden of the job had an end in sight? In my corporate days, a frequent joke from someone who had already given notice was to ask the following.
“What are they going to do? Fire me?”
As you neared your final day (assuming your employer did not immediately show you the door), what did you do about your overstuffed inbox?
- Did you have emails you read 1,000 times, intending to file them?
- Or what about the emails you ignored instead of reading?
- And why didn’t you delete others?
Knowing you were moving on, you may have shrugged, checked Select All, and hit Delete. Do you remember how you felt?
- Ah, the power of that simple task.
- The unmitigated joy.
- You just fired your inbox!
As we approach another year’s end, why not relive the relief?
Go ahead – fire your inbox.
Delightful Delete
I know what you are thinking.
This sounds like a post from Shoulder Satan
- Dare you do it?
- Can you actually fire your inbox?
- Can you revel in delightful delete?
Okay, I understand the need for caution. But why not capture some of the beauty of an empty inbox?
Do you even remember what an empty inbox looks like?
The following are three ways for achieving an immaculate inbox.
#1 – Final Day Flush
We featured this method above in the example of changing employers.
- You Select All.
- Click on Delete.
- Select Yes to the nagging question, Are you sure?
Warning: This method is not for the Faint-of-Heart, the Perennial Procrastinator, or the Follow-up Failure.
The method takes some serious *ahem* fortitude.
- Do not engage if you have Flushers’ Remorse.
- If you put off saving documentation you need, stop that flush.
- Likewise, if you know you meant to follow-up, forget flushing.
However, if you are crazy-good organized or know what’s left is for your reading pleasure only – flush away.
#2 – Seek and Destroy
They’re lurking in your inbox. Those hunks of hoarder’s paradise.
- Newsletters you will never read.
- Unsolicited products you would never buy.
- The send in 30 seconds or die emails that are way past due.
You recognize them instantly. Such as the astounding number of sales pitches I receive for the employees I do not have. It is a simple task to discover I am a sole proprietor and have always been a sole proprietor since leaving the corporate world behind. Then again, it is not so surprising as lazy marketing seems to have only gotten worse.
I start with the sender.
- Seek and sort by sender.
- Select the horrific hunks of junk.
- Delete and destroy.
#3 – Dump and File
This method will appeal to the procrastinator in all of us. If you simply cannot deal with the bulging inbox, but hold emptiness close to your heart, try this.
- Dump the obviously unwanted.
- File the rest in a Review Later folder.
Voilà ! Empty inbox.
A twist on this is creating folders for the Seriously Old and Not So Old. Personally, I am not a fan of this method because I know what will happen. Next year at this time, I’ll have two extra folders with leftover emails. 😀
Empty But Fulfilled
Ho-Ho-Ho, what a holiday treat – an empty inbox.
- No newsletters to ignore.
- No spam to abhor.
- No sales offering More.
Empty and fulfilled – just like I like it.
Until the New Year.
When was the last time you fired your inbox?
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Note: This December 15, 2025 post updates the original that published on December 5, 2012. Yep, I am still procrastinating. 😉
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Good techniques here Cathy.
I use a variation of Seek and Destroy. The key thing is that I (mostly) stay on top of important e-mails by making sure I answer them in a timely manner and that I have folders to put e-mails I want to keep.
I use the same method, John, but I have a nasty habit of starting out well in the beginning of the year and then slipping. Then I have to go back to Seek and Destroy. 🙂
Thanks for sharing your M.O., John.
I love this idea. I do a newsletter and RSS cull every so often and it’s very liberating.
Isn’t it, Sharon? I love watching my storage bar go down after a dump. 🙂 Ah, the simple things in life.
You are so right, Cathy. It’s like clearing your closet of clothes you never wear. Once gone, never missed.
I like that analogy,Kim. Darn, something else to put on my Year-End To Do list. 😉
Given the plethora of mail that sneaks in- it would only be empty for no more than 40 seconds (that’s 2200 emails a day/1440 minutes)— unless it really were my last day and they were closing up the account.
2200 emails per day – shoot me! 😉
I think I suffer from Perfectionism. Since I don’t file anything, I can’t throw out anything. If you can’t do it right, don’t do it at all. But you have given me an idea how. Thanks, Cathy.
I hit a point, Ann, where I throw up my hands and go on a clean-up frenzy – whether it’s my desk or my Inbox. The clutter gets to me after a period of time.
We each have out own push-buttons. 🙂 Thanks for sharing your view, Ann.