Lee Clemmer {dot} com

Bring the tyranny by your inbox to an end: slash your incoming email and organize the ones you’ve got and get. If you’re chained to the computer and depend on email in any kind of serious way, this is key. You may want to start by reading my earlier post on this topic or the excellent post over on zenhabits: Email Zen: Clear Out Your Inbox.

Speaking of Zen Habits, it has just posted a yearly roundup of its best of the best in this, its first year. Moreover, it has gone from 2 to 24000+ readers in just a year… I’m turning green with envy. Browsing the list of titles it really comes as no surprise, however. Merging of computers and humans is no longer science fiction (just think of all those goobers running around with phone pieces in their ear, looking like androids), and HCI, or Human-Computer Interaction, is indeed an academic field all unto its own. It would stand to reason then that the need for zen practices - or let’s call it living-in-harmony-practices - concerning daily life should emerge; daily life marked by the ubiquitousness of the computer.

So zen out man, zen out.

So in the spirit of yesterday’s rant, I’ve now disabled:

• Incoming email alert on my BlackBerry (SMS messages are still on vibrate)
• Pop-up notification of new Outlook email - the little yellow icon in the system tray should be enough notification

My inbox is already looking much “cleaner,” that is, populated with emails that actual people actually intended for me specifically.  What a concept.  I can only recommend.