Last week I deleted more than 200 old emails from the begining of the year. These are mostly notes about websites that people want me to look at, or business opportunities friends are trying to rook me in inviting me to, or Paypal receipts waiting to be printed, or emails from publicists about their clients’ latest books and cds, with articles to be considered. I open the emails when they come in, then I save them as new until I have time later to go through them. Since the beginning of the year, for the first time I got 300 emails behind. And that’s without making time for a personal life! My friend Beth has 1,000 emails waiting to be read, and even she makes time for vacation cruises every few months! I could learn from her, however I don’t want to be 1,000 emails behind.
So I made the decision to print the receipts on my recycled pages here, and I forwarded a few choices items to another screen name, and the rest I briefly glanced at and decided I no longer needed. Many emails come in that I want to look at again the next day with a fresh eye. I’m real quick to delete press releases since I get so many, but some catch my eye and make me feel they deserve a second or third look.
I’ve learned to be discerning about what I take the time to read, since so much comes across my desk. I have friends who are excellent speakers, yet boring writers. I know writers whose work grabs me and keeps me engaged, yet I die of boredom sitting in person when visiting. It doesn’t always translate. If something is overly wordy and doesn’t hold my attention, I move on. Press releases or headlines that try to scare me into buying or attending get tossed. Marketing about anyone calling themselves a guru or spiritual master or enlightened whatever gets a quick scan before tossing.
Do I discard things that I later realize I should have paid attention to? Absolutely. But my job is to scan what comes in to me and decide what has the greatest chance of being compelling to read, that peaks my curiosity and lets me walk away from the article feeling more empowered; feeling that more is possible for me than I thought before I read the article.
My spidey sense is usually pretty good about who out and about on the circuit is sincere and who is a buckster. I remember many conferences early on, I’m talking about back in the day before a lot of the new wave of new age authors were household names. I remember lots of after hours parties where lots of late night marketing strategies were planned: this makes a good story, weave it into your bio, create some big spiritual insight from it, write a book about your awakening, write a book about the message you’ve been told to bring to the world, create a theme song, create a cd series, you know the drill.
And the irony is that some of these marketing experts are now known as industry leaders. But they intuited what the consumer was ready for and wanted to buy, and they hit the nail on the head. Does it matter that they aren’t who they say they are? Likely not. When you think about it, who really is?
Whatever it takes to wake people up to the choices that exist around them, I’m for it. If they attract a charlatan, well, they’ll get some valuable lessons. If they ask me for help, I’ll do what I can. But I no longer feel like I need to spend half of every day going through press releases to make sure I pass along the best information to my readers.
Hence me deleting the 200 emails. Don’t worry, yours was not among them. Sometimes I just need to let the deadwood fall and start over.
I feel immensely lighter and freer already.
What is enduring will remain.
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