Are you someone who keeps every single email in their inbox? You may think that you're being organized and diligent, but the truth is that keeping everything as important ends up making nothing important. The idea of being important is to limit the amount of stuff to the most important. Having way more selection of things important takes away from the purpose.
Here are some reasons why you should delete your emails:
1. Saves you time from having to look for the right email
For example, when you have multiple flight emails, keeping them all will take you time to find the most up-to-date or the most relevant one. When you search for it, there will be multiple ones that come up, and you have to sort through them to find the right email. If it's a flight detail email, it might be time-consuming in a time-sensitive situation.
2. Saving you storage space
Keeping all of your emails without deleting those no longer relevant will end up with you needing to keep buying storage space which costs you money. Even if it's not much, we could use that money elsewhere and avoid costs where it's not necessary.
3. Having lots of emails cluttering your inbox will give you a sense of overwhelm
Keeping emails you already dealt with will reduce your focus and clarity as you might keep opening them multiple times to see if you have dealt with them or not. Deleting them right away, or putting them in the right folders or snoozing them for later when you are ready to deal with them will remove them from your inbox, and therefore focus only on the emails you need to deal with at the moment.
4. Helps you quickly see the most important emails
Deleting junk emails, sales emails, and all other non-important emails from your inbox will help you quickly see the most important emails and, therefore, respond to them accordingly. You'll be much quicker and less likely to give the excuse that you missed someone important emails. One of the great ways to build great relationships is when we become responsive communicators, and therefore having emails that we actually need to respond to will not be lost in a sea of other emails.
5. Maintaining an inbox zero or close to will give you clarity of mind
Knowing that you have taken care of your emails and not worrying if you missed anything is a great way to give you clarity of mind.
6. Good for cybersecurity measures
Keeping everything means that you face more risk of data breach should your inbox become compromised as they then have all kinds of data available. The less you have, the less risk of info being taken.
7. Deal with Conflicts Efficiently
Some people say they need to keep every single email for reference purposes, especially communication with their clients, etc. While that must have some sort of value and importance, do we really have time to sort through a bunch of emails when issues arise or only those that actually have some content rather than, for example, email correspondence on finding the time to meet, etc.?
8. Deleting vs Archiving
Some also would argue that they archive everything instead of deleting. While that can help you achieve inbox zero and remove clutter from your main inbox, the data is still saved on your inbox and might also be taking storage space. It's still data you have access with and, therefore, clutter you have to deal with, as well as data that others can access if you experience a breach.
9. Environmental Impacts of Digital Data
Furthermore, keeping all of your emails, whether directly in your inbox or archiving, the data still exists. We might not have an issue with the any of the above - buying storage space, fear of cybersecurity risks, or clarity of mind - but there is also the issue of environmental concerns. Often we don't think about the environmental issues that can arise from our digital practices. Because maybe they are not physical, we don't think much about it. But in reality, all of the digital data is actually stored in physical large servers in buildings specific to them. This means that as we keep creating more and keeping more of digital data, we need more of these servers, which take up lots of energy and space. This, in turn, has environmental concerns. By deleting unnecessary emails, we can help reduce the amount of data stored in these servers and ultimately reduce our carbon footprint. It's a small action that can have a big impact on the environment.
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In conclusion, deleting emails that are no longer needed is a simple yet effective way to declutter our inboxes, save time, storage space, and reduce cybersecurity risks. It also helps us stay focused and maintain a clear mind. While some may argue that they need to keep every single email, archiving or deleting emails is a better way to manage your inbox. And let's not forget about the environmental impact of our digital practices. By deleting unnecessary emails, we can reduce our carbon footprint and help create a sustainable future. So, take a few minutes out of your day and start deleting those unnecessary emails. Your inbox, and the planet, will thank you.