I need to Dump the Junk

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Today’s Blog Post


I need to Dump the Junk
I have come to the conclusion that there can be way too much “junk” in my life. Things get cluttered and slow me down – way down. I need to dump the junk.

When I looked at my Inbox yesterday there were 22,453 emails! Whoa!

A few years ago I switched from regular email that was located mainly on my computer to “Gmail”… which is email stored on someone else’s computer.

The regular email that came by using “Outlook Express” or “Microsoft Outlook” used programs that were resident (installed) on my Hard Drive. It also was email that used a regular server of the company that I used to access the Internet. So to get my email I connected to the server who in turn connected me to the Internet Main Line – allowing my email to flow my way and then be stored in my computer.

When Lap Tops first became affordable and available to people like me, it was difficult connecting when you were not home… and the place that you were in did not have Internet connections available. Today that is different. Internet is available in almost every area.

Now if you have read this far and only understood the words and not the whole idea because of some of my jargon, you can understand that my mind is filled with Junk about computers. Oh Boy!

But there is more to tell you before I get to my main Junk thoughts – and the need to dump the junk.

When your computer has its email programs installed on it and you receive and read and store and keep all your email on the machine – it can get full… so full that it will slow your machine down! In fact that would be away down in fact. At times it will seem like a turtle is driving the poor old computer.

I had this happen often in the earlier days. The hard drives on computers were smaller and it was necessary to get rid of as much of the extra baggage that we could in order to stay in reasonable operation speed.

When I switched to Gmail, which is a short name derived from Google Mail, I though that I had the problems all solved. All my emails could be stored on their machinery and not mine. And to top it all off there was gobs of space available… and there would be no more slow downs on my hard drive.

In 2007 when I started using Gmail as my only email program it was easy to click on, look into the Inbox and then read and reply where necessary. After the reply I simply moved to the next email an dealt with it.

If I wanted to look at another email that had been in the Inbox the day before or last week – it was still there. I could open it and reply if I needed to or wanted to.

I get a lot of email each day. An average day will have about 25 emails when I first click in the morning. Then if I check my emails three times a day that could be 75 at a minimum to deal with. I belong to groups that have members and the groups sometimes are active in discussions. Each discussion can have 15 to 20 emails at a time when many people are on line. Some days can go as high as 150 emails.

Gmail sorts through all the “Viagra” and “Adequacy questions about my love life” emails and dumps them into a spam file… and because of my age there are lots of those each day – maybe even hundreds.

But with Gmail it doesn’t really matter. The fact that it is on someone else’s machine doesn’t bother me.

Yesterday I looked at the percentage of fullness of my Inbox in Gmail. Hokey Mokey! It was 79% full. Even though they had given me so much space to store stuff – it was way over the reasonable amount.

The 22,453 emails dated back to mid 2007. As I clicked on the early ones and read them over, I remembered most of the conversations that were taking place between me and the other person(s).

That is a little over 5000 conversations per year! And I remembered all of them… shuddered at some of them… and wished some had never taken place… and laughed at the rest of them.

No I didn’t read all of them over again! But the subject line reminded me what I had been talking about.

I have been using email for about 19 or 20 years. And I have read most that have come my way!

Yesterday I dumped the junk! I got rid of almost all of it!

There was the oddest feeling… after that. What if you deleted something you might need? It was a small battle for a few minutes as the thought raced around my brain cells. Then it was gone… so were all those old conversations. I didn’t need them any more!

There is a unique freedom that comes when you dump the junk.

I sat in my garage and looked at one corner. Oh boy – there is way more than 22,453 things there. My friends know that.

I have resolved that when the cooler weather comes – 44,906 things will be leaving soon. That should take care of one corner of the garage.

I need to dump the junk. Then we will have a party… but I hope my wife will not die of a heart attack!

The links that are listed below – are good for me…. and maybe you. Oh boy!

~ Murray Lincoln ~
http://www.murraylincoln.com/ 

Resource:
http://urbanext.illinois.edu/clutter/dealing.html
http://urbanext.illinois.edu/clutter/but.html
http://urbanext.illinois.edu/clutter/clearing.html