upworthy

habits

Community

Psychologists explain what the number of unread emails in your inbox reveals about your personality

Having thousands of unread emails is not purely "good habit vs. bad habit."

Screenshot by Annie Reneau

Does this image cause you anxiety, or is it just par for your daily course?

Email has been a regular fixture in our lives since the mid-to-late 1990s, with many of us having many different inboxes to manage from personal and work to organizations and side hustles. Our email life can become overwhelming and even exhausting, and it definitely requires some effort to maintain it, but what that effort and maintenance look like varies drastically from person to person.

Variations in email management have prompted many a debate amongst friends, particularly when one catches a glimpse of another's 20,000+ unreads on their phone and panics. "Why do you have so many unread emails?!? That would cause me so much anxiety!" says the one, while the other just shrugs and says, "I skip the ones I don't want to read and it's not worth taking the time to delete them," as if that's a perfectly reasonable approach.

What do these reactions to emails say about each person? Is one right and the other wrong? Does one have good habits and the other bad?

Some folks will make a convincing argument for orderly and organized inbox habits, touting the benefits of the "Inbox Zero" method in which you follow a few steps to keep your inbox cleared. Such habits can help those who feel overwhelmed by too many emails and can't ignore inbox clutter to feel more at ease.

But before judging those with cluttered inboxes too harshly, it's important to note that our brains don't all work the same way. For some, keeping up a clear inbox causes more stress than ignoring emails and they feel that the time and attention it takes to manage it every day isn't worth it.

Here's what psychologists have to say about people's email inbox habits and what they mean about our personalities:

First, let's look at the reality of email and how much of it is even worth our time, because we all know a lot of the email we receive is worthless. Researchers wrote inHarvard Business Review, “Of the eight hours managers devote to e-communications each week, we estimate 25% of that time is consumed reading emails that should not have been sent to that particular manager and 25% is spent responding to emails that the manager should never have answered.”

In another Harvard Business Review article citing a 2012 McKinsey analysis, researchers noted that, "the average professional spends 28% of the workday reading and answering email...that amounts to a staggering 2.6 hours and 120 emails per day."

And that's just work email. Our personal inboxes are full of junk with seemingly endless waves of email marketing and advertisements masquerading as helpful information. Some of us understand that reality and see it as all the more reason to actively manage our inboxes, while some of us see it as a reason to simply ignore most email that comes in.

A person using a smartphone and laptop with various open tabs.

Are you a filer and deleter or an ignorer?

Photo by Yogas Design on Unsplash

Research psychologist Larry Rosen, Ph.D. told Business Insider that people who routinely file and delete emails are often trying to avoid the anxiety that comes with seeing emails pile up. "A huge, exploding inbox releases stress-based neurotransmitters, like cortisol, which make them anxious," he said.

Some of that anxiety could stem from perfectionism (or vice versa) and seeing notifications build up is a reminder of everything you're not doing or able to do.

“It could be tied to feeling overwhelmed to the point that each unread notification is yet another piled task piled on top of a thousand others,” Jenn Hardy, a licensed psychologist in Maryville, Tennessee, told HuffPost.

Rosen told Business Insider that people who stay on top of their inboxes are often people with a high need for control in their lives. "They need an external way to have control over the world," he said, so the idea of just letting emails pile up willy nilly is way too stressful.

On the other hand, people who do let their emails pile up may feel an opposite kind of stress. The idea of managing it all creates anxiety, and they feel more comfortable just ignoring it. Ultimately, there have to be occasional purges, but that's preferable to the day-to-day maintenance stress for some.

“They may find this works better for them, leaves them less stressed and helps them focus their time and energy on other matters," Hardy pointed out. Social psychologist Ron Friedman told Business Insider that ignoring email "can also mean that you recognize that [monitoring and organizing those emails] isn't helping you achieve progress," adding that recognition is "a sign of intelligence."

Email ignorers might also just be more relaxed personality types in general. More Type B than Type A.

“They may be less of a perfectionist type and go more with the flow,” Lena Derhally, a licensed psychotherapist who specializes in social media and anxiety, told HuffPost. “They may not see having unread notifications or clear inboxes as a priority, and they may not feel bad/guilty/shameful about being unresponsive.”

The one solid argument for keeping your inbox under control regardless of your personality type is the environmental impact of data storage. Deleting emails may be fairly low on the rung of carbon to-dos, but it's a simple one that anyone can do. Plus, using the environment as an incentive to clean up your email habits might be helpful for people who actually want the "Inbox Zero" life but have a hard time getting motivated to do it.

What's funny about all of this is how people's email worlds can be completely alien to one another. My friends look at my unread email notifications and chastise me for causing them anxiety (even though they're my inboxes, not theirs—just seeing the number in the bubble on my phone stresses them out). I, on the other hand, cannot even conceptualize how they keep all of their email inboxes cleaned up every day. Like, does not compute even a little bit.

It takes all kinds of people to make the world go round, so as long as people are happy with their chosen methods, we can stop judging and even celebrate the differences in our inbox habits.


This article originally appeared on 6.6.24

From Your Site Articles
habits
Health

Positive psychology expert shares how her simple 'Monday Math' can help you live your best life

It's a positive wake-up call.

via Matthias Cooper

A woman enjoying her life.

It can be frustrating to feel motivated enough to pursue your dreams when your life is already packed with responsibilities and you have a limited amount of energy and attention. But we all have those things in life we’ve always wanted to do, such as learning a skill, traveling, or becoming more physically and mentally fit.

Jodi Wellman, who has a Master’s degree in applied positive psychology from the University of Pennsylvania and founded Four Thousand Mondays, coaches people on how to be more motivated by facing their limited time on Earth.

The concept may seem a bit morbid initially, but she says that when people honestly appraise their mortality, it’s great for long-term motivation. “My top tip is to get granular with what I call mortality math,” Wellman told CNBC Make It. “So we have to get really in tune with the temporary nature of our lives ... because otherwise, we won’t take action, we will languish.”

Wellman has a calculator on her site that shares the number of Mondays you have left based on current life expectancy. (The following is a calculation for a 47-year-old man.)

get motivated, four thousand mondays, jodi wellman

The number of Mondays a 47-year-old man has left.

via Four Thousand Mondays

Wellman believes that when we truly understand we can only put things off for so long, we are more likely to follow our passions. “Later is an elusive time that may never come,” Wellman said. It’s also worth considering that some of the Mondays come when we’re older when it's more difficult to travel or do things that require physical strength.

“If you were going to die tonight, what would you wish you had taken action on? Maybe there’s an opportunity to start that today,” she added.

Mondays help put our lives in perspective. For many, it’s the first day back at work after the weekend, when it's time to get back on task, make new plans, start a new habit, or take on new responsibilities. Knowing there are only so many left can be a great motivator.

Wellman’s Four Thousand Mondays philosophy is based on the psychological concept of temporal scarcity, which states that it can be challenging to find joy in some of life’s pleasant experiences unless we know that they will come to an end.

It’s also based on the Freudian principle that we tend to seek pleasure and avoid pain and we will go to great lengths to prevent momentary pain. This can hinder us from pursuing our dreams which might involve a bit of initial discomfort.

By counting the number of Mondays we have left, we can avoid having painful end-of-life regrets when we realize that time is running out on our dreams. Wellman hopes that her philosophy provides a wake-up call for people to start living the life they always wanted because it’s later they think.

“We can fathom our deathbed regrets, for example, to sprinkle that dose of ‘oh sh**’ we need to take action in our lives,” she wrote on her blog. “We can focus on our limited lifespans and live with verve and vigor, to avoid the pain and heartache of a lackluster life we didn’t try hard enough to enjoy. In short, we will brazenly embrace the dark side… like a sneaky shortcut to the bright side.”

From Your Site Articles
motivation tips
Pop Culture

Woman flips the script on habits, touting the benefits of a 'chaotically organized life'

Being unable to stick to routines and habits doesn't mean you're lazy, says Elizabeth Filips.

Elizabeth Filips/YouTube

Elizabeth Filips shares some refreshing insights for people who can't stick to habits.

One of the beautiful things about humans is how diverse we are. Not just in the way we look, dress and eat, but in the way we feel, think and process. What works for one person won't necessarily work for another, and trying to force a square peg into a round hole is just an exercise in frustration.

This truth is particularly apparent in the realm of productivity.

Productivity "hacks" are everywhere these days. As of July 2023, James Clear's book "Atomic Habits" has sold 15 million copies worldwide. Clear's approach to habit formation has made waves because it feels far more accessible and achievable than many others—and indeed, many have found it life-changing—but what if consistent habits and routines aren't a part of your makeup?

That's the question Elizabeth Filips addresses in a script-flipping video describing how her brain simply works differently.

Filips is an artist, medical student, author, podcaster and YouTube creator who has accomplished an astonishing amount in what she refers to as her "chaotically organized" life. For her, productivity doesn't look like consistency, habit and routine—the things that are so often drilled into us as the keys to getting things done. Rather, she's learned to harness her passion-led motivation and work in huge, productive spurts of focus.

Essentially, it's the inverse of the "Atomic Habits" method of small, consistent improvements. Rather than get 1% better at something each day, Filips "primes" her passion for a task, waits until she gets to a point of "I have to learn this now!" and then makes 100%, 500%, 5000% improvements, all in one fell swoop.

It's a familiar way of working for people with ADHD, only Filips actually explains the methodology of it in a way that turns it into a legitimate productivity approach. It's not necessarily laziness if you can't keep up with routines and habits—it may be that you are wired for more of a passion-primed sprint way of getting things done rather than a purposefully paced marathon.

Watch Filips explain:

Filips also created a follow-up video explaining how one potential downfall of this method is that you might quit things too often when the passion for them wanes. She explains how to not quit everything you start in this video:

Here's to the various ways we all think and work and make the best use of our time. Productivity doesn't look the same for everyone, so if you feel like you're a square peg trying to squeeze yourself into a round hole when you read about habits and routine, maybe you just need to embrace chaotic organization. There's no "wrong" way, as long as what you're doing works for you.

Follow Elizabeth Filips on YouTube and check out her website here for more.

From Your Site Articles
productivity
Family

He was always on his phone. Then he made this incredible change you can try too.

10 simple steps to break bad habits and take back control.

I had fallen into a dangerous loop. I knew I was doing it too much.

It was easy to justify checking my phone constantly — especially since I work on a newsletter that collects valuable ideas from around the web. I was constantly browsing and searching, all day, every day.

So I did something about it.

I didn’t take a "digital detox" and completely abandon social media for a brief period of time because that feels more like a temporary treatment than an actual solution. I might have felt better for a couple days, but once I returned from my detox, I assume everything else would have gone back to "normal" — and normal wasn’t working for me.

I set out to change my phone habits and create a simple set of rules to limit the negative (and amplify the positive) impacts of when and how I use my phone.

What I came up with was this set of 10 guidelines to ensure I used my phone with more intention. They made a huge difference in how often I check my phone, what I get out of it, and how I feel about it.

1. I stopped checking my phone in my car.

I never really checked my phone while driving — it's dangerous (and you should definitely stop that whether you try out these rules or not), but with this rule I also outlawed checking it at stoplights, in heavy traffic, or any time I was in my car.

I discovered how often I was checking my phone in the car previously, how unnecessary it was, and how it actually made things like sitting in traffic more frustrating than they otherwise might be.

2. I stopped checking my phone during TV commercials.

I hate commercials as much as the next guy, and sometimes social media seems like it was invented to fill up those two-minute interruptions — no wonder I checked my phone at every TV timeout.

But when I picked up my phone during a commercial, I rarely put it back down when the show came back on. It captured my attention and drew it away from what I actually wanted to watch.

To help me stick with this rule, I implemented another one…

3. I kept my phone across the room when I wasn’t using it.

Turns out the only thing stronger than the allure of social networks is the allure of not getting up off the couch.

The further my phone is from me, the less likely I am to randomly check it.

4. I turned off all notifications.

If we enable them, we are asking our phones to interrupt us. This interruptions can be unnecessary and poisonous. Now, there are no dings when somebody likes my Facebook post or sends me an email.

5. I chose an end point for each random surfing session.

I believe in the value of "getting lost on the internet" and continue to do so. But now, when I pick up my phone to do some random surfing, I set an end point for the journey before I start. For example, when I decide to browse Twitter, I also consciously decide to do so for just 20 minutes.

It protects my time and ensures a little surfing doesn’t turn into a time suck, but it also creates a space for me to explore and discover new things.

6. I stopped checking my phone while in line.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with this, but it’s definitely not an intentional use of your phone.

By following this rule, I send a message to myself that I’m in control of my attention as opposed to ceding it to my phone any time I’ve got a moment to spare.

7. I created a framework for my day with buffers at the beginning and end of it.

If the first thing I do when I wake up and the last thing I do before going to sleep is to check my phone, what kind of message does that send to my brain about the role of my phone in my life?

One of the simplest things I did to switch up my phone habits was to create a buffer zone — in the morning and at night — when I don’t use my phone.

I don’t pick up my phone until I’ve finished breakfast (which typically means I’ve been up for at least 30 minutes) and stop using my phone at least an hour before going to sleep.

8. I put my phone away after I post something on social media.

After I post an article or a tweet or a Facebook status, I’m going to be tempted to check and see whether people like and share it over the next hour or two.

To counteract this pull, I made it a rule to log off after posting something and not check my phone for a while. It’s a conscious effort to avoid getting drawn into my phone in an unnecessary usage pattern.

Likes, shares, or interactions will still be there when I check back in, and I don’t need to follow the action in real time.

9. I stopped repeating the cycle.

By the time I went through checking a couple of email addresses, my Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Medium accounts, enough time went by that I felt the urge to go back to the beginning of the cycle and check them all again to see what was new since I last checked.

Obviously, that’s not a great habit.

I created this rule, which means I go through the cycle and check each platform once per phone-use session, and when I’m done, I’m done.

10. I recognized it’s a work in progress.

One of the reasons I don’t like the concept of a full digital detox is because it’s an all-or-nothing scenario ,  and I don’t believe that’s how we ultimately create positive, lasting change.

My effort to be more intentional with my phone hasn’t been perfect, but it has helped me start to make lasting changes in my habits.

Like all things, it’s a work in progress. That’s OK. The point is to head in the right direction and learn along the way  —  and that’s exactly what these rules helped me to do. I hope they help you as well.

This article originally appeared in the "For the Interested" newsletter, a weekly collection of ideas to help you learn, do, and become better. It is reprinted here with permission.

Trending Stories