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Oh my goodness!  We enjoyed our 9 day vacation so so much. It was so nice to decompress and unplug.  As we departed for our cruise I turned off my phone and after a few hours of iPhone withdrawal it actually felt amazing not to be constantly checking it and keeping up with notifications and emails throughout the day.  I almost dreaded turning it back on when we got back to port.  I noticed close to 1000 emails from that week alone.  I chose to ignore them for the remainder of our trip and this morning turned on my computer to 2238 emails.  Insanity.

The funny thing is that probably 10 of them are from people that I need must respond to.  100 of them might be interesting to me in one way or the other.  Leaving 2128 that I have to go through and delete.  And as someone who loves keeping on top of things I am not sure what is worse for my mojo — spending all day checking emails as they come in or sitting down at night and wasting 30 minutes sorting them.

I kind of feel violated.  What a waste of my time to go through and delete these.  Yes, some I signed up for.  Some added me to mailing list when I made a purchase many moons ago.  Some came from people who bought my name off some black market list.  But even if I signed up for an account on your site why do you think that you need to email me daily.  Even the emails that I used to love getting have lost their sparkle.  They are dragging me down.

So, I am really unsubscribing this time.  I am updating settings to less frequent emails when possible.  I no longer feel the need to subscribe to everything hoping that I don’t miss a deal.  Seriously, saving 30% off on something that I don’t even need, twice a week, does not make up for the time wasted managing marketing emails.  I am just burnt out.  I feel like I can’t use email to communicate with friends and family and blog readers because there is so much clutter to weed through daily.  I am honestly offended to be virtually shouted at daily about deals and sales, new arrivals and contests by the same companies day in and day out.  I feel like so many companies are abusing their email lists.

Today I am taking back my inbox. I want it to bring me joy — not stress.  My time is so valuable.  My life is too precious.  I want to spend it on what matters most.  Even that 1 second it takes to delete that email adds up to over 6 minutes a year.  So, instead of deleting the same emails everyday I am unsubscribing.

Seriously, to the companies reading this, people are burnt out on the emails.  Quality over quantity people.  And to the ones who are considerate with their email marketing.  I notice.  We can still be friends.   To the others.

“I’m sorry.  I can’t.”