I need to be caught up with my email
1. Is it true?
Yes. A full inbox drives me crazy and drains my mental energy while I am doing something else.
2. Can you absolutely know that it is true?
Mmh, I feel pretty strongly about that. But upon closer look I think I need it because of all the shoulds underneath and the worry of what will happen if I don’t.
3. How do you react when you think that thought?
Restless. Antsy. Every once in a while the thought about this full inbox will shoot through my head and I will have this adrenaline rush. It takes me out of the present moment. I can’t wait to have time. I feel constricted by the things that prevent me from sitting down at my computer and tending to my email inbox.
It feels like a backpack I am constantly carrying around. I know it’s there. It’s heavy. It’s a drain.
With the thought: Stress and a drain of energy.
4. Who would you be without the thought?
Oh, I hear my mind screaming: Don’t you let go of that thought!!
Ok, so I’ll take a step back: What are you afraid would happen if you didn’t believe that thought?
I would get careless and just let my emails sit there, not get back to people, not do my job.
Is it true that that would happen if you didn’t believe that thought?
Actually, no I don’t think so.
Ok, now, who would you be without the thought I need to be caught up with my email?
I think I would be more relaxed. I would take a few minutes and decide what the most important and/or urgent email is and if it can wait until the time when I can sit down in peace and quiet to respond or if I do need to make time for it right now.
Yeah, I would be relaxed. I would be gentler with myself, and I also would be more in the present moment.
(Side note: In future inquiry look at the thought: Things need to be finished. Things need to be done.)
Turnarounds:
I don’t need to be caught up with my email.
I remember that poem "If I could live my life again". I don’t think it says I would answer my emails more promptly. And from further away that seems so true.
I need to get behind on my email.
Oh yeah, there are so many stories surfacing when I do. All these stories about getting something done, needing to finish something, about what other people will think when I don’t get back, the "penalty" for not timely answering questions in the expert forum. Amazing to watch my mind go wild. I do feel compassion for it. It is just trying to protect me. Thank you my wonderful mind. Thank you for all the work you do, all the possible scenarios you go through to protect me from any potential pain. I will take a moment and really feel that appreciation and gratitude.
Filed under Time, Work by on Sep 4th, 2007. Comment. 
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Comments on I need to be caught up with my email
Hi Christine. This inquiry sounds just exactly like my mind when I don’t stop and question it. So many things to do, so little time. I notice that thoughts like this don’t necessarily make me work harder. They just make me feel guiltier when I don’t. Stress and energy drain, as you point out.
I love how you got to gratitude in the last turnaround.
I was wondering: Would your answer to the third question be any different if you phrased it as, “How do I react when I think I need to be caught up with my email, and I’m not?” and “How do I react when I think I need to be caught up with my email, and I am?”
Thanks Nancy for your comment.
Yeah, isn’t it amazing how we think that the thought is helping us (let’s say to not get behind with email or to work harder) when in fact it is actually doing the opposite. Paralysed, overwhelmed… Funny how that works.
Your question whether I would answer question 3 differently. Well, the first question with “…and I am not” is what I add in my mind when I answer it because that little addition is where the stress comes in for me. It is where wishing and reality drift apart.
The second one (How do I react when I think I need to be caught up with my email, and I am?). Mmh, let me think. Yeah, I definitely would answer it differently. It would be more like “I feel good about myself. Calm. Relaxed. Satisfaction from having it done”. I would say that with so many other beliefs in line waiting to be questioned
I leave the ones that feel good for the days to come that I just can’t find anything to be stressed about. 
What is your experience with the little additions in question number 3?
Christine, you ask about my experience with the additions in #3.
I’m starting to see that believing I’m good when I live up to an expectation, is just as much a trap as believing I’m bad when I don’t live up to it. I’m still in exactly the same place, believing the same story.
And more important, I’m not questioning the thought that my actions determine whether or not I’m happy. In other words, that events determine my feelings. I’ve still got the chain backwards, and I’m missing the first link:
thoughts –> feelings –> actions –> results
The more I take the thought and squeeze it and turn it around every which way, the more “juice” for my inquiry it gives me.
I’m not sure I’m explaining this very clearly, because I’m just starting to realize some of these thoughts and I haven’t explored them very fully.