Things I Wanted To Save When I Cleared Out My E-mail Inbox

A few days ago, I decided that I had to get my e-mail inbox under control. It wasn't as wildly out of control as some people's are, but I had about 375 e-mails sitting there, a couple dating as far back as 2007, and every time I signed in, there they sat judging me. I always wondered What have I left undone?

Over the course of the day, I took my inbox down from 375 to 12 e-mails, and my inbox has suddenly stopped haunting me with its perpetual message of my likely colossal failure. If you have an inbox like mine was, I suggest taking a day and killing it. It's been surprisingly freeing to my mind and my sense of well-being.

While I cleaned out my inbox, a handful of things popped up that I wanted to note, and the following snippets are little pieces of my life I didn't want lost to my Gmail archives, because they each point to specific points of time in my slow sea change over the last few years that I want to keep pinned down chronologically.

This is more like personal note-taking out loud.

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MARCH 2009

(The following is my present response to an e-mail I was sent by a counsellor I saw briefly in 2008 but who continued to read my weblog and help me out behind the scenes without my knowing that I had a kind ally within the mental health system. It was a revelation, and she permanently altered the course of my life.)

Dear Bev,

I have no idea if you are still reading this weblog at all, since our last communication was in March of 2009, but I want you to know that I still think of you and the work that you did for me.

At the time, I was lost on waiting lists within the mental health system, too unwell to properly care for my own mental health but not unwell enough to land me in a psychiatric ward, and you heard me. You read my stories here and found me the help I needed at a time when the mental health system in my city seemed to be the least humane. Through a few sessions with a new counsellor, thanks to you, I was able to garner some skills to help me process some of my anxiety, and that has taken my life from barely livable to one for which I feel grateful. You heard me, you helped me, and you changed my life.

Thank you.

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MAY 2009

A friend urged me to "...fill a pigeon with rice, glitter and hundreds of little notes saying I'm outta here... and push it into the HR office".

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AUGUST 2009

I wrote five blog posts for NBC Universal. I never saw my name attached to any of them published online, but I was paid for them, and that cheque bought us a couple of weeks of groceries. Eating makes writers happy.

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OCTOBER 2009

The Palinode sent me video interviews he did of me talking about blogging and quitting smoking:





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NOVEMBER 2009

I went on CBC radio two or three times over the course of the month to talk about my experience participating in NaNoWriMo. I was a little freaked out, because I was still an anonymous blogger and was terrified to have myself outed so publicly. I ended up with my anonymity intact, but I had dreams that I legally changed my name to Schmutzie Pickles while wearing a big, red clown nose.

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I had no idea that clearing out my inbox would free up so much of my energy or that it would be such a This Is Your Life type of experience, but it was, so take a few hours and give your life a good digital clearing. You might be surprised at what you find.

I Have No More Faith In Blogging Than I Do A Hammer. Blogging Is A Vehicle. It Is A How.

I've been going through my email inbox, and I mean really going through it back to emails I haven't cleared out since 2007, and, while I've been weeding through hundreds of bits of digital detritus, I've come across some really interesting bits and pieces of my life from the last handful of years.


I took this photo during a Pathfinders session at BlogHer '11 in San Diego.

One e-mail from June 2010 stands out for me, in particular, because it reminds me about why I'm here in the blogging arena and why I still love what I do. I've chosen to remove the author's name and tell-tale details to preserve confidentiality:

Okay, girl. I need to ask you. Where does your faith in blogging come from? I can't seem to muster it... I spend hours trolling online for amazing writing, and I rarely find it. Yet, people will share and discuss and comment and promote pieces that are really poorly written just because someone discloses something taboo or irreverent. It's like we applaud mediocrity all the time online. Now, don't get me wrong there are pockets of brilliance, you, kate, maggie, xtx, conscienceround, bhj, and a bunch of other. But, I see a lot of branding and bravado. The worst part, when you criticize any of it people just assume you are jealous or fearful. It makes me crazy. I don't know. I want to see the good in it. But, everywhere I turn people just seem to be following each other blindly without thought. It feels so obvious and at times desperate. I just want to write. I just want to participate in communities where people really love the written word. I don't feel that online. Maybe, it's me. Maybe it is all my own fault. I don't know.

Why do you love it? Don't you ever shake your head at any of it?

Here is my unedited reply:

You know what? I see inauthenticity at every I turn, too. It's bound to happen. Just look out at the world. People can be really lame, and they are, all the time. People often rise to meet only the lowest bar required to show signs of success.

It's like with children. Their answers to questions usually meet their perceived needs of the question. If you ask them how fast a car was going when it bumped the other car, they will say that it was going pretty fast. If you ask them how fast the car was going when it smashed really hard into that other speeding car, they will jump around and tell you about flying shrapnel. I think we are doing the same with success as bloggers. Most of us are merely meeting the perceived requirements of the question and not pushing ourselves further than the needs of that question or even questioning the question itself.

There is bound to be a lot of laziness, hard work, hacks, shining talents, inauthentic dweebs, and people who put their heart and soul into it, but I would never look at blogging as a whole and then say I don't feel love of the written word there or originality or thoughtfulness. I can't take any book off a bookstore shelf and say that the writing in it is even decent. I cannot look at the human race and say I say I see humanity in all of it, but here we are, and we still try to tease out the bits of us that work on this planet. That's what I try to do sometimes with stuff like Grace In Small Things to help people remember to stop being awful and this thing to try to introduce some thoughtfulness to our blogging.

One big problem with blogging is that we can drop in and find it rife with douchebags any day of the week, but that is generally the problem with life outside the internet, too. I try to avoid the douchebags and focus on those who further themselves and their craft. It's not about putting blinders on and more like learning to live on the internet the way I live out in the real world where people are just as brilliant and awful. I choose who I'll hang out with, where I want to go, how I want to present myself, and who I'll invest my care and time into.

I have no more faith in blogging than I have faith in a hammer or a car's engine. Blogging is a vehicle. I do have faith, though, at least to a certain extent, in myself and some of those I find here. I have faith in certain individuals and individual talent. Blogging, though? That's just the how.

So, why do I love it? Because I love how I do it and some others that I've found. Do I ever shake my head at any of it? Hells yeah.