The Feng Shui of Email Clutter

By Stuart Brown
StudentAffairs.com
stuart@studentaffairs.com

Posted: March, 2005     Student Affairs Online, vol. 6 no. 1 - Winter 2005

I have a friend who visibly squirms in her seat when the subject of email clutter is broached. The hundreds (or is it thousands) of electronic correspondence residing within her various email files are sacrosanct. Removing any of them to the oblivion of the Ethernet would be an unthinkable act.

But, according to Karen Kingston (1999), author of the book, Clear Your Clutter With Feng Shui, clutter is an "obstacle to the flow of [positive] energy…For your life to work well it is vital to have a good flow of life force energy…" (p. 5). Crammed email folders the root of all that is bad in the world? Not quite, but Kingston presents some interesting arguments for uncluttering our lives or in this case, emails.

Think about her definition of clutter as it might relate to electronic missives: "Clutter creates an obstacle to the smooth flow of energy and space. This in turn creates "stuckness and/or confusion in the lives of occupants" (p. 8). How often do we logon to our computers each morning, feeling the dread of what lurks in our email in-basket? The voluminous number of messages can cause a deep throbbing in our heads as we slump back in our chair, ready to raise the white flag in defeat. Read now or wait? Delete old correspondence or save? We become trapped. The clutter "slowly, insidiously, grows and grows-and so does the stagnate energy around it" (p. 11).

The "stagnate energy" to which Kingston keeps referring can be the root of many evils. Here are just a few maladies caused by clutter:

So, how do we remove the obstacles to "the harmonious flow of energy?" Do we boycott our email? Hire a work-study student to respond, file and delete our messages? Chuck the PC out the nearest window?

There are three less impulsive strategies individuals can utilize to make our existence more in tune to the rhythms of the universe:

  1. Pull the plug on unused email. If you haven't referred to those messages in over a year chances are you never will. Delete. Delete. Delete. Keep what you need. Kingston states: "Things that are loved, used and appreciated have strong, vibrant, joyous energies around them" (p. 17).
  2. Clean up after yourself. File emails into folders. Disorganization "creates stress and confusion in your life, rather than the peace and clarity that comes from knowing where things are" (p. 19).
  3. Don't put off today… Take a few minutes at the beginning and/or end of the day to address clutter. Remember, Rome wasn't built in a day. It took God six days to create the world. Think tortoise, not hare.

By dealing with, rather than avoiding, clutter clearing techniques we can march forward in our personal and professional lives. Now, worry-free, the tendency, according to the author, to "feel bogged down with problems" and "blaming the past for our current situation" (p. 23) will appear as insignificant as a deleted piece of spam.

References
Kingston, K. (1999). Clear Your Clutter With Feng Shui. New York: Broadway.