delete your e-goo

Delete, unsubscribe, remove, cancel; these are a few of my favorite things. Lately I have been a huge advocate of the frequent use of these powerful tools:

• Checking myspace.com once every 3 months? Delete!
  
• Getting newsletters you don't read? Unsubscribe!
• Subscribed to a blogger that doesn’t blog or worse, blogs about irrelevant topics? Remove!
• Using, or rather not using a SaaS (Software as a Service) that you’re paying for? Cancel!

The Internet is a wonderful resource and can provide loads of value to our lives. But its use tends to fill up our cups everyday with e-goo that, in the end, provide little or no value. It took me a long time to become a fan for the delete. With time (or lack there of), I began to notice that I was wading through useless emails, having accounts with useless websites, and not reading blogs I subscribed to. From this, my passion for eliminating the unnecessary was born.

Is it really that hard to remove the e-goo from our lives that does not provide us with value? On second thought, e-goo with no value can be easy to delete, but it is that stuff that has just enough value, even a small amount, that can be the problem.

Consider Pareto’s 80/20 Principle. You use 20% of your e-stuff, 80% of the time or 20% of your e-stuff makes up for 80% of the total value. Would I be able to find this website again without bookmarking it if I needed to? Yes. Ok then don’t save it. The more you wade through your own e-goo, consider how much time it sucks out of your day. Whether it’s 2 hours for 40 emails or 2 seconds to find that bookmark amongst the thousand, it all takes time, your time, and that is something that you cannot get back.

So what are you waiting for? Get out there and flex those delete muscles, throw out that old pair of shoes, and take back your time. Value your time, and use delete as daily practice.

The e-life can keep you connected and enhance your life, or it can drown your time and attention in a cesspool of digital e-goo. Your choice...