Years ago, I remember spending the weekend working just as hard as I did during the week. As a business owner, you want to give it your all, but you soon find out that you’re only human. If you find yourself in that spot, then I give you permission to stop everything regardless of where you are and spend only one hour today and tomorrow (Saturday and Sunday) sorting, deleting and otherwise clearing out your email account.

Why? Well, it’s about putting yourself in a position of power instead of being a slave to the whims of others. It’s also a good opportunity to use the time to unsubscribe from any email campaigns that you’re receiving that is no longer of use to you or haven’t looked at since signing up.

By creating a daily scan and a VIP category to help streamline your inbox, you’ll be surprised at how freeing your mental space will become. Email takes up a huge chunk of time and can zap your mental energy, so if you’ve sorted it out beforehand to the point where only the important emails pop up and you schedule a time to sift through the skim category, then you are ahead of the game. You will find yourself more productive throughout the day because you are no longer a slave to the constant distractions and interruptions that email causes. It also frees you up visually because your inbox is not a mishmash of clutter.

To maintain this new level of productivity, make it a habit to only check your email twice a day. I do a quick view first thing in the morning to make sure there aren’t any fires burning, but I only answer in the afternoon. This allows me the freedom to manage the responses and avoid the constant interruptions when I answer earlier in the day. It has been my experience since doing so that the number of “emergencies” have dwindled to none, and it has trained my clients to plan better before dropping those “you have to drop everything and help me right now”