Bonus: Managing Email Stress and Supporting Kids' Attentional Well-Being with Gloria Mark

Email Stress

Gloria Mark highlights the emotional toll that emails can have on individuals, noting that they often lead to stress and negativity. She explains that emails add an extra layer of workload, contributing to feelings of exhaustion, especially among professionals like physicians who already have demanding schedules 1. The unequal benefits of email, where the sender gains more than the receiver, exacerbate this stress. Gloria points out that email has become a symbol of work, further impacting our emotional state.

One of the most robust research findings that we've found is that email creates stress and not surprisingly, email puts people in a bad mood.

--- Gloria Mark

The habit of checking emails, driven by intermittent reinforcement, keeps people engaged despite the negative impact 1.

   

Managing Overload

Managing email overload is crucial for maintaining a healthy work-life balance. Christy Harrison and Gloria discuss strategies to reclaim attention from email, emphasizing the importance of setting boundaries to prevent burnout 2. Christy shares her personal experience of feeling beholden to email due to her business, despite having an assistant to manage routine tasks. This highlights the challenge of balancing the potential opportunities and urgent issues that emails can bring.

I feel very beholden to email. And even though I have an admin assistant who answers all the like over the transom stuff that comes in, there's still people who find me randomly and find my email address.

--- Christy Harrison

Gloria suggests that being "always on" in a workplace can make individuals vulnerable to burnout, underscoring the need for effective email management strategies 2.