_posts/2018-01-26-how-to-use-your-task-manager-to-process-email--the-sweet-setup.markdown
---
title: How to Use Your Task Manager to Process Email | The Sweet Setup
date: 2018-01-26 10:28:00 -06:00
tags:
- productivity
- work life
link_url: https://thesweetsetup.com/use-task-manager-process-email/
---
Bradley Chambers on *The Sweet Setup*:
> The principal of GTD that has helped me the most is not treating my email inbox as a to-do list. In October of last year, I took a much needed week off from work for my ten-year anniversary. My wife and I spent a week in Belize with some friends of ours. As emails arrived that needed to be handled upon my return, I directly forwarded them to my task manager. On Sunday night before I returned to work, I sat down with my task inbox, processed them (more on that later), and felt entirely in control the next day at work.
Bradley details a pretty great setup to get emails out your inbox and instead prioritize those tasks somewhere else. I have the bad habit of leaving emails unattended that I know need some type of action, but can't respond right away for whatever reason. If you're like me, it's incredibly bothersome to see your email app full of stuff you can't take care of.
Now that I'm using [Things 3](https://culturedcode.com/things/), I decided to follow Bradley's recommendation, and use the "Mail to Things" feature. After trying it for the first time last night with an email I need to respond to, I'm impressed. This may be yet another key to a saner work life.