The Arena Newsletter: Issue 35

The Arena Newsletter

Issue 35 | January 21, 2021

“I like pens. My writing is so amazing there's never a need to erase.” — Todd Barry

New Year, New Inbox

As we find ourselves now solidly into the new year, this feels like a good opportunity to remind everyone that if you have an inbox overflowing with unread emails from last year, it's time to declare email bankruptcy. For all those unread messages, create a folder in your inbox and move them all so that you can officially start this year fresh. This way, you still have the email in case you need it; chances are, you won't.

New Year, New Review

While we're fully on board as more and more people forgo "New Year's Resolutions," we do recommend taking a look at your work habits to see what - if anything - needs some tweaking. For a small addition to your week with a big impact, we recommend the Weekly Review from David Allen. Quick, effective, and it can be done on any day at any time. Added bonus: There's a pre-built checklist waiting for you in Arena when you're ready.

New Year, New Process

As you settle into your new routine of the Weekly Review, work on adding one more step into it: Deleting. That's right. Deleting. Go through your to-do list and see if there's anything on there that doesn't need to be. And then? Yes. Delete it! Initially, you may feel a bit odd about it, but after a while, you'll realize that you were wasting time and energy worrying about the things you didn't need to do.

We tend to assign the notion of "starting new" or "starting fresh" with the beginning of the year (or month or week), but really you can do this at any time. Even the third Thursday of the month, if you so choose.