Turn off your smartphone’s email notification feature and discover enlightenment.

For years I’ve been glued to a mobile device. I got my first cellphone in 1995, before I was in high school. After circumventing my mothers opposition to such an idea, I got a job and the mobile store. Having a cool new gadget that let me keep in touch with my friends, at the same time, was too good to be true. In 2003 I jumped on the BlackBerry bandwagon, before the days of the expected instant email reply. The thing looked like a video game with a pager built in.

So the addiction started young. I was even scared to migrate to the iPhone because I didn’t think I could live without the instant email.

Two months ago that all changed. Emails’ constant push against my normal life caused me to hit a wall. I had to make a change.

I hit rock bottom while enjoying a few after work pints with friends at the neighborhood pup. I subconsciously and instinctively checked my email. It was nothing special, just your average overly emotional message from an overly emotional business connection. Yet, it was all but instinct for me to go into response mode. How do I put this fire out? What’s the best time to send a response.. etc, etc…

It was not till later that evening, in a burst of post happy hour genius, that I realized even having read that email was pointless. I’m not managing a presidential campaign, Matt Lauer won’t be asking me questions in the morning. Merely wasting the brain power to read that email, let alone think about it while I should be relaxing and focusing on having some downtime was horrendous.

Later that evening it all came to me, the obvious, that this instinct to check email, to stay on top of things, was causing me to do anything but. In a fit of frustration I turned my iPhone’s notification sound off and sent the thing to only check email every hour. Aside from having a battery that lasted through noon I slowly began to work away from my addiction. I didn’t have that worry of what was happening with work, when I wasn’t working.

Effectiveness is not constant, it comes in bursts. I don’t think they are completely controllable. But, if you no longer realize that your A-game is won’t happen all the time, you will lose understanding of where the bar is. You can train yourself for instinct, how to defend yourself, how to respond to a crisis. You can’t have your creative, business best all the time, and all to often that is what email is about.

So, stop, slow down. Check the email twice a day, not constantly and I think you will see that you ability to convey your thoughts goes up.