amyjogarner.org

Over the years, I’ve moved from dial-up, to DSL, to Cable Broadband, and have recently cut the cords and gone strictly wireless with my Sprint Mobile Broadband modem. I’ve also gone from Yahoo! Mail, to MS Outlook, to Mozilla Thunderbird, to Google Mail. And I’ve gone from Internet Explorer, to Mozilla Firefox, to Google Chrome. Lately, I’ve been moving all of my contacts to Google Contacts and am keeping my schedule in my Google Calendar. I cut the cord on my landline years ago and have had a Sprint cell phone and used a voicemail service ever since. This month I got a Google Voice account and now have a local voicemail number, so I nixed the voicemail service.

You could say that Google is my go-to service. And it works seamlessly with my Sprint service. My voicemail, contacts, calendar, and email are all accessible from my Samsung Reclaim. You might even say that I am gaga over Google.

This morning I finished reading Leo Babauta’s The Power of Less: The Fine Art of Limiting Yourself to the Essential…in Business and in Life. The book has much to offer, especially for those who feel overwhelmed by the constant demands on their time. I am puzzled by how the inside flap compares it to The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich. Ferris’s book was one of the most arrogant, self-important works with little application to the average American that I’ve come across in a long time. Babauta, on the other hand, has written a thoughtful, easy-to-read commentary full of ideas that nearly anyone could put into action in their own lives.

His ideas on taming the email/IM/social networking beast are probably the most useful ideas he puts forth. He recommends consolidating the number of inboxes you’re checking, limiting the number of times email is checked each day, reducing the amount of email you receive, clearing out the inbox each day, writing shorter email answers and only answering an email if absolutely necessary.

Babauta also has good ideas on setting goals and defining projects and tasks. His idea is that we limit ourselves to attacking one goal at a time and break it down into small, highly manageable projects and tasks.

I must part ways with him a bit on the filing and decluttering chapters. Maybe it was just me, but I started to get a serious control freak vibe from him as the book went on. I kept wondering how his wife and 6 children function in Babauta’s minimalist, everything-out-of-sight world. Let’s just say if he and I both signed up on eHarmony, there would be a 0% chance of getting matched.

This is a short book and is worth a read to get some ideas on simplifying, scaling back, and really enjoying life.