I said I'd be honest with you guys about my attempt to ignore my inbox for one week. It was hard! Harder than I thought it would be, because even if I didn't check my emails it didn't stop me from seeing exactly how many emails I had waiting for me. My mind starting playing tricks on me, saying things like, "What if one of those emails is from that agent who has your full?"Or, "What if 7 of those emails are from agents who want a full?" Yes, they could wait a week to get my manuscript. No harm no foul, but tell that to all the synapses in my brain firing off all those warnings.
"Check the email, check the email, check the email," they chanted in my brain like a crowd holding picket signs.
I had to do it. So, at exactly 9:13pm on Tuesday June 7th, I check my emails. And wouldn't you know, not one was from an agent. Not even a rejection. * le sigh *
Operation Ignore Inbox has taught me something, though. I can go all day without checking my emails and nothing bad happens. I might be a bit distracted, but come on, I'm always distracted writing in my head while I'm working, so what's the difference?
My biggest problem was, I didn't think this through. I'm waist deep in query hell, and for the month of June I said I'd send out one query a day. Well, I can't really do that if I'm not opening that email account, can I? So I had to weigh the options.
Ignore emails, or send out query? *taps chin while contemplating for a nano second*
Sending out queries won. Duh.
Perhaps in July, I'll revisit Operation Ignore Inbox. It's a worthwhile goal for me to have, ignoring my emails within a reasonable amount of time.
So, we shall see how I manage. Hope you all aren't too disappointed in me. :-(
9 comments:
When I had an agent reviewing my full...I was pathetically obsessive.
Which ended badly, because she ended up not even sending me a rejection. Haha. Best of luck to you. :)
Thanks Elfarmy, I'm trying to be less obsessive and more productive. It's a work in progress.
Maybe you could limit yourself to only checking once a day? ;)
Okay, I didn't say this last time, because I wasn't sure if I ever told you this via email, but I purposely ignored my gmail account (not my main hotmail account, and this was before I had them linked so I could check gmail via hotmail) over Labor Day weekend after I'd sent a revision to an agent. I figured she'd be at an awesome Labor Day party NOT thinking about my book.
Well, wouldn't you know it, she got back to me the Sunday before Labor Day. With an offer of representation. And I didn't check my gmail until Tuesday morning. The only time I went longer than 12 hours without checking my gmail.
True story. Here's hoping your next email is from an agent. With good news for you and Platinum Diaries!
*fingers crossed*
My phone chirps every time I get a new email. So technically I'm not checking it. I can't help it if my phone keeps bugging me to check it. ;)
Happy querying! I'm there too and it's no fun.
YAY, Karen! Glad you're sending out queries. Good luck! Nothing wrong with checking your inbox once a day, eh?
That's about what I do. May not answer or deal with them all immediately, but it's good to see who's writing to you. I've gone as long as 12 days without checking email while on vacation with no internet access. But I'm afraid those days are gone, now that I have a smart phone!
Wow! I give you so much credit for even trying something like that! I cannot function if i do not check my email several times a day.
Tere! No, you never told me that. Thanks for telling me after, or I wouldn't have lasted 15 hours. But that is awesome. I'd love to have that waiting for me after a few days away from my email.
Karen, I know the feeling. The phone is asking you to check it. It would be rude to ignore it, right?
Thanks, Joanne. I have a love/hate relationship with queries, but I'm glad to have somethning ready to query.And I'm working on checking my emails once a day. Thanks again.
Thanks Stephanie! It's a work in progress for me. I checked my email as soon as I woke up and was happy to see I had a request send at 2:36am! I'll be able to go the rest of the day without checking my emails. LOL.
Hey Karen,
This is Tammy (Callie/Zellie's friend from Chimera Critiques). I have been out of the blogging world for quite a while. It was just taking too much of my time, and I needed to focus on finishing my book. Anyway, I finally did that, and I've been slowly getting caught up on people's blogs again.
I came over here and saw that you are querying. Congrats. We happen to be querying at exactly the same time, so I know what you are going through. It's tough! I just wanted to wish you luck. I really hope you land an agent. I'm following your blog under tamaradw now. After two years of being in the blogger world under Callie, something happened recently to make me rethink my decision to write under a pen name. I'm still debating.
Anyway,I really just wanted to say that my fingers are crossed for you :)Keep us all updated...
Dude, I check my inbox 39485 times a day. Matter of fact, I just now switched tabs and hit refresh. It's a sickness.
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