A scenario happened to me that is all too familiar — I tried to find an email and realized that my inbox was too clunky and it was a futile attempt. This was not the first time or a new thing to happen, but the timing did happen to be at the end of an already frustrating year. Therefore, it led me to declare publically that I was going to Do Something About It.
I think in honor 2020 being a shit year & my progress with treating my OCD/OCPD (which hoarding is a symptom)...
— Alyssa Feola (@its_a_lisa) December 31, 2020
... I am going to declare 'Mailbox Zero' with physical and virtual mail. pic.twitter.com/uF1f5ktQPw
So, now I had to put my money where my mouth was … and do it!
This blog is going to document the journey I went on to turn this declaration into a reality. It is going to be a two-part blog because 99% of my physical mail is located offsite. After all, my hoarding of it became so bad.
Background
The problem:
- Too many email addresses.
- Just a collection of junk emails.
- Increased attack vector.
- Hard to find the emails that really mattered.
What I’m looking to achieve:
- Get rid of all of my current emails.
- Have a backup of the emails.
- A system to not let this happen going forward.
The process
-
Use Google Takeout to export the data
- Wait 3 days
- Validate the data exported properly by importing it locally using Thunderbird
- Delete all mail from inbox
- Unsubscribing from services
- Setting up OOO and mail forwarding for old email addresses