This morning I was reading the AM news feed from Inman News.   Inman is the leading source of independent real estate news, information, advice, research, opinion and commentary for industry professionals and consumers alike.   
One of the articles profiled a presentation by Merlin Mann, who is a writer and web personality.  The title was "Inbox Zero" , which immediately caught my attention. 
He was discussing specifically how overwhelmed we get with email.  Not only how overwhelmed we get, but specifically how we focus our attention...is it on the stuff that matters? 

Nowadays, he said, the flow of messages can be overwhelming. And that holds true for real estate professionals, who can be in constant communication with clients and other business contacts via phone or e-mail.
"There is a huge disparity in the number of requests that you will receive for your time and attention today and the amount of time you have to respond to that. I believe more than ever in 2008 that you've got to have some kind of system," he said, to manage the in-box influx.
And it's important not to treat your e-mail as a "place to hang out," he said. "It's not like your local bar. It's a place to get into and out of as quickly as possible."  (I especially loved this line!)

It almost makes us long for the days our snail-mail box was stuffed.  At least with snail mail, each day there was a specific time of day it arrived, and once it arrived, it didn't keep coming.  There was a usual time of day we opened, discarded, kept or filed it away, usually after we arrived home from work.  After going through the exercise, we went about our business and didn't dwell on it, until the next day when we went through the same exercise.

Mann suggests five ways to process incoming e-mail: Delete, delegate, respond, defer or do.  I love it ... a plan of action.  That is something I can live with.

Interestingly, (or not, depending on how you view the plan of action the Universe puts out to us each day), a little later this morning, I received a blog notice (via email) that had been posted on the ACRE (Accredited Consultant in Real Estate) website.  You may know from reading past posts of mine that I have this accreditation. 
Anyway, that post came about due to someone missing an email about an important call she wanted to attend.  My friend (and ACRE founder) Mollie Wasserman gave some very thought-provoking words to ponder about the differences between what is "important" vs. what is "urgent". 
So many times, it's easy enough to get so caught up in what we view as "urgent" (i.e. what causes us to put out fires) and end up missing what is "important".  

I hope you end up having a fine day filled with "important" stuff!