I would get to work and rather than write the report, which was clearly the most important thing for me to do, I’d check my email. If there was anyth… - Shane Parrish

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I would get to work and rather than write the report, which was clearly the most important thing for me to do, I’d check my email. If there was anything in my inbox that required even a modicum of attention, I’d tell myself I needed to do that before starting on the report. And, of course, by the time I was done with that first email, more had come in that needed attention. It didn’t take much to convince myself I needed to do that before I started. Only near the end of the workday would I finally sit down to write the report, mentally exhausted. When you step back and think about it for a second, I was giving one of the most important things I wanted to do the worst of myself. Email, which I dread on the best of days, was getting my most energetic and creative self. Many of us do this with our partners too. By the time everything we need to do over the course of a long day is finished, we’re exhausted. And this is the time we give to our spouse, the most important person in our lives!