Microprocessing

What a Compulsive Email Habit Does to Your Mind and Relationships

Workaholism is just the start

Photo by Tayler Smith; Prop Styling by Caroline Dorn

Every morning when I wake up, I roll over and check my email.

Usually there’s nothing that can’t wait: some press releases about new studies, the occasional email from an editor, and plenty of spam. The checking is a compulsion I’ve adopted in the past several years — one that only adds to my already significant anxiety, with few upsides (if any).

It is, in effect, making me something of a workaholic, or someone who is driven to work “excessively and compulsively,” according to psychologists at Norway’s University of Bergen.

Despite making attempts to create emotional boundaries between myself and my work, including quitting my full-time job last year to go freelance, the habit creeps back in. Nothing can erase the fact that I work in a culture that dictates that I’m always on, always connected, and always available. My entire life is inundated, in one way or another, with work. And it’s exhausting.

For millions of people, specifically white-collar American workers who spend their days tethered to a desk, workaholism is activated, in part, by the expectation from managers that employees constantly check and respond to email. This…