If only “online” could be separated from “real world”!

Drudge links an interesting study about being constantly online and the development of mental disorders:

“Demands for availability originated not only from work and the social network, but also from the individual’s own ambitions or desires. This resulted in disturbances when busy or resting, the feeling of never being free, and difficulties separating work and private life,” Thomee explained in the study. “Unreturned calls or messages led to overload and feelings of guilt.”

An online media consultant complains that he dreads email, saying “somewhere along the line I’ve allowed my emotions to become to connected to that little red alert.”

Does that mean a sociopath would fare better online?

No matter how busy I get, I still try to squeeze in a blog post a day, and I can do this by treating it the way I treat exercise. (A daily habit that must be accommodated.) So the blog does not make me feel like a nutcase.  (In fact, I rather appreciate the way I can use it as a healthy alternative to the real world….)

My worst problem is email because I cannot control it. It can get really, really bad. Especially the constant nagging demands that I do actual things in the real world (especially involving local politics) that I simply do not have time to do. I hate saying no to people, so I have come to dread the nagging emails like the plague. Unfortunately, ignoring them does not make them go away. They pour in constantly.

And because they are from well-meaning activists who want to save the country and genuinely believe they are doing so, the emails often scold.

The problem with saying no is that I feel like a flake and that makes me feel guilty. The problem with not saying no is that I feel just as guilty. The problem with saying yes is that I feel resentful if I comply, and even more guilty if I do not.

Absent a power failure, I see no way out of the email quagmire.  To attribute the problem to being “online” is like blaming the mailman for the mail, or a telephone company for cell phone calls.

UPDATE: Right now my email is down. Praise the Lord!