You raise a useful tip for self-discipline on tackling something. Would be interested to learn how you manage such discipline issues when it comes time to tackle those unpleasant tasks and suddenly some coffee, other sorting or heading out for some quick grocery shopping just seems to much more appealing?

An approach that also works well for me – never empty your deleted items – rather setup an autoarchive rule (if applicable) to move these all to a single folder somewhere. Knowing that you could “refer” back to an email (even though you know you never will!) makes pressing that Delete button easier – and you’re therefore more likely to press it when you should!

You seem to have another practice relating to tasks lists already worked out – looking forward to reading about it sometime!