Within the Inbox I have four folders: ToDo, FollowUp, Interesting, and Registrations. My main Inbox gets sorted continuously during the day to one of these four folders. More often than not, the emails sorted to FollowUp and Interesting get trashed down the road. The Registrations folder is for all of these confirmations you get when you sign up for stuff on the internet. I weed through it occasionally - usually surprising myself at the number of applications and groups I belong to.
The key to making this work is to sort and then do - your main Inbox should always be empty. Don't spend time acting on any of the emails when sorting.
Additionally - remember that, with most email applications, dumping stuff in the Trash doesn't mean it is gone. I have a rule that permanently deletes items from my Trash when they are six months old - that way, I feel free to delete things. If I find out I needed an email - I have plenty of time to rescue it, but 99% of the time it just goes into oblivion.
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