Please Don't Jump to Conclusions

Before you hit that Reply button and start typing a cryptic emotional response that you may later regret, sit back and reread the e-mail you are responding to carefully and take its intent in it's entirety. If you react emotionally to only a portion of an e-mail without looking at the message as a whole, you can many times take the sender's meaning out of context.

The last thing you want to do is send off a reply that is filled with accusations (and the formatting to back up your intent) when, if you would have reread the e-mail, and took it at it's face value, you could have saved yourself embarrassment. Make sure you are not reading anything into the e-mail that isn't there!

I see this happen every day. "I thought that they meant...." when in fact the e-mail in question did not indicate anything to that effect. The person was reading more into the typed words than was actually there (or didn't take the time to read the e-mail in its entirety). More times than not, if you take something personally that is not meant as such, it is because you chose to do so.

Take the sender's words at their face value and don't assume anything that isn't there. If you still feel upset, take the time to ask if how you perceived their words is what they meant before you fly off the handle. You will find you avoid hurt feelings and misunderstandings by asking instead of reacting!