what we have..is a failure to communicate

email - gotta love it, right?  it's become our primary form of communication.  there's a problem.  email doesn't let you hear emotion in the sender's voice - often there's no inflection in what's been written, so you really are at a loss as to how to interpret what is being said unless you know the sender very well.

we have become so dependent upon this form of communication, yet most don't have a clue how to properly use the medium.  they don't carefully choose their words to convey the correct meaning, no, instead they spew whatever words come forth from their meager vocabularies and don't even think about the ramifications of their impact on the other party without the benefit of inflection or emotion.  this can and often does have devastating results.

at least when we speak with someone face to face or even on the phone or chat on the internet, we have the benefit of seeing their face and or hearing the inflection of their voice and can often tell if they are joking, smiling, laughing, angry, sad, etc.   with email we get none of that.

communication is the bedrock of every relationship - friend, lover, work, person you meet on the street, customer -  essentially, every interaction you have with another human being requires communication of some sort.  it is far too important to leave to chance or guesswork by the other when you create an email.  take the time to think about what you want to convey with your words and then put it down.  yes, it may take a few extra seconds, but those few extra seconds may make the difference between understanding and misunderstanding and save a lot of heartache in the end.