Reality Check

Short Version

Modern life in 2026 feels like permanent backlog.

Unread emails.
Unedited photos.
Unfinished projects.
AI tools multiplying faster than we can implement.

All that deleting, so much deleting, we know we need to do it - but when - easier to upgrade our cloud to 1TB, or 2.

The problem is no longer access to information or productivity tools.

The problem is filtration and storage.

There is no real “catching up” anymore once certain categories fall behind.
Only prioritizing, deleting, segmenting, and moving forward as best you can.

The people who thrive over the next decade will not be the people doing everything.

They will be the people deciding what to let go of altogether.
What are you letting go of?


Long Version

I'm writing to you this weekend from Whistler BC, where I parked myself a week ago with the intention to lay down 4,000 words per day on a very specific project, while also popping up the mountain for some Spring skiing in the afternoons.

The week has not gone to plan.
At all.

Today is day 6.

I should have 24,000 words locked and ready for a final edit.
I do not.

Not even close.

I should have 100,000ft plus of vertical skied as well.
I do not.

Not even close.

I should be having a 'first class experience' given my hotel of choice for this trip.
I am not, it's a 'shoulder season' issue. IYKYK.

And today, due to a technical issue with my backpack, I lost my insta360 camera.

The loss of the hardware doesn't matter.

But the memory card, the memories, the footage...
A really cool day’s worth.
Also the entire ski season, some epic shots.
Also my Tokyo trip last August - 6 days of amazing-ness.
And...
And...
And...

Those giant memory cards made me lazy for sure.

The amount of digital debris we are all accumulating is wild.

Never mind tech debt.

How about:

Download-from-device debt
Social-Media-sharing-debt
Upload-to-cloud debt
Editing footage debt

Inbox debt
Text debt
DM debt... so many DM's - (sorry)

Deletion debt.

I'm not sure about you, but the pace of digital accumulation is accelerating way past what I can realistically manage in a day, or a week, or probably even a full month off of all other tasks.

If I treated cleaning up my:

Photos - 61,665 items
Inbox - 1,435 unread plus another 3,773 still sitting there because I need to reread or action them
Voicemails - 1,246
Purchased and as-yet un-'read' audiobooks - 115

...like a full-time job?

I would need a year to address it all.
A year where nothing new comes in.

And that is never going to happen.

And each year moving forward, there will only be MORE content coming at each of us.
More volume, higher resolution, more more more - than there was the year before.

(that m-dash above, and the one in this sentence... my own - sigh!)

Mortgage Life

You now need more conversations to get the same number of applications as three years ago.

You need more applications to close the same number of files as three years ago.

More credit pulls.
More docs reviewed, and stored for 7 years minimum (technically forever actually)
More AML checks.

Nothing will get easier.

The banks undercutting you by 50bps?
That dates back to 2023.
And it will not be changing anytime soon.

AI?

AI is not going to eliminate you.
But, most of you who are leaning in are realizing that it's not saving you (yet?) either.

AI is overwhelming many of us with a dozen new to-do's each week.

AI is making most of our lives that much more cluttered and less streamlined, because there is now so much more to learn, create, build, apply, iterate, modify, clear with compliance, share, discuss, and execute on.

Do I use AI to fix bad photos?
I do.

And now, despite the 61,000, I wish I'd stopped deleting mediocre pictures years earlier than I did.

Do I use AI to help plow through the dozens of informative emails I receive daily?
I do.

Do I use AI to help research chapters, blog posts, and presentation content?
Absolutely.

And do I feel like my days are lighter and less cluttered?
No.

Are presentations built faster?
No.
Not the ones I actually want to deliver.

I still average 10-20 hours of prep for every one hour of content.

Are blogs posted faster?
No.

Although the typos are now 99.99% gone.

So what is the point of this long-ass post you just read with your human brain?

The point is this:

There's no catching up anymore once you fall behind in certain categories.
There just isn't

Welcome to May of 2026.

If you're where I'm at, I think we just have to accept this new reality and move forward accordingly.

Prioritize.
Segment.
Delete.
Let some things go unfinished forever.

Will I ever buy a massive memory card for a camera again?
No.

I will buy several smaller ones.
I will clear them after each adventure.
Or I will physically store them somewhere safe.

Because maybe the lesson here is that limitations were never the enemy.

Maybe unlimited storage, unlimited inputs, unlimited options, and unlimited accumulation are the real problem.

And unlimited data creation, along with unlimited data curation, filtration, and summation?
Not really the solution.

The future probably does not belong to the people who try to keep everything.

It belongs to the people who finally learn what to let go of.

And maybe this... literally a realization as I type these words attached to my third editing pass... maybe this is why we hear about these early AI insiders, the AI engineers, unplugging and walking off into the woods to grown their own food and live off the grid.

Maybe there's a breaking point.
And we simply tap out and walk away from all of it.

Maybe if I had AI stock options I would.
I do not.

I am in it with you for at least another decade.

And what a decade it is going to be.

Next week - some interesting data... no really... I'm writing the piece tonight... just filtering a stack of data through AI first (about 150,000 words dumped in so far).

Stay tuned.
Or unplug.

I get it either way.

DW