Simple ways to reduce the overwhelm…
When I think about it, clutter in technology is not that different from clutter at home. The more disorganized I get, the more overwhelmed I feel and the more frustrating technology becomes to me.
It seems to me that it doesn’t take long for my devices to be full of unused apps. Photos, files and emails are bunched up without order or a system, in various places. Once I feel lost, I feel the need to do a clean up — here are the steps I took to get there.
Tidying up my inbox
Like most of us, I’m guilty of maintaining thousands of emails in my inbox. The issue is my inbox is not a storage bin . I had to learn to treat it like my mailbox at home. It should only have the new mail that hasn’t been opened or processed.
The best way to do keep the inbox from overflowing is to empty it every day. I had to make it a habit. The best way is to review each email and either respond to it, delete it, or move it to a designated folder for future reference.
Email providers give the option to create folders to help keep our space organized. I decided to use this feature and create folders by a person’s name, a topic or an entity.
Since my inbox was already overflowing, I started the clean-up process by bulk deleting emails, especially junk and take control of the email situation. There is also an option to remove all emails at once. This helped me to get back to zero, or at least a manageable number. I also searched the inbox by a sender’s name, and then deleted or but the bunch in a folder.
When I decided to devote half an hour a week to the cleaning up process, I managed to stay out of overwhelm.
Training the Spam Filter
These days junk mail is unavoidable. The spam filter can catch a lot of the garbage so I don’t have to deal with it. However, to get the most of the spam filter, I had to train it by marking it as junk instead of just deleting it. I’ve also gotten into the habit of checking my junk/spam folder once a week to make sure relevant emails are not accidentally caught by the spam filter.
Once I cleaned up my junk email, I started unsubscribing as new unwanted emails came in.
Photo Management
One of my favorite benefits of having a smartphone is that I have a camera everywhere I go, so I don’t miss out on life’s best moments. The downside is that I have photos of every moment and I have multiple shots of the same thing to make sure I got the perfect one. I use a few different methods to keep my photos organized. I take some time after a vacation, or as I’m flying back from a vacation or special event, to go through the photos and delete all except the best images that I want to keep.
There are special recognition filters that makes organizing photos easier. With Apple or Google Photos and multiple other apps, I can assign faces to named people. Photos are automatically sorted into albums by names. All it takes is a little time to get it organized and set up.
Fortunately, cloud storage has gotten very affordable and easy to use. I’ve learned it’s best to back-up my photos to a cloud service in case something happens to my device.
File Organization is Key
My main objective in organizing my digital life is being able to retrieve things when I need them so organization is vital to file management. The search function on my device and computer can be handy to find files, but I can’t just rely on that. I had to set up some critical systems to make my digital life more functional:
- I set up a naming method for my files that is detailed and consistent
- I used dates and keywords in file names
- I created folder structures for high-level categories such as finances, home or Medical. I tried not to make it overly complicated.
- I put digital files in the appropriate folders quickly when saving
I’m making it a practice every quarter of the year to clean up my device and getting rid of every app, game, and file I haven’t used in 90 days. I ask myself: Do I really need this? If not, I delete it!
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