The ultimate digital decluttering calendar

If there’s one area where my simple, minimalist lifestyle faces the biggest challenges it’s my digital life.

Overall, I’m a quite organized person and I try to apply this organizing to my digital devices as well. I don’t hoard applications, I use Dropbox and cloud services, I regularly declutter my social media feeds, I try to be intentional about what I’m subscribing to and thus letting into my life (and inbox), I love digital filing systems and yet – sometimes it can still get out of hand and feel like it’s a never-ending battle.

We’re often reminded of how harmful physical clutter can be to our wellbeing. And it’s easy to see why as it has tangible effects – stuff lying around the flat, closets bursting with clothes, a pile of paper junk. Physical clutter is everywhere and easy to detect.

Digital clutter? It’s trickier.

It’s trickier because it’s less visible. We’re lulled into a false sense of security by quasi-unlimited storage and the constraints of the digital realm (after all, it does not annoy you IRL). But unfortunately, digital clutter lives on.

In fact, it multiplies.

Ever single day.

Just think about it – every email we get, word document we start, image we save, app we use, attachment we download has the inherent potential of becoming digital clutter.

And, just like physical clutter, it can overwhelm us. The overflowing inboxes, the shrinking storage, the annoying beeps of a thousand notifications, the version 1.1, 1.1.1., 1.2, .final in your document lists, the annoying feeling that you’re unable to find anything.

I believe that it’s easier to manage and keep up an organized order than to start from scratch every single time and I find it especially succinct when it comes to digital clutter, simply because of the sheer amount of it.

The bad news?

As opposed to physical clutter, where you can kind of stop the inflow of stuff, digital clutter is impossible to be completely eliminated.

The good news?

With a little practice and some intention, it’s quite easy to manage and once you’ve formed the necessary digital decluttering habits, it doesn’t even seem like a time-eating chore anymore. Bonus: it can really enhance your sense of control and productivity.

Clearing up the clutter though is only the first step. In order to regain complete control, try to be intentional with digital technology and apply digital minimalism.

Digital minimalism, as defined by Cal Newport is:

“a philosophy that helps you question what digital communication tools (and behaviors surrounding these tools) add the most value to your life. It is motivated by the belief that intentionally and aggressively clearing away low-value digital noise, and optimizing your use of the tools that really matter, can significantly improve your life.”

To learn more about the basic principles, read his article On Digital Minimalism.

Digital decluttering checklist

Phone

• Delete the apps you don’t use anymore
• Put rarely used apps into folders with a clear category name (e.g. Photo apps, entertainment etc.) or delete them and use the browser version. No need to store everything on your phone
• Put the most often used apps to the first or second home screen
• If you’d like experiment more with organizing systems, check out these 7 creative ways to organize your mobile apps 
• Delete duplicate or bad quality photos
• Close the internet tabs and running apps
• Check your phone storage data and see whether you can eliminate apps and files that take up too much space
• Clean up your contact list – if you have no idea who that person is anymore, you probably don’t need them in your contact list
• Delete podcasts and music you don’t listen to anymore (and always stream them instead of downloading)
• Review your notifications and get rid of most of them

Social media

• Unfollow everyone with content that doesn’t interest, entertain, or inform you anymore
• Mute or block people if necessary
• Clean up your Pinterest boards – delete unused ones or make them secret
• Review and update social media profiles with any new info
• Review and declutter your blog reading list

Internet

• Close open tabs at the end of the day
• Clear caches
• Clear history
• Declutter your bookmarks, delete what you can, and create folders for the ones you keep

Computer

• Empty the trash
• Delete or move files from Downloads
• Clean up your desktop, try to keep it as minimal as you can
• Delete/uninstall unused programs and apps
• Check for updates and actually install them (don’t hit “remind me tomorrow” for a month)
• Clean the monitor and the hardware
• Get a professional cleaning – cleaning the ventilator can really prolong the lifespan of a computer

Email

• Unsubscribe from junk emails or newsletters you don’t read anymore. Previously, I used Unroll.me, but nowadays I try not to give access to my emails and data to random apps and services so I basically use the old, manual method. Once a week, I go through my Promotions/social tabs and actually unsubscribe from newsletters. Yes, it takes some time. Yes, I may never fully finish it. But I’m still more comfortable this way.
• Use labels, flags, filters, and folders to create a logical email sorting system
• Create a specific folder for newsletters and make filters that automatically sort those emails into the folder
• Delete old emails you don’t need any more
• Find the emails that are eating up your storage – in Gmail click on the little arrow in the search box and check “has attachment” to filter out all emails with an attachment
• Save emails you actually need
• Clean up the inbox

Useful links:

+ Video on how to use Gmail to organize your life

+ The Power user guide to Gmail

Files

• Review your filing system – is everything logical, easily findable, and scannable?
• Put everything into folders and subfolders – create a system and stick to it
• Make your most-used folders easily accessible – on Mac, drop and drag the folder into your favorites in Finder
• Delete old versions of files and documents
• Give thoughtful and clear names to your files. You may know now what it contains, but will you remember 6 months from now as well?
• Back up files (ideally to the cloud and/or an external hard drive)

Photos

• Sync your phone and computer photos
• Delete duplicates or poor quality photos. Be ruthless – if the photo doesn’t immediately evoke a memory, let it go
• Organize photos by date or event/category
• Back up photos to multiple places (cloud, external hard drive)

Blog/Website

• Check for broken links or 444 error messages
• Run system health checks
• Moderate/answer/delete comments
• Update plugins
• Backup your whole blog

How often do you declutter your digital life?