How to have a digital declutter

How clearing out your devices can leave you with a clearer mind: 

When we spend all day every day on our phones, computers, laptops, tablets, kindles, things can start to get a bit out of hand. Emails pile up, downloads sit waiting without purpose, your social medias are full of people you don't recognise, photos are here, there, and everywhere feeling forgotten and unloved. And what better time of the year to have a clear out than in the quiet days after Christmas when everyone is still riding out their food comas. 

So feel free to take these one step at a time, and do one thing each day of January, or go nuts and spend an hour just doing it all in one go. I guarantee you will feel and enormous virtual weight lifted from your shoulders.

So roll your sleeves up, pull up your wheely chair, grab your USB cables; let's do this.

I've also made a PDF for you to clutter up your downloads folder with...but you can delete it as soon as you print it because you won't need that shizz anymore!

Photos

Upload all of your photos from your phone/iPad/tablet/SD cards onto Google, and organise them into folders (of months/years/location - whatever works best for you). I like to keep all of mine on Google Drive (rather than just relying on Google Photos, or putting them in folders on my laptop) so that I can have my photos on any device I like, be it mine, or any computer with a browser.

Documents/Google Drive

Delete old documents (don't get too click-happy or else you'll have serious regret, but get rid of anything you know you will never need again). Organise everything into folders again - try and have a folder for everything. Organise into date, work/personal, whatever you like. When you're done, make sure you empty your recycle bin.

Google Keep

I open my Keep app at least 10 times a day and always have the web version open in a tab on my browser. So you can imagine how many notes I'm making and how out of control it can get. Delete any notes you don't need anymore, or merge the information from several similar notes into one big one. Another thing I do is colour code all of my notes, or add labels to them.

Downloads

The download folder on your laptop can quickly become a graveyard of random photos and PDF menus for restaurants that you thought about going to 6 months ago - delete everything you don't need and move anything important into folders.

Desktop

Your desktop is another of those places where old and unloved documents go to die - get rid of the shortcuts you don't need/use and, hey, why not give yourself a pretty new background whilst you're there - like this one or this one.

Emails

This is a big one, but one you'll definitely feel the benefit of - the aim here is to get to inbox zero, a tough and tedious task, but I believe in you. Unsubscribe from all of those promotional emails and just general crap that you somehow signed up for. Once you've finished, clear out your bin.

Browser

An easy one, open up your bookmark manager and delete any bookmarks you don't need anymore.

Social media

Every now and then it's important to open up every social media (as well as Youtube) and just unfriend, unfollow, and unsubscribe. Get rid of any account that is putting negativity into your feed, or generally getting on your nerves, or that you just don't need in your life anymore. Whilst you're at it, take a break from it all for a while and turn off notifications.

Apps

Uninstall unused/unwanted upps. (Had to keep the alliteration going, sorry)

Phone contacts

Go through your contacts and delete any duplicate/unused/old contacts, (including any numbers from when you were 9 and swapping illegal MP3 downloads via bluetooth).

Don't forget you can click here to get access to the free PDF checklist for your digital declutter!

Good luck and enjoy your clutter-free digital life!