In Just 15 Minutes a Day!
Some days I love technology, and some days (like today!) I feel completely overwhelmed and bogged down by the sheer amount of information on all my devices. As CEO of Casa Arevalution, oftentimes the digital photos, the digital files, our contacts, and so many other things fall to me to remember, categorize and retrieve. Slowly, I am getting these things under control. But, there is no magic wand. Digital clutter continually grows, changes, expands and needs to be maintained. The military lifestyle only creates more contacts, events, files, etc. and so it is important to build the 15 minutes a day habit into your life. That is why I created this 7 day, 15 minute Digital Declutter Challenge. Download your checklist here!
15 minutes is the perfect amount of time
Why 15 minutes? I find that I can usually focus on any of these tasks for about 15 minutes at a time. A kid inevitably pops out of somewhere and needs something, a dog gives me a guilty stare which indicates the need for a walk, or my husband reminds me that I had every intention of cooking dinner that night. 15 minutes is enough to get something done, but not take away too much time from the other mandatory tasks of our day. Little by little, I have created a space for this 15 minutes of organization in my day. I have immediately seen the benefits, and I hope you will too! With the digital declutter challenge, I hope to jump start your desire to get organized!
15 Minutes of Productive Phone Time
Another reason why 15 minutes works for me, is I find myself on my phone more often than I’d like. I will purposefully sit down to scroll on Instagram, check out Facebook, or play one of the games on my phone (way more often than I’d like to admit). I find that if I can replace at least one session of mindless phone time with more purposeful phone time, I feel more productive and more on top of my digital organization. My phone habit is bad, but hopefully this can make it more productive.
You Can Declutter (Most Everything) From Your Phone!
Speaking of phones, I love that I can do all of this challenge right from my phone (minus 1 day!). Whether I am at my kid’s practices, sitting down at night watching TV, or waiting for an appointment I always have my phone. Full disclosure: I have an iPhone and all Apple products, so some of this may not be relevant to PC or Android users. However, I think most things have integrated to the point where people’s phones and laptops/desktops can share the same “cloud” of information. If you are not using a cloud system yet, I do highly recommend it as it updates from anywhere and allows you to work on the go.
15 Minutes Every Day
Will you be able to organize everything? Nope, no way! But, hopefully, after 7 days you’ll see the benefits of doing little chunks at a time. Just think if you did 15 minutes every day FOR A YEAR! That would be 91 hours of organizing your digital life. 91 HOURS…only by replacing one round of Candy Crush or one Pinterest scrolling session a day. Take the 7 day digital declutter challenge today!
7 Day Digital Declutter Challenge
- 1st Day: Digital Photos
- 2nd Day: Emails
- 3rd Day: Contacts
- 4th Day: Apps
- 5th Day: Computer Desktop
- 6th Day: Files
- 7th Day: Passwords
Before We Begin…
Before we get started, I want you to choose your 15 minutes. Think of something you are already doing in your day where you naturally have 15 minutes of downtime. Don’t try to squeeze this 15 minutes into the busiest time of your day. Don’t expect your family to stop their normal activity for you to do this. Commit to 15 minutes, but make it make sense for YOU and YOUR life!
Commit to 15
For me, I like to do these tasks while I’m waiting. If I’m waiting at a kid’s practice or at the doctor’s office, I’m on my phone. However, I’m getting things done! Start to notice those times when you are just wasting time on your phone. Could you be organizing your photos instead? Have you been pinning on Pinterest for an hour, and maybe you could be reviewing your password security? Do you want to really get motivated? Check out your screen time for the week. (If you’re anything like me, this number is scary!) This can help you identify those times during the day where you spend the majority of your time!
Have any tips or tricks that you would like to share? Feedback about the challenge? Please feel free to share in the comments below. Looking for more tips? Read my articles: 5 Tips for How to Get Things Done and 7 Tips to Get Organized and Reduce Stress. Looking for some help with passwords? Read my article My 5 Biggest Password Mistakes!
5 Responses
Great article! I love that you focus on only one area at a time and limit the decluttering task to 15 minutes. Some of these I do regularly but most I do not. Need to up my game.
Thank you! I love that you added apps to the challenge. So many people forget about that step when decluttering. I will be sharing them with all my followers.
Such a useful reminder how much can be accomplished in small, consistent time increments.
Recently, I opted to delete files in an “archive” email box because I thought I didn’t need them. My email program stores them there automatically. But something when wrong during the deletion process and it accidentally deleted that last 45 days of email from my current inbox.
After talking with Apple and Carbonite tech support, I finally gave up and decided to let it go. Most emails I responded to and were waiting for me to file them in their project folders. But it got ‘taken care of’ for me in a less desirable way.
I guess the good news is things got cleared out. It’s not exactly the method you proposed, but it does feel good to have a lighter inbox.
I agree that it is so great to be able to do a lot of this from your phone. So often we are in a “waiting place,” and this is a great little idea for using that time wisely. Of course, I need my glasses to see my phone these days, but I still love it. 🙂
This is so important; too often, if we can address clutter, we opt for the visual and the physically messy, but it’s that digital space that really keeps much of our life humming along, or turning into a cacophony. And I love that you’ve broken this down into bit-sized pieces, making it less abstract and overwhelming, and decidedly more do-able!