7 Organization Hacks for iPhone & Mac Computers

This year I’m doing more work than ever from my phone and computer at home (I’m sure you are too!). Thought I’d share some hacks that have made working with a million notes and files and photos (or should I say, 55,524 photos) feel a little less chaotic:

FOR IPHONE:

1. use all the notes app features:

   • Create folders

     • I have a to-do lists folder, an “info” folder for random links I want to save, a folder for content ideas, and a folder for each client (with subfolders for each project under each client!)

     • Once a week or so, go through and delete notes you’re dont with and make sure every note you want to keep is within a folder so it’s easy to find!

   • Pin notes you want to go back to

     • I have a note called “TO DO” pinned at the top so that I can just keep updating one to do list instead of having a million tiny ones all over

2. read text messages right away and then pin messages you want to respond to later at the top.

   • You can pin up to 9 conversations at a time. If I get to 10 conversations and can’t pin anymore, I know it’s time to go through them and respond to some, so I never get to more than 9 “unread” messages.

3. rearrange your home screen to have one happy slide that never gets notifications and only has apps that you find calming

   • This is great for if you scroll at night or use your phone for work and don’t want to be constantly distracted/stressed by notifications

   • You’ll have to take email and messages off of the bottom tab for this to make a difference.

   • My happy slide has Kindle app, Audible, Bible, Spotify, Podcasts, and other apps that I use at night like my alarm clock, security cam, white noise, and voice memos (to record Nathan sleep talking, of course).

   • All my work/communication apps are on one slide (email, messages, dropbox, google sheets, maps, calendar etc) so when I’m leaving work mode I can mostly ignore that part of my phone.

4. use the files app instead of airdrop

   • AirDrop only sometimes works for me. The Files app is awesome (it probably came with your phone but you deleted it, if you’re like me). I use it to transfer photos, videos, etc from my phone to my computer and vise versa. It’s nice because you can keep things in folders (unlike AirDrop which goes to Downloads always), and it works quickly for large files that AirDrop doesn’t always accept.

FOR MAC:

1. optimize your email (mail app)

   1. Have it organize emails by “Unread” so your unreads are always at the top

   2. Archive emails that you think you’re done with but are scared to delete (you can use the search bar to find archived emails later)

   3. Have a designated email address for junk mail

   4. Have a designated email address for newsletters that you sometimes want to read and sometimes want to ignore

2. have screenshots save to their own folder instead of to your desktop

   • Hold down Shift + Command +5, click Options, click Other Location, create a folder called Screenshots.

3. create a big folder on your desktop and use it like your junk drawer

   • I use this instead of my actual Desktop to save all random items when I’m moving quickly so that my actual Desktop background always looks clean and pretty (definitely better to not have the junk drawer folder but just trying to be realistic here)

4. splurge on icloud storage

   • (only $10/month for the most expensive package)

   • Have it automatically back up your computer. My computer recently crashed and I didn’t lose anything! I’ve tried other backup systems and this has been by far the easiest.

   • Do it on your phone too —have your phone automatically move things online when you’re low on storage so you never have to see that annoying pop up again