How to Organize Your Life (Digitally)

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Are you happy with the way you have organized your life?

I’d be curious to know how you answered that.

I would totally understand if you said your organization plan isn’t working anymore, and you are very frustrated.

That realization came for me recently, after I spent hours searching through documents and receipts we needed for tax deductions.
So painful!!
During my tedious search, I noticed some things were paper, some were saved in a folder on my computer, a few in google, and some I just couldn’t find at all.

Plus, while looking, I found other things I didn’t know I had lost and realized what a scattered unorganized mess everything was.

If you have experienced this yourself, you know how upsetting it is to be wasting precious time because you are unorganized.

It was then I decided I had to figure out a better way to organize all my lists, documents, and files to spare myself from repeating this experience over and over.

Sound familiar?

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My dream is to have ALL of my documents, files, lists, and notes
ALL IN ONE PLACE!

Organizing Your Life

I call this organizing your life because it is so much more than a filing system for important papers and documents.

This is also about how you plan your day with a to-do list, keeping track of holiday spending, planning a menu for a big event, or a place to file tax deductions!

I guess it is about EFFICIENTLY organizing everything in your life.

Truthfully, I can help you with all of this, but you are going to have to be a little patient with yourself and be prepared to take some baby steps so you don’t get frustrated and throw in the towel.

I’ll be honest, it is not a small job, but once you have it in place, it is awesome!

Organizing With Apple Notes

Yes, I said Apple Notes. I discovered Apple Notes is a very underrated app, and most people are unaware of all the awesome features it has to offer.

Every year when Apple does updates, they overhaul one of their apps and last year it was Notes.

You might be thinking, she’s got to be kidding. I’m not. 

Seriously, I can almost feel your skepticism, but I am telling you to hang in there, you won’t be sorry.

I started to use Apple Notes several years ago, but basically just made new notes whenever I needed a quick reminder or wanted to make a shopping list or something like that.

After a lot of investigating and research, I was as surprised to learn Apple Notes has pretty much all the features you will need to keep your files and documents completely organized.
In addition, it is very user-friendly. ( No worries about not being techy)

I am so excited about how I have stuff organized now……

I decided to create an ONLINE COURSE to help you create your own personalized organization plan using Notes.

If you haven’t used Notes before and would be starting from scratch, that’s okay too.

I made the first 5 lessons completely free so you feel comfortable using Notes when you start your organization plan.

Where Should You Start?

You don’t have to do what I did to realize you need a better plan.

Let me ask you, where do you have everything now?
Start by jotting down all the different places you keep things you don’t want to lose.

Maybe you have a kitchen basket or drawer where you automatically put any paper document you absolutely can’t lose and want to find quickly when you need to.
Not a bad idea.

Don’t forget your computer or phone?
Are you alarmed to find that, like me, you also have folders full of unknown documents, more docs in Google, and your desktop has become an electronic bulletin board?

No doubt, the worst for me is the scenario I described above where I’m trying to remember where I put something and have to waste so much time looking!
Have you heard yourself say “I know I put that somewhere, I just can’t find it right now”? Ugh!

At this point, I’m hoping you might be a little excited to think how great it will feel tohave everything under control and electronically stored.
It might even be fun?

So now you know you’re going to start moving everything into Apple Notes. You don’t know how yet, but we’ll get there.

First things first.

What Do You Need to Organize?

I recommend you make a brain dumping list of everything you can think of that you have to keep track of. (it won’t be complete)
Your list won’t be exactly like mine, but it might look something like this:

• To-do list
• Shopping list
• Holiday gifts
• Meal planning
• TV Shows or Movies to watch next
• Passwords
• Budget
• Bills
• Receipts
• Home inventory
• Taxes 
• Mortgage papers
• Insurance information
• Travel Plans
• Personal Goals
• Workout plan
• Bucket lists

Of course, this isn’t my complete list either, but I think you get the idea. 
To help you a bit, here is a list of things you may have not thought of.
Go ahead and download it.

Please don’t go grab a piece of paper and start writing your list.
I want you to go to the NOTES app from Apple on whatever device you are using.
(Mac, iPad, iPhone)

Open the app, click on the Notes app, and then open a New Note.
In case you haven’t done this before, it is a little square with a pencil, and it is the same on all devices.

Remember, the first 5 lessons of Organize Your Digital Life are free, so you can learn how to do that right away.

Okay, now start creating your own brainstorming list of things to organize.
When you are done, you will have your first list made using Notes.

One of the many things you’ll most like about Notes is that you can set it up and then easily keep changing it as your organizational needs change.

Creating Folders

Remember I promised we were going to take baby steps.
Well, the next step is honestly the most important and I want you to take your time here. You are going to create folders to sort things in a way that makes sense for just you.

Okay, let’s take another look at the list you made of everything you need to organize or keep track of.

Hopefully, you can see some things that would go nicely together into a Folder. For example, maybe budget, bills, and receipts seem to fit together.

To do this, go back to your Notes App and go to Folders. On the bottom just click
New Folder.

Put your lists into folders- Start taking those categories we just talked about and make some folders. How about making 5 to start.

• Home
• Holidays
• Food
• Family
• Entertainment

If you are feeling ambitious, here’s a list of Folders to Create when you are ready.
Go ahead and download it, so you have it when you need it.

As you add notes, don’t feel like you need a folder for everything right away.
Apple has a default folder called Notes.
You can keep everything in the Notes Folder created until you are ready to put it into a folder of your own.

Tip for moving notes into folders: If you are on your phone, slide your note to the left and you will see a folder icon, click on it and bam all of your folders appear. Just choose the folder you want you to note to get to, and you’re done.
If you are on a Mac, you can simply drag and drop your note into the folder you want to keep it in.

Apple Notes Organized My Life

If I went into great detail here with how you can use all the features of Apple Notes, I wouldn’t be letting you take baby steps and this post would be way too long.

I do go into step by step directions with all of these features in my Organize Your Digital Life Notes Course.

Here’s What You Will Be Able To Do!

When you look at the course Table of Contents, you’ll find 22 short videos starting with the very basics of using Apple Notes to pretty advanced stuff like scanning and even signing documents electronically.

The whole course is broken up into 5 modules, so you can skip around and choose what you want to learn and of course come back and review anytime.

Organizing with Notes starts out with Free lessons on the very basics of learning the app to the more advanced features you see below:

• Scanning documents to my lists has been invaluable when wanting to access official documents quickly like tax documents. – These can easily be password protected.
  I now use my kitchen basket to hold documents that need scanning and stored digitally
• Adding links from other sites is more than inserting links on a topic to a list.
  Let me give you an example.
  Let’s say that you created a spreadsheet on google that has your complete home inventory.
  Copy the link to your spreadsheet.
  Go to your Home folder in Notes.
  Create a new note and insert the link to your spreadsheet.
  Next time you need it, instead of digging through google files, you can open the note, click the link and away you go.
• Bookmark in Notes: Let’s say you are on amazon and find the perfect gift for your daughter. Copy the link in Amazon and then add the link to your “Gift Note”  – LOVE THIS!
• Making notes secure is huge. Apple Notes is totally secure. You don’t have to worry about putting passwords or files that contain personal information on a list.
  You can password protect it or use your fingerprint!
• Thank Goodness For the Cloud!! Sharing between devices is one of the features you’ll love the most.
  Make a note on your phone while shopping or at work, and later when you open your iPad, there it is!

Making EVERYTHING Digital is Really Pretty Easy.

Apple Notes Will Keep Your Life Organized Too

Still feeling a little overwhelmed?
I understand, but take it one step at a time and it quickly makes sense.

In the end you are not only going to be relieved, but a little proud that you pulled this off!

Next time you hear something you need to remember, quickly open Notes, create a new note and write it down.

Or maybe someone at work starts talking about having a great series they are watching on Netflix.
Immediately, add that to your list that is categorized as “ Movies and TV Series”.

When you are out to dinner, open a new note and take a picture of your receipt right from the app, file it in your “receipt folder”.

I seriously have a list entitled, “Things to remember for Chuck” (my husband).
I don’t think an explanation needed here.

At this point in time, I have not been disappointed. I know it sounds too good to be true, but Notes lets me have EVERYTHING stored in one place. The more I use it, the more I love it.

Need More Information?

Truly, using Apple Notes to create your own organization plan is easy to do.
Remember I said I can help!
Take a look at How to Organize Your Digital Life Course.
Get ready to learn step by step how to use the app and to easily create your own organization system.

Interested in balancing your Digital life? This post will really help you make lifestyle changes. Do You Live a Digitally Healthy Lifestyle?

Let me know if you take the free lessons and what you think!