Use that power sparingly. Keep your system icons (Recycle Bin/Trash) visible. Add your top three daily apps. And for everything else? Use the Start Menu (Windows) or Spotlight (Cmd+Space on Mac).

Now, go clean up that desktop. Add only what you need. And change that ugly default folder icon while you’re at it.

The desktop is the psychological home base of your digital life. It’s the first thing you see after logging in and the last thing you see before shutting down. Yet, for millions of users, it remains a sprawling wasteland of default shortcuts or, conversely, a chaotic junkyard of random downloads.