I agree with these tips from @mwra, and over the years I’ve found big speed differences with modest changes like those he suggests:
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In outline views, I will often keep “containers” collapsed (ie, not displaying their sub items) unless I am actually working with those items. That way the program doesn’t have to be constantly figuring out how to display all those component items.
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In containers with a lot of sub-items, I have found it valuable, as Mark A says, to leave Sort turned off, and turn it on only episodically when I need to re-arrange things. Eg: I had one enormous container with more than 1000 items in it. I had set the container to do a two-level Sort, by subject and by date. That made the file seem sluggish. I switched that container to “Don’t Sort,” which left the items in their already sorted order. Whenever I added enough new items to have a possible effect on ordering, I would sort it once again – and then turn sorting off. The point is, there was no need to have it running constantly on a usually static list.
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Have learned through experience to agree with Mark A on avoiding Display Expressions that have to be constantly re-calculated as well. (If you store those values in a string, as he suggested, it’s much lighter lifting.)
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The Attribute Browser is the equivalent to the Industrial Revolution, in ramping up TB ease-of-use and power. Get to know it and rely on it, if you don’t already. Considering how much work it does, it’s surprisingly quick and responsive. A long discussion of its virtues and techniques is here: How to use the Attribute Browser