‘By nature I am a chaotic person,’ says entrepreneur Muk van Lil (27). Her life was like a messy room until she discovered organization app Asana. “I record everything I want to remember and it is automatically added as a task. I used to have papers to dolists that I then lost again, and everything was mixed up. In the app I can add tasks per project. And if I don’t complete a task, it stays on my to-do list until I check it off. That way I can’t forget anything.”
The Flemish planning coach Brigitta Vangeel (43) also gratefully uses organizational apps. She was, she says, born “as a real stress chicken and chaotic”. Since corona, she has had many customers with stress and ‘almost burnout’, partly because all kinds of things are mixed up due to working from home. “That makes planning even more important,” she says. “It means getting things out of your head.” She herself uses Trello, an app in which you can create separate ‘boards’ (overviews) for all aspects of your life. Vangeel: “I also put my shopping lists in it. Then my husband doesn’t have to call me when he’s in the supermarket, but he can see what he needs to buy in the app.”
Social media specialist Bo (32) has ADHD. For fear of negative reactions, she prefers not to give her last name. She uses various apps to create order out of chaos. They have made her life “so much easier,” she says. “Before this I was a loose cannon that remembered nothing and lost everything. Now I use Google Calendar for all appointments and birthdays. I get a push notification for everything, so I don’t forget anything. I put chores that I don’t feel like doing with multiple alarms in my alarm clock app. Things on the web that I want to revisit later, I put them all in Google Keep, so I don’t have to endlessly scroll back through my Twitter or TikTok history.” Recently she has been using smart tags† These are small devices that are linked to your smartphone and that can help you find things. She has the tags attached to her keys and purse. “ADHD medication only works for 70 percent. Apps help me for the other 30 percent.”
That also has to be added
Copywriter Erika van Zinderen Bakker (44) has less good experiences with organizational apps. “I really think these kinds of apps are a disaster. Then you have to do that again. And that is exactly what you as a chaoot are not waiting for.”
According to her, these kinds of apps are not good for chaoting, because the possibilities are limitless. “You can put endless lists in it. That’s why I much prefer a paper agenda, with days and times and limited space. That gives you something to hold on to.”
My Trello is as messy as I am
Entrepreneur Deborah Vila Oziel (48) does use a digital tool, but doubts whether it has made her more organized. “My Trello is as messy as I am. I think if you’re an organized type, your Trello is ordered. If you’re chaotic, your Trello is chaotic too.”
Recognizable, according to planning coach Vangeel. “You can set up those apps in all sorts of ways. They are essentially empty lists. It’s more about what you do with it. Many people therefore follow a course to learn how best to set up that app, or they use a self-help book as grip or Getting Things Done, with methods like the two-minute method: takes a little less than two minutes, do it right away. If it takes more time, plan it in. In any case, downloading such an app is not enough. You have to develop a system that works for you.”
According to Vangeel, digital tools are not a panacea. For many chaotic people, a paper planner can offer a solution. „It is not so easy to do a task on paper copy-paste to the next day. Then you have to write it again. And you can’t cram ten tasks into one line. I always say: paper doesn’t lie. And many people like to cross out a task with a pen. That gives an extra dopamine shot in the brain, more than digital ticking.”
And so everyone tries to create order in the chaos in their own way, while another new trend is on the way: apps that use artificial intelligence (AI) to make an optimal planning of your days, including meditation breaks.
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But while AI seems to be bringing a productive and stress-free existence closer, philosopher Marian Donner (48) is concerned about our frantic pursuit of optimization. “I’ve never used an app like this and I don’t plan to,” says Donner, who in her Self-destruction book (2019) casts a critical light on 21st century trends of self-help and self-improvement. “All those organizational apps remind me of what philosopher Herbert Marcuse calls ‘technocapitalism’: technology serves the production system. Capitalism is chasing us, we feel a constant pressure to become even more productive and efficient than we already are. And then we’re all going to install apps again to achieve that optimization. In this way technology and capitalism go hand in hand.” Her motto? “Relax, live as relaxed as possible.”
For Vangeel, planning is the best way to go through life stress-free. “Planning has a bad nickname. Like: someone who plans is not flexible. But planning actually helps me to improvise. Because I have an overview, I know exactly that I can spare an hour to spontaneously go for lunch.”
But planning also takes time, Vangeel admits. “That’s why you shouldn’t make it too complicated. Once chaotic people and ADHD people start planning, I often see that they immediately go overboard. Everything in folders with different colors and so on. People quickly make it too difficult. My advice for chaoting is: start simple. Choose a method that suits you. And stop saying you’re chaotic. As long as you continue to think that of yourself, you will remain chaotic.”
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper of 5 July 2022
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