There was apparently a meeting at some point where society decided that simply being alive wasn't administratively demanding enough.
So we fixed that.
Now, before breakfast, you may have already checked your email, dismissed twelve notifications, entered a verification code, reset a password you absolutely knew was correct, declined cookies, accepted different cookies, updated an app and been asked whether you'd like to receive notifications from the app you just opened voluntarily.
No, actually.
I would like to make coffee.
Everything Has a Portal
Your doctor has a portal.
Your employer has a portal.
Your child's school has a portal.
Your bank has an app.
Your insurance has another app.
Your electricity company would very much like you to create an account.
The account would very much like you to verify your email.
Your email would like you to prove you're you.
And somewhere in the middle of proving your identity for the seventeenth time this week, you've forgotten what you originally logged in to do.
We've quietly turned ordinary existence into unpaid clerical work.
Appointments must be scheduled.
Subscriptions must be cancelled.
Forms must be completed.
Passwords must contain an uppercase letter, a lowercase letter, a number, a symbol, the blood of your ancestors and apparently something you haven't used since 2017.
Then comes the verification code.
We've sent a code to your phone.
Lovely.
My phone is asking me to verify that it's me too.
Convenience Has Become Suspiciously Inconvenient
Technology was supposed to make things easier.
And in many ways, it has.
But we've reached a peculiar point where convenience requires quite a lot of maintenance.
We update the devices designed to save us time.
We manage the apps designed to organise us.
We answer notifications from systems designed to simplify communication.
We unsubscribe from emails we don't remember subscribing to.
We manage automatic payments because somehow automatic still requires supervision.
Then we download an app to manage our time because all the things designed to save time have consumed it.
Brilliant.
Even Relaxation Requires Administration
Want to watch television?
Choose a streaming service.
Actually, choose four.
Remember which one has the programme you want.
Update your payment information.
Accept the new terms.
Then spend twenty minutes browsing until you're too tired to watch anything.
Want to go somewhere?
Download the parking app.
Create an account.
Add your vehicle.
Add your card.
Enter the zone.
Confirm your email.
By this point, walking home begins to feel spiritually appropriate.
Even hobbies have started requiring usernames.
Perhaps This Is Why Everyone Feels Behind
We talk endlessly about productivity as though people are mysteriously failing to manage their time.
But look at what we're managing.
Work.
Money.
Appointments.
Households.
Relationships.
Messages.
Calendars.
Accounts.
Passwords.
Subscriptions.
Forms.
Devices.
Notifications.
Updates.
And the endless tiny digital obligations that barely qualify as tasks individually but collectively nibble enormous pieces from our attention.
Maybe people aren't terrible at managing life.
Maybe life has acquired too much admin.
There is a particular exhaustion that comes from having fifty tiny unfinished things floating around your head.
None of them catastrophic.
All of them requiring something.
Click this.
Confirm that.
Reply here.
Renew this.
Upload that.
Schedule this.
Remember that.
And somehow, after completing all of it, we're supposed to meditate for twenty minutes and practice gratitude.
I Would Simply Like to Exist
Not optimise it.
Not track it.
Not sync it.
Not create an account for it.
Not receive weekly insights about it.
Just exist.
Drink something warm.
Sit outside.
Talk to someone without checking a screen.
Do something badly because it's enjoyable.
Go somewhere without being asked whether we'd like to download the app.
There is something quietly luxurious about a part of life that requires nothing from you.
No login.
No streak.
No productivity.
No documentation.
No proof that you were there.
Perhaps that's why ordinary, analogue things have started feeling almost rebellious.
A book.
A garden.
A conversation.
Music playing in another room.
Making dinner without photographing it.
Leaving your phone somewhere and forgetting where you put it.
For a little while, you are not a customer, user, account holder, employee, subscriber, applicant or data point.
You're simply a person.
And frankly, that position already comes with enough paperwork.