Life admin

[Gardenarian]

Life admin - are you familiar with this concept?

I was reading an article about dormitory-style housing in London, and they mentioned that one of the great features is that "The Collective offers living as a service. We don’t have time to, nor want to, worry about life admin. So paying one monthly bill which includes everything from room cleaning and linen change, to concierge services and all utility bills and council tax, makes life a lot easier, giving people time to focus on more important things."

I thought it was an interesting turn of phrase. All the crap we do day-to-day: life admin. It would be nice to have all that stuff taken care of for me! On the other hand, there is something infantilizing about it.

It costs around $2-3000 per month to live in what is essentially a small studio apartment at The Collective (Life admin included.)

It's in the Urban Dictionary, too:
Life Admin
Refers to one's personal day-to-day chores that are of an administrative nature. This includes tasks such as personal banking, making appointments, paying your bills, responding to personal emails.
"Sorry I can't today, I have too much life admin to take care of."

"UK’s The Collective Offers Whole System Design Living"

[Gardenarian]

An interesting article on the concept: "'Life admin' tasks like paying bills making many lose sleep."

One of my goals in simple living is to rid myself of just these kinds of stresses. But sometimes the pressure to live more simply (like the article mentions, getting to that decluttering) can create more stress. I, too, feel the pressure of the TO DO list.

[Francie]

Wow, those are very interesting concepts! I lived in a YWCA for awhile before DH and I married (in the mid '60s) and it was more like a dorm room with the bathroom down the hall. (At least I don't remember that we had a bathroom for the two of us, but it was so long ago I really don't remember .) The cost was so low I'm sure there was no bathroom. But a microwave sure would have been nice!

[iris lilies]

Yep, I can see the attraction of dorms and senior homes if one really wants to live a life of the mind.

that seems very cheap for London, although is that in £?

i still remember the ease of life as a graduate student in a single room. Thet washed bedding, they cooked, and I dismlt have a car on campus to mess with. It was simple living.

my friend's father stayed in a place for seniors that was two rooms, meals,mouse keeping all,provided. That cost $33,000 annually,seems like a good deal.one doesn't have to be elderly and/or infirm, probably one just has to be 55 years old.

[Packy]

This is very Socialistic. Some people have a need to feel very secure & be taken care of. Others would find it very confining. Just depends on the person.

[Gardenarian]

Iris - that's in dollars. If you go to their website you can see they have rooms ranging from 210-400+ pounds per week. I thought it was quite expensive for a studio, even by San Francisco standards. But it does come furnished and includes cleaning, wifi, TV.

Packy - Socialist? I think of it as more communal.

[ApatheticNoMore]

Well unless they are doing my dishes ... Really though paying bills is a pretty, almost ridiculously, easy part of life admin. Yea if they'll do my dishes, cook for me from recipes I hand them, apply to jobs for me, do my taxes, and write or call my congressperson for me whenever I say, and find activities for me to do on the weekend, and manage all investment tasks, and schedule a haircut - then we're talking. And yes I've definitely put off doctor and dentist appointments, no time - especially as it involves taking a vacation day of course (luckily I can see the dentist on weekends). I wouldn't have time to switch utilities either, thank heavens there is no choice (the only one I'd even *want* a choice in is to switch off AT&T for landlines). Yes it often, probably most of the time, feels like all I can do is survive day to day.

[Tammy]

My current apartment bundles all utilities into our rent which I have automatically deducted from our account monthly. I had nothing to do on move in with utilities except signing the lease. I love it this way.

[Packy]

Iris - that's in dollars. If you go to their website you can see they have rooms ranging from 210-400+ pounds per week. I thought it was quite expensive for a studio, even by San Francisco standards. But it does come furnished and includes cleaning, wifi, TV.

Packy - Socialist? I think of it as more communal.

Communal, is pretty much a euphemism or a corollary for Socialism. If you'll look up "communal" and you'll see "socialism"(or a variant) included in the definition. But, you already knew that.

[ApatheticNoMore]

Life administration: I was really picking on myself everyday for something I knew I was supposed to do *always* slipping. It's not that I'm that forgetful, maybe a little, but no early onset Alzheimers here . And what was slipping was chores, not turn off the gas ... although I did lock my keys in my car several times a sure sign of being under stress!!! But yea some chores I should do would slip every day. I am kind of lazy and that was part of it. I would pick on myself for something that would slip and something I should do and so on.

I eventually just reached a point of @#$# it, and just accepting, things would slip every day. There would be days I wouldn't make my salad ahead of time and would pick one up at TJs, it would happen. There would be days after taking some utensils home when they were filthy, I would forget to bring them back, and have to use the plastic disposable ones, oh well. A utility bill might even be late occasionally. I might have to re-wear a pair of pants because I didn't do laundry. Never mind actual goals I was hoping to work on that were the easiest things in the world to slip (I don't deny some procrastination). Etc.. Things would slip every day, in fact it was almost like a mantra "things slip every day". It took a long long time to accept that as I really DID used to be capable of handling it all much better when I worked less (it really is insane how much we work in this society). But society @#$# up or not ..... that was my then not now.