App Spotlight: Remindr

A lot of people with ADHD find conventional organizational systems unhelpful at best. This circumstance isn’t helped by the judgement we feel when we reject these systems. After all, ‘everyone else’ has no problem with it.

The best system I’ve found is to simply accept that we are different, that when it comes to a lot of things, we have to make our own systems. Sometimes this includes a few layers. For example, my memory requires three layers: I use Alarmed for most things, the proprietary Apple alarm app for other things, and for another few, I use Remindr.

Remindr has an Apple-only app (sorry Android users), but it is primarily a web-based service, so anyone can use it. You enter a message for yourself into the online dashboard, select the date, time, frequency of repeat, and mode of delivery. It will text message, email, and/or send you an automated call.

In addition to nuts and bolts reminders, I decided to put Remindr to a more whimsical use. I combed the internet for positive affirmations and entered one for every day of the month. Some days the words were exactly what I needed to hear. It’s like encouragement from me to me.

What layers does your organizational system have?

Legacy

Whenever I attend an end of life ceremony, it invariably causes me to take stock of my own life. I hear the loved ones of the deceased speaking such tearful and heartfelt memories. They talk about gifts given that will linger on long past the departure of the physical presence.

What words will be spoken after I draw my final breath?

It's hard to assess with any real clarity how others feel about and perceive us. The smallest action, unknowingly taken, can have vast and rippling effects, completely hidden to the initiator. Some of the most impactful events cannot be expressed in words, and therefore go unsaid.

What words would I choose to be spoken?

Every person has their own unique set of values and traits. Highest on my list are things like kindness, love, compassion, acceptance. If I could select any traits to be remembered, it would be these. That everyone in my life felt some variation on those things that I hold most dear.

What power do we have over how we are remembered?

Perception is a tricky thing. No matter how hard we try, the image of us in the minds and lives of others is subject to their particular lens. The only power that remains to us is to live true to our internal compass. We will be valued by those who value the same things.

In memory of Gord Hope, 1954-2016