Hot take: I ditched clickup for a plain text file and my stress dropped 40% in two weeks

I used to manage my whole workday with clickup. Boards, tags, due dates, the whole mess. Honestly I spent more time organizing the tool than actually doing work. Two weeks ago I just opened a .txt file and started typing bullet points. No colors no notifications no bloat. It sounds dumb but I feel way less overwhelmed. Has anyone else gone backwards like this and actually liked it better?

3 comments

3 Comments

ryanf661mo ago

The brain craves frictionless thinking, not fancy interfaces.

noahpark1mo ago

32% of people still prefer paper notebooks for deep work. That friction of pen on paper actually helps you slow down and think better. Maybe friction is the point sometimes.

baker.riley10d ago

Why does everyone act like a plain text file is some kind of productivity hack when it's just a list? I get that clickup can be a time suck, but going from a full system to a blank document feels like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. You're basically trading one extreme for another - no structure at all instead of too much. The real trick is finding the middle ground where you have enough organization to remember what needs doing without the tool becoming the job itself. A simple checklist in a text file might work for a week, but wait until you've got twenty clients and a hundred tasks to juggle. Then that plain text file is gonna look like a mess on its best day.