Disorder, Chaos And Decay: How To Avoid High Entropy
In February 2009, I headed down south on a 5-hour train to join the Royal Marines. A few days earlier, I'd been accepted to work for a company that one of my best friends worked at, and still works for. Everything I'd known about myself (and others) prior to that decision told me it was a wasted journey, but I headed down nonetheless. I'd just turned 19, and it's not that I was an incapable person; I just wasn't remarkable. I was impressively average at everything I did.
The advert read: 99.9% need not apply.
Those 8 months (the shortest time it can take anybody to finish the world's longest basic military training) were a constant fight. I was fighting to stay awake, fighting to stay somewhat organised, fighting to learn and improve—fighting just to keep up.
The training was purposefully overwhelming on every front. Regular kit inspections would pick up even the minutest trace of carbon hidden away deep inside the barrel of your rifle or a deviation on an otherwise perfect crease down the centre of your bottom bed sheet.'Thrashed' was the term used for what the training team did to the recruits when they fucked up. And whilst this physical and mental beasting was playing out, you were constantly reminded just how worthless you were.
But, that time in my life was the most illuminating and beneficial 8 months in my 35 years. After training finished, life felt like a breeze. Going from having to do dozens, perhaps hundreds, of things a day perfectly, to considerably less was a blessing.
Over the years, my capability to handle things as an adult, both in my personal and professional life, has varied. Being highly efficient for some period of time doesn't translate to permanence. The training is purposefully hard to maintain standards, but 16 years later, I've figured out why Royal Marine training was so hard. Everything had to be perfect.
It was a high-entropy environment.
Entropy, a concept from physics, describes the natural tendency of systems to move from order toward disorder. Left unchecked, things fall apart: structures break down, spaces get messy, and our bodies decay. Put more simply, entropy is a measure of disorder. It's nature's way of moving something from one state to another. It increases chaos. While entropy originates in thermodynamics, it serves as a powerful metaphor for the challenges of maintaining order in our professional and personal lives.
Things naturally become less organised as the energy we put into keeping them in order decreases. This constant battle plays out in everyday life. Take your work desk. Your desk is cluttered, so you finally decide to get rid of all the mess, but it doesn't take long for the desk to accumulate clutter once again—a coffee cup, paper, pens, etc, until yet again, it's time for a big clean up. This basic example illustrates entropy and how, if things are left to their own devices, they naturally become disorganised unless something intervenes.
As Anton Chekhov put it, "Only entropy comes easy."
But why is disorder the natural state of affairs?
Disorder is the natural state of affairs because there are simply far more ways for a system to be disordered than ordered, and left alone, systems will tend to drift into one of those many disordered states. There's only one way to perfectly order a deck of cards (e.g. Ace to King in each suit), but there are millions of ways to shuffle them into disorder. So, if you randomly shuffle, the odds are overwhelmingly in favour of disorder—not order. That's why casinos hate people who can count cards. They understand which hands are worth playing and which are hopeless.
If you feel like you are constantly battling to keep on top of your projects, your housecleaning, your health—it's because you are. You are deliberately fighting against entropy and the natural tendency for things to head towards chaos. People say that "life is a battle," but more accurately, what you could say is "life is a constant battle against entropy."
The good news is that you can learn to anticipate entropy and put systems in place to keep chaos at bay, but also learn when adding a bit of chaos to your life can be beneficial.
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The Universal Drift Toward Disorder
Entropy is a universal force present in all systems. Left to fate, our personal lives, our businesses and our thinking would decay. Energy has to be put into keeping entropy at bay, let alone making improvements. Some examples you may have noticed:
• Your body: You eat clean food, exercise regularly and have your sleep routine nailed down. You finally feel like you're starting to get somewhere, until suddenly you stop. The effort and sacrifices to get here, you decide, just aren't worth it anymore, so you let your hair down. Your body doesn't stay in the shape you got it into—it atrophies. Painfully quick as well. Muscle mass decreases, and fat increases. Without regular intervention, it will never be the other way around.
• Your habits: You decide to commit to a morning routine of learning a new language. You feel motivated at first, and so getting up in the morning isn't too bad. Besides, the words you're learning to start with are basic words and phrases. Over time, you have to put more effort into advancing, and you've made good ground thus far, but it's all getting a bit too much, so you decide to stop for a bit. Over time, the new skill you have learnt will begin to diminish. "What's that word, again?" will become a frequent phrase as you battle to try and remember what you once knew.
• Your projects: Every project you decide to start starts with goals, structure, and deadlines, but over time, entropy is working against you. There is a constant battle to stay organised whilst juggling your regular commitments with new ones. If processes aren't updated or you start missing deadlines, it's a slippery slope that fast turns into a giant snowball hurtling towards a cliff.
• Your knowledge: When you acquire new information, as much as some may want you to believe, it isn't stored in your mental hard drive ready for downloading when you need it. You have to work to understand the concept of what you have learnt and put that knowledge to work and get real-life feedback. Knowledge + Experience = Wisdom. If you are unleashing a barrage of information artillery on your mind, you won't have time to tend to any of it, and as a result, once again, entropy will come and take away from you what you do not guard.
I could write for days with examples of entropy at work, but the big takeaway is this: There are far more ways for you to be disorganised, imperfect and untimely than there are for you to be organised, perfect and timely. Entropy shows up as a loss of structure and efficiency everywhere in your personal and professional life.
How Entropy Creeps into Modern Professional Life
Entropy loves complexity because with complex systems comes the potential for more chaos. The system has to work harder to maintain order, and the slightest slip opens the door for chaos to come in and do its thing. Small, seemingly insignificant little breakdowns of order cascade over time. Compounding interest, as Einstein noted, is the "Eighth wonder of the world," but it works both ways—you can compound debt.
Below are some common ways in which entropy shows up in work and organisations:
• Clutter and disorganisation: Every modern organisation has to deal with emails, documents and clutter. If emails aren't read, documents filed, and clutter removed, chaos ensues. Ever had that dread of returning from holiday with hundreds of emails, meetings to catch up on and deadlines to meet? Your work just became a hundred times harder as a consequence of you wanting to take a break. That'll teach you! We've all searched in vain for something we can't find, or worked on the wrong document or process, and it's like pulling out teeth. It's incredibly frustrating, but it's also effortful and boring to "keep on top" of the admin. We hate being behind but also hate doing boring shit. It's just who we are. Regular clean-ups (just like mum made you do with your bedroom) are done for a purpose, and it should be no different with your professional environment.
• Slipping standards: One of the worst forms of entropy in any organisation is the slipping of standards. When a camel spider bites its prey, it slowly takes nibble after nibble, utilising digestive fluids to liquefy its flesh. The gradual relaxing of processes, preparation and quality is the equivalent of liquefying your standards into a mushy pulp. If you notice people are ignoring little rules or discipline is slipping, it's not because they're lazy—it's that maintaining the status quo requires active effort, and sooner or later that effort will give way to entropy.
• Communication breakdowns: Thriving organisations have clarity in their communication channels. Information is passed freely and timely from place to place and employee to employee, resulting in effective collaboration and up-to-date details. When information is constricted in the communication channels, it takes a lot of effort to unravel entropy's grip. If details are missing, people stop showing up to meetings, or assume somebody else was "picking it up," misunderstandings proliferate.
• Strategic drift: Imagine a basketball team doing drills on the court. This well-oiled machine knows exactly where each player is and has a multitude of plays that they can trigger. Teams practice drills relentlessly in any sport until it becomes second nature. But, imagine if somebody threw in 20 other basketballs—it suddenly would become nigh on impossible to execute the drill effectively. Everybody has to be moving in the same direction. Even if it's slow, because if you have people heading off on their own adventure, there won't be a natural place for anybody to arrive at. To keep entropy at bay—regularly course correct.
• Decaying networks: We've all had friends whom we've lost touch with. Slowly, over time, the distance between us has grown as they've gone one way in life and you've gone another. It's not that you weren't good friends, it's just…life! Networking, aside from cringe LinkedIn posts, is about fostering relationships, else they decay, and most people are on the lookout for how something can benefit them or their business. Building "contacts" is reduced to feeling like you're a SIM card collecting data on people you will never reach out to, but professional relationships—with colleagues, clients, mentors—require maintenance. However, you choose to build your network, it needs the same kind of attention a plant would need. Without the right kind of attention, plants die—as do relationships.
With all of these examples, it's clear: initial order and efficiency without regular course correction drifts into disorder. A classic systems trap and from which none are immune.
So far, I've talked about ways in which entropy can show up in your personal and professional life, but now I would like to discuss strategies and tools for maintaining order.
Managing Entropy
Establish Regular "Maintenance" Routines: Maintaining order is an ongoing process, not a one-time achievement. Set aside time, daily or weekly, to get your ship in order. Review your schedule, tasks, and clean both your physical and digital spaces. Delete or archive obsolete or out-of-date processes or documentation, and update any projects you are working on or collaborating on. This isn't sexy work, but there are plenty of frameworks out there, such as Getting Things Done, that can help you prioritise your time and energy effectively. Being organised, professionally or personally, enables you to go from running uphill to running downhill.
Simplify and Standardise Processes: Entropy loves complexity. If something doesn't have to be complex, then don't make it. Simplify wherever you can. Create checklists to combat memory fatigue or misinformation. Cut bureaucracy back to its bare bones. The world doesn't need more middlemen. Create standard operating procedures—not because you want to sound all cool and corporate (if that's even a thing,) but because they're easier to rely on than people. People, places and time change. How you operate and want others to doesn't have to.
Foster Clear Communication and Shared Vision: Miscommunication is entropy's best friend. Information must flow freely to hold off chaos and disorder, and having strong communication channels should be a common practice. If you have information silos then you need to think of a way to link those together both at work and at home. For this, I use Obsidian. Everything I ever write gets put into Obsidian and is linked to other notes and essays, which grows from an isolated seed into a stem, a branch, a tree. In the workplace, when everybody has the same shared vision, it's easier to course correct and catch the entropy drift in action when you have lookouts. Meeting notes, quick summaries and regular check-ins aren't micromanaging tactics—they remove ambiguity.
Embrace Continuous Improvement and Learning: Things naturally decay without regular intervention. A car bought today will not be the same car in 50 years, and regular maintenance and care is needed to keep it in good condition. The same applies to your systems. But that 2-litre engine in the car today can be upgraded to a V6 turbo if you wish, and the same philosophy should be instilled into everything you do. It's not hustle culture to say, "How can I shave 5 minutes off my 10K time?" or "Why is information not getting to those who rely on it at work, and how can we improve this?" Adopt a philosophy of continuous improvement and learning to avoid going stagnant.
Plan, Prioritise, and Be Proactive: There have been plenty of times in my life when my busyness has accelerated me closer to entropy. Being busy doesn't always translate to being effective. If you are the reactive type (a trait of mine I'm in constant battle with), then being busy may 'appear' to mean you're doing everything right. However, you could be inviting chaos to the table. If you don't pause and take stock of the situations you are in, you may as well put a bag over your head, because you're blind anyway. Take time to plan, to prioritise, to think. Even better, sometimes just do nothing—including thinking. Find a cadence that makes you think you're moving forward but not at a pace you can't keep up with. Proactive time-management tools such as time-blocking or task-batching can help add structure. If you are reactive, try conducting pre-mortems where you anticipate disruption in advance and try to deal with it before it comes to a head. We had a saying in the Marines that "Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast," and 16 years later, I still remind myself of that fact.
Build Resilience and Adaptability into Systems: "No plan survives first contact." Sorry, I know, another military quote, but in what environment is there such high entropy? Chaos that's out to do you harm. Hopefully, the entropy in your life isn't trying to kill you (any quicker than your decaying body is,) but no matter how well organised you are, life occasionally throws curveballs at you. I find they come in threes, but resilience is the ability of your systems to absorb disorder and keep going. To cultivate this, design your processes and teams with some redundancy and flexibility—elastic bands do snap, but they stretch beforehand. For example, avoid keeping critical knowledge in one person's head; do cross-training so others can step in (that way, one departure doesn't equal total chaos). Another technique is to document "Plan B" for common failures—ensuring you're not bumbling around in the dark when the lights go out. Never assume that something is "set it and forget it," and while some systems require an initial setup like cloud back-ups, others require active input to stay stable. This is the difference between active and passive stability. Aim to create both at home and at work, and if something can be automated (hello AI agents), then give it a go.
Address Problems While They're Small (Broken Windows): The broken windows theory is a concept that illustrates how small signs of disorder can lead to bigger problems—not just physically, but socially and systemically. Broken windows and boarded-up houses lead to more broken windows and boarded-up houses. "Why should I care? Nobody else does" is a catchphrase for those wanting to cause harm or havoc in areas where it already exists. Humans take cues from their environments, which creates a negative reinforcing feedback loop. Professionally, if you're a manager, you can see how quickly this type of behaviour would need stamping out. At home, a dirty bedroom might not seem too bad, but then it's your bathroom, your kitchen, your living room, your garden, your clothes, your attitude, your kindness—until why the hell should you care about anything? Nobody cares about you. But, by responding to and addressing small cracks, you're showing that you care to yourself and others around you. You're the elderly neighbour who still sweeps their front yard once a day.
Final thoughts: Entropy teaches us a humbling truth: there is no finish line to being organised. There is truly nothing that is completely "set it and forget it," and there is absolutely nothing that is off the table concerning entropy. Disorder is waiting, and it doesn't grow tired, old or frail. The only way to keep it at bay is to be prepared. Move and think like a boxer when trying to avoid a punch.
We’ve focused on avoiding entropy, but entropy is also the "leading edge of reality." It's where new patterns, ideas and understandings merge and collide. Without chaos, disorder and instability, life would grow stagnant—die. It becomes some sterile version of reality, not worth living anymore. Professionally and personally, the leading edge is where change happens. You have to step across the boundary—from known to unknown, because that's where evolution, innovation and creativity are waiting for you.
Do what you must to avoid chaos and disorder in your life, but now and again open up the door and step through it. You never know what life-changing thing is waiting for you behind it.
AI Prompt:
Entropy Hot Spot Detector
Instructions: Copy this prompt and customise the bracketed section with your specific area.