Sometimes a productivity system can be great… until it suddenly isn’t. In this episode, we talk about what to do when your usual way of getting things done starts to feel stale, frustrating, or just not effective anymore—especially after a big life change.

We chat about why it’s normal for tools and routines to stop working, how novelty and “reward” can help you re-enter real life after a chaotic season, and a few playful ways to shake things up (including Shannon’s plan to try to-do list bingo). If you’ve been thinking, “But this system should work—what’s wrong with me?” we’re here to gently remind you: probably nothing.

What We Talk About

1. 01:04 — That “chaos slash nothing” season, and why getting back in the swing is hard
2. 02:13 — To-do list bingo as a way to make tasks feel fun again
3. 03:32 — When a “good system” stops working, digging in your heels can keep you stuck
4. 04:32 — Shannon’s hybrid planning setup (bullet journal + Todoist + calendar) and why redundancy helps
5. 06:10 — Keeping the bingo board inside the bullet journal (so it’s not “one more tool”)
6. 08:28 — Janine’s Trello era, novelty, and the motivational power of confetti
7. 10:16 — Bullet journaling through hard seasons and why flexibility matters
8. 13:02 — Mark Forster’s “Do It Tomorrow” / Autofocus: the premise matters more than the rules
9. 19:44 — Re-entry after shoulder surgery: sometimes you need extra reward to restart momentum

Key Takeaways

1. When a productivity system stops working, it’s information—not failure If something that used to help you suddenly doesn’t, it doesn’t mean you failed. It may just mean your life changed and your system needs to change with it.
2. A temporary reset can restart momentum You don’t have to overhaul everything. Sometimes a short-term experiment (like to-do list bingo) is enough to make things feel doable again.
3. Small rewards can help you follow through Confetti, bingo, tiny celebrations—if they help you take action, they count.
4. Redundancy isn’t always wasted effort If rewriting plans helps you remember, visualize your week, or feel more grounded, it can be worth the extra step.
5. The “holy grail” of productivity is a myth You can find something that works really well—and still expect it to evolve as your needs and seasons change.

The Bottom Line

The big message here is simple: if your current productivity system isn’t working, you don’t have to force it—or blame yourself. Life changes, your energy changes, and what used to fit might need an update. Sometimes the most “good enough” move is to try a playful tweak (like to-do list bingo), borrow a little novelty, and give yourself permission to experiment.

Listener Action: Pick one small way to “shake up” your current system this week—something that adds a tiny bit of novelty or reward (a bingo square, a mini challenge, a new way to write your list)—and notice what changes.

Want More Like This?

Episode 6: Task Management We get delightfully nerdy about task management and the tools we’ve tried over the years—Mark Forster’s systems, Todoist, Post-it® Notes, and why writing things down can make life feel so much easier.

Episode 61: You’re Not Behind If you stress about feeling behind, this episode offers a kinder reframe: “behind” can be a signal to step back, reassess what matters, and set up a more reasonable way to keep up.

Episode 93: Preventing Pileups A practical follow-up for when your system needs an update: strategies for creating systems (especially for email and paper) so backlogs don’t keep coming back.

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• Email: gettingtogoodenough@gmail.com

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I think the real key is that different things work at different times and for different people and for different situations, and that it's totally reasonable and normal for something to stop working for you.

Yeah. Right. It doesn't mean you failed or it failed.

Right.

It just means your life is changing and your systems need to change with it.

Hey, there. Welcome to Getting to Good Enough. I'm Shannon Wilkinson.

And I'm Janine Adams. We're here for practical and fun conversations about living with more ease and way less stress.

Yep. We're all about embracing progress over perfection. So grab a tasty beverage and let's get started. Hey, Janine.

Hey, Shannon. How you doing?

Well, I'm pretty excited because we have a tentative visit to St. Louis in the book. Yay.

I know. I'm so excited. Yeah, we could record an episode together.

That would be fun. Yeah, I know. I've been feeling a little bit. You know, stuck's not the right word, but, like, my old.

I. I guess I'm having a hard time sort of getting back into the swing of things. Like, I've been. Everything's been so chaotic. Slash nothing, if that makes sense. For almost five months now.

I can't believe it's been that long. But, yes, I just did the mental math. Amazing. Yeah.

That. It's just.

It's sort of hard to get back into the swing of things, and I feel like I need to, I don't know, maybe shake things up a little bit to get me reinvigorated about getting things done. You would think just so, like, finally being able to get things done would be enough.

Right. So you're feeling like you need to, like, reinvigorate your. Your systems around getting stuff done, I think.

So what's been kind of popping into my head is maybe a little term of to do list bingo to make things fun again.

Yeah. For me, it was really good when I had stuff that I wanted to do but wasn't high priority. And so it would.

It wasn't urgent, I guess, and so it wouldn't get done. But when I put my tasks on a bingo board and then I wanted to get a bingo that got stuff done like that. And there's so many easy ways to do that.

I think that's. There's also. When was I doing this? It was when I were. When we were getting ready to move and I had a couple of months, and I think I had that long.

And I knew I had to downsize, and I was overwhelmed by all the different ways, all the different rooms and Stuff. Anyway, I found an online bingo card generator.

Oh, interesting.

So you enter your tasks. Yeah. I think it's called Bingo Baker. And you enter your tasks and it creates a board. And so anyway, there's so many ways you could do that.

It's so weird. I mean, I have a system I love, and I'm not remotely interested in changing anything up, but I'm so excited for you. To do. To do List bingo.

Yeah. And we've talked about this to do List Bingo a number of times on the podcast, so we can point people towards resources to learn more about that.

But it's just a fun way and kind of gets me excited to do some of those things that are just not feeling as exciting to just cross off a list, you know? But it. I get a little stuck in doing that and thinking, I have a good system. This should work. Why is it not working? What's wrong?

Right. And if you get your. You dig in your heels about that, then nothing gets done because it's not working for you. And so you're not working with it.

So, yeah, shaking it up and.

And even if it's just a temporary shakeup and you end up going back to whatever it was you were doing before that, I think that can make a lot of sense.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And it's taken me a while to sort of come up with the hybrid system that I've been using. I use a bullet journal, and then I also use todoist and my online calendar. There is some repetition. There's some redundancy built into that. And I.

At first I thought that was maybe not a good thing. Like, oh, this is wasted effort. I don't need to put this in my bullet journal if it's already on my calendar.

But what I learned for me is that actually copying things into my bullet journal and writing them out helps me remember stuff and picture my week more effectively than if it's just on my electronic calendar.

Oh, interesting. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I also use a bullet journal, and you and I use our bullet journals really differently. Right.

We both created systems that work well for us. I don't have a weekly spread like you do, so I'm not rewriting my activities, except do the. What do they call it? A future log.

So I have the coming year in three pages per month.

So I can jot down things like when I start a subscription to something on a cheap free trial, and I can write down, cancel the subscription by this date or you will be charged. But it occurs me to say, I wonder when you Think about shaking up your system because it's feeling stale or what have you.

Could you shake up how you use your bullet journal rather than like taking it out of the bullet. The system away from the bullet journal? I mean there's. Because there's infinite ways to use a bullet journal.

Yeah, I mean, well, in essence what I'm trying to do is sort of gamify my task list in a different way. And so I. I mean I could, I could make a bingo board in my bullet journal. So it's is part of the record.

Yeah, yeah, you sure can.

And I'm still, you know, just using that one tool. It's not another piece of paper or an online thing or something that I have to pay attention to. Right.

But just sort of a different, different way to approach my to do list.

Yeah. You could incorporate some washi tape or rubber stamps to make your bullet journal fun. You're not a washi tape rubber stamp

person that if they happen to magically appear in front of me, that would be awesome. But if I sought them out, that just seems like a rabbit hole. That is not gonna help me get more things done.

You don't want me to share my favorite shop for that stuff with you?

No, no, I don't want to know it exists.

I may just have to pop a roll of washi tape into the mail to you.

Yeah. That is 100% gonna put me on a perfectionist like streak. That would be really hard to get out of as opposed to right now.

I could just draw a grid and write things in it.

Yeah. But just think if you create, all you have to do is get some washi tape and a die cutter. Stop.

I love my washi tape and I don't get perfectionistic about it though. But I think the point here is, and we both experience this, that we can get going with systems and love them and they can work really well.

And then life happens, something changes and we start seeking out something different. I used to. Do you remember how crazy I was about my trello board?

My.

My trello board.

Oh my gosh.

You.

You were like evangelical about your trello board.

Yeah, I mean I had automations. I had all these. It was, it was, it was something. And I haven't, haven't used it in years. Years and years.

Because I've been using the bullet journal since 22, so four years. Yeah, it's so funny. I mean it really was great and I think for me part of it was the novelty of it. I think maybe, although it lasted for

a While I think the big part of it was confetti. Remember when they added that thing where you could. When you moved a tap, you know, a tattoo task into a different column, it would do confetti.

That's right.

I think you're absolutely right.

And I'm pretty sure, because I have that set up in my. That's how I track my reading, what books I've read.

And when I move a card, that is a book that I'm currently reading into the column for the year that I have read it, and I get that little confetti. That's exciting.

Yeah. And I'm glad that Ynab gives me confetti. So at least I still have confetti in my life when I reconcile. Right. No, I've forgotten about that.

You're right. That stuff is so powerful. Or like in the Libby app, where if you return a book in early, you can get a shower of flowers? I mean. Yes.

Makes me want to return my books early.

I know.

So get that done. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

So that was nice. Definitely a nice part of the Trello board. Or then I tried todoist for a while, got that set up, and that never really took.

Right.

But I'm grateful for it, and I'm grateful that it's, for me, really flexible.

And I don't know what I would have done if I didn't already have it.

Yeah.

Who knows?

As I recall, that was one of those things that took me a long time to get you to consider using, I'm sure, all about electronic task management. That's right.

I felt like I'd finally gotten there. Like, I was always working toward electronic task management. I. I got there, I had my confetti, and then I didn't want to go back.

And I wonder what it was maybe you recall. I don't what it was. That just Made me decide to try it. I remember that I. I had a.

Like a notebook that a client had given me that I did the last two weeks of December of 21. I thought, I'm just going to see how this feels. So I put no perfectionism around it at all because it was not going to be.

Only going to be used for two weeks.

Right.

And in fact, it's quite ugly if I look at it. But. But then I was hooked, I think.

Yeah. Yeah, well. And because it.

I mean, it certainly is valuable and this isn't just promoting bullet journals, but I mean, I think the real key is that different things work at different times and for different people and for different situations, and that it's totally reasonable and normal for something to stop working for you.

Yeah, right. It doesn't mean you failed or it failed.

Right.

It just means your life is changing and your systems need to change with it.

Yeah, exactly.

I feel like in our clients, we especially people who are parents, everything goes by the wayside and they have to reinvent how they can do literally everything. And that's a really obvious example of how when life changes, your systems have to change too.

Yeah, yeah. I was just hearkening back to the autofocus. What was it called originally?

It was called Do It Tomorrow.

Do It Tomorrow, yeah.

Mark Forster.

Yeah, Mark Forster, yeah. And then he did all these different iterations of list making, essentially with different rules of how to do it.

And I remember getting sort of frustrated because it seemed like he just kept changing the rules. Be like, oh, no, now you have to do it this way. And then, oh, no, you have to do it this way and this is the right way to do it.

And then at some point I sort of realized, like, well, it doesn't matter. The premise is still the same.

You get everything out of your head and then you work through your list in a way that allows you to work through your list.

Right. A way that works for you. He was always giving you new options, new ways to work through your list.

And I guess the idea was you use the one that worked well for you, but you're right, getting it out of your head onto a piece of paper was the critical component.

Right, right. And I'll ask. Or into a electronic stomach somewhere, getting it out of your head and recorded somewhere in some way that you can access it.

And hopefully everything goes into the same place, into the same repository.

Yeah. Gosh, I kind of wish I had an old notebook from those days. I'd be curious to look at it to see how I mean, because he was always changing it up.

But it was basically long lists of. Just long lists.

Yeah, it was basically long lists.

And you know, you might start at the top, you might start at the back, you might go through the whole list until you find the thing that jumps out at you and then you look at the whole list again and see if there's anything that needs to be done before you do that thing.

And you know, there were just a lot of different things, ways to approach it, which in hindsight is really valuable, but at the time was really messing with my head because I wanted to do it right. It was before I had fully embraced. Good enough.

Right.

Yeah.

I have a bunch of blog posts from back then. I'm going to have to, I'm going to enjoy looking at those because I can't even quite remember.

I just remember I was very passionate about it and it worked.

And for me, I believe it was a big departure from what wanting to create categories of tasks because all the tasks were in one big list that you worked your way through. And that was a big shift that had novelty associated with it and a little bit of structure.

It's interesting, there's all these different ways to figure out what it is that you need to do or want to do and then choosing what to work on next and there's not any right way to do it.

Right. If only, if there were and we could be the ones who told people about it, wouldn't that be great?

Well, if there were and I could be someone who knew that and just did it for myself, that would be great. Forever and ever. That would be great. I mean, I'd share it with everybody else too. But like, yeah, if there was just one way that worked.

But I have been known to, you know, be looking for the holy grail of task management slash planning slash productivity tools and hoping that, you know, whatever new thing I find is gonna like really work this time and.

Right.

And I, I feel like I've let that go. I mean I do sometimes get a little like bright eyed about something new.

Yeah, sure. Well, I feel like I, I too have, have looked for the Holy Grail and on a couple of occasions, founding, you know, and until, until it wasn't. Right.

Until it wasn't.

Yeah. So like that's where I am. Like my, my bullet journal gives me great happiness.

I think I'm on my, I don't know, 19th one now journal and it gives me like all the things I need like satisfaction and dependability and yeah, it does its job and so did Trello back in the day. Right, right, right. Yeah. My, my Trello system was amazing. So I guess that's to say I, I'm grateful that I have found I.

In at least a couple occasions I found something or planner pad. Remember planner pad? That was before Trello for me. Yeah, yeah.

Well, and actually the weekly spread that I do in my bullet journal is based on planner pad.

Oh, there, that's right. Yeah.

Yeah.

So you got tasks and appointments and priorities. What's the other three things?

Yeah, so I'll, I'll have the, the bullet journal I'm using right now has a sort of a template already in it. So I can't do it quite like I used to.

But what I would do would have from when I was doing it myself, I would have like the three tasks for the day, then the schedule and then sort of the things that I wanted to do for the week by category at the bottom.

It would. Oh, and it. Oh, right. Schedule is when your appointments were that you had to work around. Yeah. Oh, thanks. Yeah, great.

So planner pad was great and it was paper. It was a paper spiral down week at a glance planner.

But I like that I can feel okay about switching it up when I need to and also at the same time feel really good when it's working. And I mean like I don't have to, I don't have an itch to change just because I haven't changed in a while.

Right. Yeah. I think that's sort of what I have settled into as well. When it's working, I'm great.

When it's not working, I, I'd like to feel a little more comfortable switching it up even if it's just temporary or I mean it probably more than likely is temporary because I keep coming back to this hybrid system that I have because it really, in most cases it just really works for me.

Yeah. And you had, you know, with your shoulder surgeries, you had a major shakeup in your life, your ability to do anything right.

So it makes perfect sense that needing a different kind of re entry might be what's necessary.

Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I guess I, I keep thinking that like I'm just going to be so excited that I could do stuff that I'm just going to do it.

But I'm gonna need a little more, a little more reward to get going, I think.

I mean, I'm getting stuff done that needs to get done, but I would like to do a little more than that and you know, sort of coming out of this really hardcore recovery mode. It's a little tougher than I expected it to be.

So a good life.

Thank you. I'm sure I will be reporting in on a regular basis.

Please do so.

We would love to hear from you, our listeners. Do you have a system you love? Are you looking for something that works for you?

You can send us an email to GettingToGoodEnoughmail.com until next time, this is Shannon Wilkinson in Portland, Oregon, and Jeanine Adams

in St. Louis, Missouri.

And we hope that good Enough is getting easier for you. Thanks for joining us on Getting to Good Enough. We hope you heard something that makes your life just a little bit easier.

If you did, leave us a review or share this with someone who's looking for their own version of good Enough.

Thanks for listening. See you soon.

Now I'm excited to make my bingo board.

Oh, good. Maybe you can send me a picture of it.

Okay.