Getting to Good Enough

We can all use a little help in succeeding. And you're the best person to provide that help! This week, Shannon and Janine discuss simple ways to set yourself up for success and how easy fixes can sometimes get rid of barriers to starting. We also talk about the importance knowing what success means to you and creating different levels of success for yourself.

Discussion topics include:

• A recap of Shannon’s Alaskan cruise

• How making something just a bit easier can allow you to get started on it

• Classic example: Laying out your exercise clothes (or any clothes) the night before

• That sometimes big barriers have small fixes

• Questions to ask yourself to set your self up for success

• How making any decisions the night before can make mornings easier

• Shannon’s awesome key-management system

• How Shannon set herself up for success the night before going to the DMV

• Knowing what success means—and how you’ll know when you achieve it

• Creating a vision of three levels of success—so that success is achievable and also worthy of striving for

• How what success looks like can change from day to day

• The importance of figuring out what you want (not what you don’t want)

What are tolerations? They're those little things you put up with that bug you. The squeaky hinge. The dirty eyeglasses. You get the idea. This week, Janine and Shannon discuss tolerations and why we should think about addressing them (without letting perfectionism get in the way).

Discussion topics include:

• Janine’s wine- and potsticker-centric vacation

• Some examples of tolerations

• A classic toleration: Shannon’s squeaky dishwasher

• How tolerations can be big or small

• Janine’s outrageously annoying bathroom (and ugly kitchen) that she tolerated for years

• How it’s not until you address a toleration that you realize how much energy was expended tolerating it

• Why we tolerate tolerations: Because they annoy us when we can’t do anything it

• Another reason we tolerate something: Because it feels difficult and overwhelming to fix 

• The most insidious tolerations—the ones we don’t even realize

• Making a list of tolerations to address

• Looking for technical solutions to technology-related tolerations

• That when you eliminate tolerations you gain energy you things you want to be doing

• Avoiding perfectionism in finding the fix to your tolerations

It can feel uncomfortable to let something be good enough, particularly if you have a tendency toward perfectionism. This week, Janine and Shannon talk about how getting comfortable with that discomfort can improve your life. We discuss various strategies for getting past the discomfort and we even invite you to join us in writing a novel this November!

The varied discussion topics include:

• Getting comfortable with our discomfort around imperfection

• A working definition of perfectionism

• Improving your life by getting comfortable with with your discomfort

• How American Ninja Warrior relates to this topic

• The greatest thing ever invented: Ad-free Hulu

• Paying attention to when something is good enough and doesn’t merit further effort

• Practicing asking yourself “what do I need to do to make this good enough?” so that it becomes more natural

• How good enough ≠ sloppy

• Taking imperfect action

• Getting comfortable with discomfort both when you’re starting and when you’re finishing something

• Our experiences with National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)

• Our pledge to write a novel again this November (care to join us?)

• Janine's novelist hat (see photo on the website) and Shannon's unconventional prom dress

• Strategies for getting comfortable with discomfort

• Practicing feeling uncomfortable

• Intentionally being imperfect in order to get used to the discomfort of it

Visit the show notes at www.gettingtogoodenough.com for copious and links and to see a picture of Janine wearing the red hat.

Do you stress about feeling behind? This week, Shannon and Janine discuss how feeling behind isn't productive--it can be stressful and lead to mistakes. We talk about how rather than stressing you, feeling behind can serve as a prompt to step back and rethink how you're doing things.

Discussion topics include:

• How feeling behind tends to lead to mistakes

• How when you feel behind it's a good time to step back and think about what needs to happen to get you where you want to go.

• How feeling behind can lead to negativity while turning our attention to what you can do can be much more inspiring

• Questions to ask yourself that will help you let go of some of the things that you’re feeling behind on

• Keeping an eye on your priorities and what really matters to you

• The gnarly cycle: Catch up, take a break, fall behind, catch up again

• The alternative: Figure out a reasonable way to keep up (and let go of some things)

• Shannon’s approach to not getting behind in her email (it involves unsubscribing)

• Reframing what it means when you feel behind

• Coming up with ways to catch up without falling behind again

• What do when you feel behind: Check in with yourself about what’s important, reassess what you feel like you need to do and decide what it is you can do

• Taking the time when you’re feeling behind to set up a system to make it easier going forward

• How if you’re constantly feeling behind, it may be useful to integrate more reviews into your day

• Creating ways you can see your progress so you feel like you’re accomplishing something

Labels on bins are great. Labels we give ourselves can be limiting. This week, Janine and Shannon talk about the problem with negative labels we apply to ourselves, along with the benefits of positive labels. We also discuss some of the labels  we're trying to shed in our own lives.

Discussion topics include:

• Words matter: By talking tendencies, not labels, we allow ourselves room for change

• How Janine, who is naturally good at good enough, sometimes acts in a perfectionistic way

• What should we call people who embrace good enough? (Good enoughers?)

• That positive labels can be helpful, but negative ones are limiting

• How our self-applied labels don’t necessarily reflect reality (Shannon had run three marathons before she would call herself a real runner!)

• How Shannon overcame a swimming phobia as a gift to herself for her 40th birthday

• Thinking about which labels can be useful and which aren’t helpful at all

• The shift in Janine’s thinking about her self-applied “messy” label

• Labels Janine and Shannon hear from their clients

• Just-in-time productivity versus procrastination

• How if your label becomes your identity, it’s something to explore (particularly if it’s holding you back)

• Janine’s label as a “non-handy” person and her strategies for changing it

• Shannon’s label as someone with a bad memory and how she’d like to change that

Go to the show notes at www.gettingtogoodenough.com for links.

It's summer in the U.S. and both Shannon and Janine are traveling. Janine has just returned from a genealogy research trip to Kentucky and Shannon is anticipating an Alaskan cruise. In this episode we discuss some "good enough" strategies to make travel more enjoyable and less stressful.

Discussion topics include:

• How Janine let her recent genealogy research trip be easy

• The benefit of building flexibility into the research trip

• The beauty of a simplified wardrobe when you’re traveling

• The challenges of packing for an Alaskan cruise

• Some ideas for creative packing to deal with multiple climates

• Various ways we’re using Trello for travel planning

• A new-to-us tool for making Trello even better: The Trello Safari bookmark (it feels magical!)

• How perfectionism around travel can be so paralyzing we don't go anywhere

• Other ways that perfectionism can get in the way of traveling

• Building self-care into travel

• The value of building in a buffer of at least one rest day after returning from a trip

• Planning to do less than you think you can fit in, to leave room for rest and spontaneity

Visit www.gettingtogoodenough.com for Trello links!

This week Shannon and Janine sit down with Geralin Thomas of Metropolitan Organizing in Cary, N.C., a rock star in the organizing world. She's not only famous for many appearances on the Hoarders tv show, she's known for her generosity in sharing her business acumen with other organizers (including Janine).

Geralin is a business coach for entrepreneurs, particularly professional organizers, and in this episode we talk with Geralin about the challenges people face when starting a business. And, yes, perfectionism can be one of those challenges!

Be prepared for a lot of laughter.

Discussion topics include:

• How perfectionism can show up when starting a business

• The perfectionism/procrastination relationship

• Geralin’s emphasis in branding and marketing with her coaching clients

• How what you say, how you say it and your processes are all part of your branding

• How people can get perfectionistic about branding

• Geralin’s advice on how to pay attention to details without getting mired in them (hint: Know thyself)

• Having a specific—and consistent—point of view in your branding

• The importance of being authentic in branding and marketing

• Advice for starting points at the very beginning of a business

• Some thoughts on choosing a business name

• The things we’ve regretted in our businesses

• The prospects of drinking alcohol while recording (or listening to) the podcast

• Geralin's favorite Getting to Good Enough moment

Visit the show notes at www.gettingtogoodenough.com for lots of links!

Do you think there's a right way to some things? And that all the other options are the wrong way? That thinking might be holding you back. This week Shannon and Janine discuss how moving away from the right-way or wrong-way thinking can help you let go of perfectionism. It's liberating!

Discussion topics include:

• How right-way thinking fuels perfectionism

• That the more we can get away from thinking about right and wrong the easier we it will be to let go of the perfectionistic ideals that hold us back 

• How equating right with perfect is a recipe for disaster

• The many options for what could be considered right

• How a belief in the myth of right can stop you from adapting and adjusting the way you do things

• Janine's epiphany about how her right-way thinking was getting in the way of planning her genealogy research trip 

• How easy it is to not do something because you feel you can’t do it the right way

• That knowing what’s important to you will help you choose among all the possible right ways to do something

• Shannon’s non-traditional wedding and the simple criteria she used for her many choices

• How Mike (Shannon’s husband) nailed the decision on what color to paint their house without worrying about the right way to do it

• How releasing yourself from the notion of having to get something right is a huge step to letting go of perfectionism

• The value of recognizing that there are many ways to get where you want to go

Change can be hard, especially if we hang on to regret or wistfulness about the way things used to be. This week Janine and Shannon discuss letting go of emotions surround the past so that you can move forward to a better future.

Discussion topics include:

• Poodle encounters in Portland

• The value of looking to the future rather than spending time regretting the past

• How this applies to moving house

• Focusing on the positive of a new situation when you have to make a change

• How knowing what’s important to you allows you to focus on the benefits of the change

• Figuring out a way to cut yourself some slack and move forward

• Avoiding becoming mired in wanting things to be how they used to be

• Shannon’s early propensity for rearranging furniture

• Shifting away from being bummed about what you can no longer do and embracing joy over what you can do

• Thinking about what you want, thinking about what’s possible for you, and finding the silver lining when facing change

• Shannon’s verbing of the word “crutch"

Janine's four favorite words are "Let it be easy" and she says them to anyone who will listen (including, frequently, Shannon). This week, Shannon and Janine discuss the value of that mantra and how we try to let things be easy in our lives. And, as usual, we discover that it all boils down to knowing what's important to you.

Discussion topics include:

• How Shannon and Janine spent time together in Portland this week, but didn’t manage to record a podcast

• How her mantra, “Let it be easy” benefits Janine

• The expanded version of the mantra, from coach Michael Neill: “Why is it so hard to let it be easy?”

• How Shannon has tried to let it be easy as she deals with getting around on crutches (which is decidedly not easy!)

• Janine’s “let it be easy” approach to her photo-scanning project

• How Janine’s clients respond when she urges them to let it be easy

• Janine's super power

• Putting the “let it be easy” filter on the planning for an upcoming genealogy research trip

• The value of getting clear on why something is important to you

• The fact that complicated systems are doomed to fail (particularly filing systems)

• The “let it be easy” approach Shannon and Janine took to starting this podcast (we went from idea to execution in less than two months!)

• How recuperating from ankle surgery has helped Shannon practice letting things be easy

• The fact that letting it be easy often means embracing good enough

Go to the show notes at www.gettingtogoodenough.com for links!