Get It Together, Weirdo

Ditch the Cookie Cutters: Design Your Own System for Focus and Organization

• Sarah Bowser, That Weird Nerdy Mom • Episode 2

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Feel overwhelmed and inadequate when you try to fit yourself into one-size-fits-all organizational systems? 

Resident weirdo and “get your shit together” coach Sarah Bowser’s been there, too — failing with various tools, strategies, and systems and feeling frustrated and guilty because of it. But she’s here to tell you that standardized organizational systems just don't work for everyone, and that’s okay.

In this episode of Get It Together, Weirdo, Sarah emphasizes the importance of embracing your uniqueness, experimenting, and seeking support from others to find the organizational and time management methods that work for you.

What you’ll learn in this episode

  • The ineffectiveness of one-size-fits-all systems and societal expectations.
  • The importance of self-acceptance and understanding of your unique brain function to create a personalized system.
  • The role of experimentation with small changes in finding the tools and strategies that work for you.
  • That support and accountability, whether through friends, coaches, or co-working groups, can help you stay motivated and gain new perspectives.

Noteworthy quotes from this episode

“You're not failing. The system is failing you.”

“Not everyone's brain works the same way, and that's okay. Society likes to push these expectations onto us, saying that things need to be done this way or that way in order to be acceptable.”

“It just starts with self-acceptance and understanding. We need to recondition ourselves to be okay with being different, with not needing to force our lives and our needs into a template that doesn't fit. It's important that we reflect on what works for us and what doesn't.”

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Welcome to Get It Together, Weirdo, the podcast where we dive into ways to help you figure out how you can tackle your to-dos, keep track of your side quests, and manage your time in a way that works for your brain, so you can focus on nerding out on the things that make you do a happy dance. I'm Sarah Bowser, your get-your-shit-together coach and resident weirdo, here to guide you on your journey. So, let's get it together, weirdo.


Hey there, my fellow weirdo. How are you holding up today? Doing okay? Are you super overwhelmed right now? Exhausted? Over-stimulated? If I had to guess, I'd say most likely all of the above, right? 

If you're like me, your brain's probably doing that thing where it plays pinball with your thoughts all day, and it's definitely not the good Pinball Wizard pinball, it's the really, really bad at pinball type of pinball playing.

How many different systems do you think you've tried over the years to get your shit together? My guess is a lot — like a whole slew of apps, planners, color-coded spreadsheets — anything to get a grasp on the Everest-sized mountain of tasks, to-dos, random things you need to remember. 

And how many times have you heard someone say that this one system will solve all of your organizational and time-management problems for the rest of your life. About a million times, right? Yeah, I figured. 

So let me ask you, how often does trying to fit into those cookie-cutter systems actually work for you? And how often do you wind up beating yourself up because you should be able to figure this shit out? The frustration, the guilt, the what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-me feeling, it's enough to make anyone want to scream into a pillow or, I don't know, find a nice cave to go and hide in for a while.

But before you ditch society altogether, let's look at things in a different way. Let's throw away the cookie cutters and talk about how you can create your own system that's unique, for focus and organization, one that works for you and your wonderfully weird brain. 

So let's start off with a little story time. 

If we go all the way back to the late 90s and early aughts — why does that have to actually be so long ago, because I'm still in denial — but anyhoo, anyone else remember those agendas that we'd get in elementary and middle school? Like the ones with the holographic covers that were supposed to help us stay organized?

Yeah, I sucked at using those. We'd get them on the first day of school in homeroom. I would start the year with all of the best intentions, filling in my homework assignments, staying on top of everything my teachers wanted us to write down in them. 

But after a couple of weeks, that thing was just gathering dust. I'd carry it around with me from class to class like a good little student because we were supposed to always have it with us. But it was nothing more than a colorful, spiral-bound paperweight. 

And that trend followed me for years. I tried every kind of paper planner you could think of, from the cheap ones at the dollar store to those fancy planners with stickers and washi tape. My attempts at bullet journaling? Yeah, pretty pathetic, given my embarrassing art skills. 

And then came the digital age. I dabbled with Trello boards, Asana setups, Notion pages, spreadsheets for all of the things. I tried all sorts of template systems and step-by-step courses that promised that this was the last system I'd ever have to use. 

And then I would feel like a complete failure because everyone else seemed to be thriving with these perfect systems and these perfect tools, and I couldn't understand why my brain just couldn't click with them. They were supposed to be the end-all, be-all system that everyone succeeded with, but not me. 

This was the case for me until I started allowing myself to experiment. I took bits and pieces of each of the systems that I tried that actually did work for me, and I started to piece together my own system. 

And that's what we're going to talk about today — how to break free from the cookie-cutter systems and design your own.

Here's the thing about cookie-cutter systems. They're not designed for your unique brain. They're designed for an imaginary person who doesn't exist, someone whose brain just molds perfectly into whatever they're told to do. Whoo, wouldn't that be nice — no, it wouldn't be nice. 

But when we try to force ourselves into these one-size-fits-all approaches, it backfires horribly. When we do this, we're setting ourselves up to feel overwhelmed, anxious, guilty, and, honestly, like an epic failure. 

And we hear it all the time, but we need to keep repeating it so that it really sinks in. Not everyone's brain works the same way, and that's okay.

Society likes to push these expectations onto us, saying that things need to be done this way or that way in order to be acceptable. So we end up being pigeonholed into using these tools and systems that may or may not make sense for our brains or for our needs. 

And when those systems don't work, we blame ourselves. We feel like failures because we can't seem to stick to them. We've internalized that because these systems don't work for us, we must suck at being consistent, that we must be broken. We obviously are just useless. 

And it's embarrassing for us to admit how much time we spend just trying to figure out how the system works, let alone actually trying to use it. And the guilt, the guilt for abandoning or even thinking about abandoning the system that you've sunk your time and energy and, quite frankly, sometimes money into. You feel like you're doing something wrong if you don't make it work. Like you're an embarrassment to society, to your friends and family, to your credit card, to yourself.

But I'm here to tell you that you're not failing. The system is failing you. 

You're allowed to do things in your own way. You're allowed to make things easy for yourself. Being different, being weird, going against the mold, none of that is a bad thing. And sometimes, you need to recreate the wheel to work for your specific vehicle, and that's okay. 

It starts with self-acceptance and understanding. We need to recondition ourselves to be okay with being different, with not needing to force our lives and our needs into a template that doesn't fit. It's important that we reflect on what works for us and what doesn't. And most importantly, to feel the feelings. Let ourselves feel the fear, feel the guilt, feel the frustration, but not let them keep us from being ourselves.

So let's talk about designing your own system and designing your system while giving up the need for perfection. We have to give up our perfectionism here. And yeah, that's easier said than done, I know. I am, hello, a recovering perfectionist here. But your system doesn't have to be perfect. It just has to be yours. 

Start by setting goals and priorities that are meaningful to you. What do you really want to accomplish in your personal life, in your home, for your work or your business, even what you do for fun? 

Once you know what you want to accomplish, you just need to figure out how do you want to accomplish it. It's just a matter of trying out some experimenting with different tools, techniques, and strategies. 

There's no one right way to do this. And that's the whole point of experimenting, it's determining what you want to figure out, piecing together how you want to test it, and then performing that test in a way that works for you. 

The results of your experimentation are going to be unique to you and your brain. Maybe you find that a combination of digital tools and paper planners works best for you. Maybe you'll invent a completely new way of organizing your time that makes your heart do a happy dance. 

The point is to test things out and see what clicks. There's no right or wrong way to do this, so don't let your brain or its conditioning by society tell you that you're not experimenting correctly. There is no correct way to experiment. You do you.

My one caveat there is don't just try it for a day and give up. Give each experiment that tickles your brain a fair chance. Try it out for as long as your brain allows you to without malfunctioning, but long enough to be able to reflect on how it's working or how it's not working. 

Don't be afraid to tweak the experiment as you go. It's totally fine to just try things out and do things differently. And if one method hasn't worked, but you're not ready to give up on the experiment, switch that method up a little bit. But try only to change maybe one or two things at a time, that way you can see which ones are the ones that are working, aren't working, that sort of thing.

And hey, you don't have to do this alone either. Finding support and accountability can make all the difference, whether it's with a coach like me, a co-working group, finding an accountability partner. Having someone else in your corner can help keep you on track and give you a fresh perspective on your experiments. 

Maybe you have a best friend like I do who you can just text and be like, “Hey, this is what I'm doing today. Tell me that I'm not jumping off a cliff.” Or tell me that I'm not completely losing my mind. Help talk me down from just chucking it all out and starting all over again.

And sometimes, just knowing that someone else is there silently co-working with you or cheering you on through text messages is enough to keep you motivated. 

Or maybe you're into gamification, where you can turn your tasks and your experiments into a game where you earn points or rewards. 

Or maybe you just need to check in with a coach every other week. 

Find what works for you, and don't be afraid to change it up if or when it stops being helpful. You're allowed to change your mind. If co-working doesn't work, then try something else. If an accountability partner doesn't work, try something else. If a coach doesn't work, try something else. 

That's the beauty of our brains. They're constantly changing and evolving. We're constantly growing and learning, and we're allowed to change up the tools that we use to support the new evolution of ourselves.

So take some time to reflect on what truly matters to you. What are the things that light you up, that just make sense to your brain? Start experimenting with small changes in your daily routine or organization methods. And remember, we're not going for the one-size-fits-all solution here. It's time to break free from those cookie-cutter systems and design one that's going to work for you.

Now, if you want to stay in the loop on new episodes, posts, and other tidbits that I share, hop on my email list or join us for weekly coworking on Mondays. I would love to have you in the community, and I'll see you in the next episode.


Thanks so much for listening today. You can find complete show notes, links to resources mentioned, as well as a link to our co-working community on our website, thatweirdnerdymom.com. Be sure to leave a rating or review and check me out on Instagram at that_weirdnerdymom. Feel free to shoot me a DM — I'd love to hear from you. 

Until next time, my wonderful weirdo, you've got this. Bring out your weird.