15 Months of FIBS: What I Learned from Judging My Days in Reverse
Reflections on my yearlong productivity experiment with backward scoring
In early 2024 I ran a small productivity experiment called FIBS—short for Forward Intentions, Backward Scoring. Here’s the full story:
FIBS began as a two-week trial to assess my base-level productivity. But it quietly became more than that. It didn’t just survive the experiment window—it became the cornerstone of my evening ritual.
Now, over a year later, I’m still FIBSing. And I want to show you where it’s taken me.
Typically, when we make plans, we assess ourselves against them. We set forward intentions and then, in a process I call forward scoring, we evaluate how well we stuck to the plan. I call this standard approach FIFS—Forward Intentions, Forward Scoring.
FIFS has one major flaw: it often punishes us for life’s unpredictability. It overlooks the work that emerged spontaneously, the care we offered when it was needed, or the energy we poured into things that we genuinely enjoyed doing, but never made it onto our to-do list.
My experiment flipped that script.
With FIBS, I still set forward intentions each morning. But in the evening, I ignored the plan. Instead, I reflect on what actually happened—and score backwards. Each entry is rated based on effort, value, and contribution. No bonus points for sticking to the blueprint. Just an honest look back.
In FIFS, we measure success by adherence to the plan. In FIBS, we measure it through reflection, by what actually happened, what it cost, and what it contributed.
Last month, I came across a 2007 article in Harvard Business Review that underscored this idea. It was titled Inner Work Life: Understanding the Subtext of Business Performance. The authors found that what most fuels worker motivation isn’t pressure or praise, but the experience of making progress in meaningful work. They called this the progress principle.
I’d heard of the progress principle before. I used to think that setting clear goals and then measuring myself against them would create that satisfying sense of progress. But the principle doesn’t quite work that way. It’s not about watching some imaginary progress bar jump from 22% to 23%. What matters is the conscious experience of a small but meaningful win. That moment of recognition is what fuels us.1
That’s what hit me.
In light of FIBS, the progress principle made more sense. The feeling of progress isn’t just about hitting targets. It’s about recognizing any real movement, especially the kind that wasn’t even on the map. And for progress to motivate us, it doesn’t just need to happen. It needs to land—to be seen, to be felt. FIBS, with its quiet, built-in habit of backward reflection and self-appreciation, gave me that. It made my small wins visible. It made my effort count, even when it didn’t match the plan. And it did so with a kind of gratitude embedded in the process.
My Current FIBS Practice
In my Personal Knowledge Companion (PKC), each calendar day has its own note—essentially a digital daily journal.
At the bottom of each daily note, I have a section where I write out my FIBS reflections. When I first started, it was just a loose bullet list. I brainstormed on a blank canvas. However, over time, I noticed that many of my wins stemmed from repeated patterns or fell into specific categories, and it became beneficial to introduce some structure into the process. So I built a small template.
Here’s what it currently looks like:
Nothing fancy. Just enough to guide the flow. The template initially had 5 or 6 categories and gradually evolved as I discovered more nuances worth tracking. The details are personal. But the key is this: Every2 evening, I ask myself one question:
What did I accomplish today?
Not: “What did I plan?” or “Did I follow through?”
Just: What meaningful things got done—or happened?
Whether it was big, small, expected, or completely unplanned—if it felt meaningful, it goes on the list.
Here’s what an actual filled-out section might look like:
As you can see, I don’t just list the items. I also score each entry from ✴️ to ✴️✴️✴️✴️✴️, depending on how much effort it took, how much it mattered, or how much of a difference it made. Early on, I kept a small reference sheet to stay consistent—things like “gym session >40min = ✴️✴️” or “1h reading = ✴️.” But after a few weeks, it became intuitive.
Side note: I call these ✴️ marks shine points—because they reflect personal momentum and make the effort feel like it shines. The concept of “shine” is inspired by behavior scientist B.J. Fogg, who coined the term in Tiny Habits to describe the emotional uplift that reinforces positive behavior. I borrowed the term and turned it into a scoring system—not to build habits, but to notice and celebrate effort.
Each day, I total my shine points to get my shine score.
When I started FIBS last year, a good day was around 10 points; 12 or more felt great. But as the system matured, the baseline shifted. These days, 16–18 is my standard range, and anything above 20 feels exceptional.
To be clear, the goal isn’t to game the system or maximize points. It’s to reflect more honestly and generously on what actually happened.
What Changed Over 15 Months of FIBS
Back in March 2024, I reported some early findings: FIBS made me feel better about my days. Now, with a full year of data behind me, I can say more—and with more clarity.
Baseline Shift: In the early weeks, a “good day” meant ~10 points. Now it’s closer to 16–18. That’s not inflation—it’s evolution. I refined my understanding of meaningful effort and rebalanced the categories accordingly. I even experimented with negative points—deducting when I neglect a life category or exceed a calorie threshold. It’s not about punishment; it’s about adjusting the score to reflect what truly mattered on that day.
More Holistic Self-Respect: Over time, I began giving credit to things I used to overlook—like rest, caregiving, or joy. A walk with my son during lunch counts. So does listening to music with full presence. These don’t check any traditional productivity box, but they matter.
Synergies: Paradoxically, FIBS also improved my planning. I started spotting more synergistic opportunities. Taking over my wife’s chores became both a household task and an act of care. A 90-minute walk with my son earns points for both health and bonding. A higher shine score doesn’t necessarily mean I spent more hours or did more stuff; it just means I did more of the things that mattered. This is why it aligns so well with my ideas of Productiveness with a capital P.
New Categories & Adjustments: I added elements like Flow Hours and TIL. I also introduced temporary categories aligned with current priorities—like a “Bid” category for small marriage-building gestures. These were set with intention, but their actual value emerges in reflection.
Emotional Stability: On bad days, instead of spiraling, I ask: “What did I get done anyway?” Even a low-score day usually has some effort worth honoring. That gives me a kind of grounded gratitude that typical gratitude lists often miss.
Better Weekly Reviews: My weekly review now includes a section where I list out each day’s shine score, giving me a clear view of how the week really went. And I no longer have to build my accomplishments list from memory—it’s all right there, structured and ready, pulled directly from each day’s FIBS entries.
What’s Next
Despite its upsides, FIBS has limitations.
Scoring is subjective. Mood plays a role. Some days I’m strict; others, generous.
There’s still some bias toward small tasks. For instance, taking out the trash as a favor might score as much as a 50-minute gym session. But that’s by design. Gym is routine; kindness is the edge I’m cultivating. That said, my scale certainly feels skewed at times. An 8-hour renovation day might earn the same as five small chores. Ten 1-point actions can outscore a deep 4-hour work block. While my reference list helped balance this out somewhat, it’s still a structural tension I want to resolve.
Another thing is that because FIBS doesn’t enforce commitments, a high-score day might not push major projects forward. I recently came across a study that suggested another possible downside. I’ll explore that in a future piece—but it raised a good question: Could backward scoring, in some cases, subtly reward comfort over challenge? Something to consider.
None of these are fatal flaws. There are trade-offs. And for the most part, I’m okay with them. So, after a year of daily practice, I believe FIBS offers something rare:
a way to feel good about the right things. Not a productivity method, exactly—but a self-alignment ritual. A daily act of noticing what actually mattered.
Looking ahead, I’d like to keep evolving it. I want to automate some of the tedious tallying (I already tried using ChatGPT for a while, but it often got the formatting wrong, maybe I need to write an app for it myself), further refine the scale (maybe experiment with nonlinear scoring), and further balance out the categories (e.g. dynamic weighting based on seasonal focus or shifting priorities). And maybe most importantly, I want to keep asking the question FIBS quietly raised:
Why do some things feel more valuable in hindsight than they ever did in planning?
That question, I suspect, doesn’t just lead to better productivity systems.
It leads to a better life.
This doesn’t devalue goal-setting. Goals matter. I still set quarterly goals and assess them with forward scoring, simply because for more extended time frames, that feedback is needed to improve. If goals don’t seem to work for you, it’s probably not because you’re “not a goal person”—but because your goal-setting method needs work.
By “every” I mean “most” evenings. I usually reflect on 3–4 days a week and backfill 1–2 more later. I delete daily entries where I didn’t write anything to keep the log clean.