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This episode is sponsored by Feeding America. Every act of change begins with a neighbor, with someone saying, we take care of each other. Here in food banks and food pantries, neighbors pack fresh food and dignity into every box, moving food from farms to families through Feeding America's nationwide network. So when that box reaches a home, it carries more than food. It carries a promise that together we can end hunger. Feeding America, led by neighbors Give now to end hunger@feedingamerica.org this episode is sponsored by Merit Beauty. My most recent decide once has been using Merit Beauty full stop. I don't want to wake up every morning and renegotiate my entire face. I want a few products that live in the same bag, know their jobs, and help me look awake enough to enter the world. Merit is a minimalist beauty brand that makes elevated makeup and skincare design designed to help you look put together in minutes. The minimalist is a staple for me. It's not quite a foundation, not quite a concealer, but it replaces both. I swipe it on where I want a little coverage, blend it in with a brush and move on. I also love clean lash because it makes my lashes look longer and awake, but not like I'm going to a wedding at 8:30 in the morning. And on days when I don't feel like wearing makeup, Great Skin Serum gives my skin that fresh, hydrated look without adding a bunch of steps. Right now, Merit Beauty is offering our listeners their signature makeup bag with with your first order@meritbeauty.com that's M E R I T beauty.com to get your free signature makeup bag with your first order meritbeauty.com hey there. You're listening to the Lazy Genius Podcast. I'm Kendra Adachi. This podcast is not about hacking the system to find more time or hacking your energy to get more done. Hustling to be the best or to make the most out of every opportunity. It is exhausting and it's unsustainable. So here we do things differently on this show. We value contentment, compassion and living. In our season, we favor small steps over big systems. Here we are, lazy geniuses, being a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. And I am so glad you're here. Today is episode 468, what's Saving My Life? As regular listeners know, this has been a segment for years. Once a quarter, I share the things that have been saving my life for this particular season and I hope it's an encouragement for all of you to make your own List. What's saving my life is a phrase popularized by the writer Barbara Brown Taylor. And a lot of us on the Internet use this on a regular basis. And some of you have brought it into your lives regularly too. I remember a recent Lazy Genius of the week who said that she and a longtime friend friend who's like a long distance friend now. Like, they used to be close and now they're far away. They make an appointment to talk on the phone regularly and they share what's been saving their lives. Like that's part of their call. I just love how this practice, it helps us stay grounded where we are, pay attention to the small things that matter. We can connect with people and just like find more joy. It's so great. After that, we're going to have a little extra something where I share a decide once that we have used for quite literally years when it comes to school mementos. We will celebrate the Lazy Genius of the week with a great idea for travel. And we'll finish with a mini Peptocra when you cannot see the finish line. Because I have a long list of things that are saving my life right now. We're just going to jump right in. All right, here's. Here we go. First thing that's saving my life is peanut butter toast in the morning. I know it's revolutionary. I am on a quest to add more protein to my day, especially to my morning, which many of us are. And ever since I learned that it kind of broke my heart that my collagen protein powder that I put into my coffee every morning, it's not a complete protein, so it doesn't really count in the same way, which was like, kind of devastating. I've been trying to figure out things at breakfast. I still use my collagen powder because it's like, good for my joints. And I have like, joints that are decades older than I am. But it has been a bit of a struggle to find a new breakfast rhythm and a meal that kind of ticks all those protein boxes. I don't love cold food in the morning, so that takes out like yogurt parfaits and smoothies and stuff. Like, I cannot stand a smoothie in the morning. I'm an afternoon smoothie girl. But please do not hand me a cold smoothie at 7am Absolutely not. I also don't want to have to like cook something in a pan, take out the eggs, all the things. Now, obviously, like, I do both of those things on occasion. I'll have yogurt. Sometimes I'LL have eggs sometimes, but neither are long term consistent solutions for me. Then I found this protein bread that I actually really love. It's the brand Sola. I get it at Walmart. It's great. Toasted, I love, I smother it in peanut butter mixed with like a bunch of hemp seeds and some honey. And I've been doing this almost every, every single morning. It's really quick. It's super tasty. It is ridiculous, ridiculously filling. I don't get hungry for lunch usually until like sometimes even one, which is really helpful for my work rhythm because I get Annie Most days at 2:30 in the afternoon and to stop for lunch at like noon and then go back to work for you know, like an hour, it just doesn't, it doesn't work with my flow. So it's really nice to just stop working around one and like have a long lunch break and then go get Annie. And so this peanut butter toast is like making that, making that possible. Right? I can, I can work until one, even a little after without getting distracted by my growling stomach. And then I have like my break before I have to, you know, mother for the rest of the afternoon before I would be hungry for lunch closer to like 11:30 and that would sort of hijack the afternoon a little bit. So anyway, it has been so great. My peanut butter toast on protein bread with all my hemp seeds. I do have to floss my teeth more than usual, but that is worth it. Okay, number two. Number two is strawberry season. Strawberry season has officially begun in North Carolina and I have gone out to our favorite Rudd farm a couple of times already to get like huge buckets of berries. The first day I brought strawberries home, the children cheered like fists in the air. Audible cheering like we were, you know, in lame as a rob and just won a battle or something. It's like a holiday in the Adachi house when strawberry season finally arrives. I have made cobbler. Annie dipped some strawberries in chocolate and was not a fan. But now we know we don't like chocolate dipped strawberries. And basically I've just been shoving strawberries into my mouth at every opportunity. The kids are coming home with clean lunch boxes that were once packed with strawberries and now they are all gone. It's like double strawberries in their lunchboxes every day. We are just going to milk this season like to the nth degree. Just strawberries and strawberries and strawberries. It's going to be great. All right, let's take a quick break before we get into the rest of the list, we're gonna hear from our sponsors, which makes this show free for you to listen to. Real quick. Before we do here, just two quick reminders. The first one is it is the middle of May, which means the Summer Playbook is about to start. The Playbooks are our planning companion notebooks. The summer one runs from June through August, so since it's the middle of May, now is a great time to grab yours. So you have it before June starts. You can go to thelazygeniuscollective.com playbooks if you wanna order yours. Second reminder, we send out a podcast recap email every other Friday. It's called Latest Lazy Listens and it summarizes the episode. It shares the lazy Genius of the week and the other segments we have on the show. It also has a little extra note from me to help encourage you through the weekend. So if you would like to get that recap, you can head to thelazygeniuscollective.com listens this episode is sponsored by Good Ranchers. I've noticed that dinner gets harder when I don't have a starting point. If I haven't meal planned and I open the fridge at the end of the day and nothing is obvious, things can start feeling overwhelming fast. That's a big reason I started using Good Ranchers. Having high quality meat already in the freezer makes dinner feel so much easier. I'm not scrolling through the grocery store app trying to figure out what to buy or if it's good quality. It just shows up at my door and it's 100% American meat. Sweet, sourced from local farms and ranchers. But mostly it just makes the daily question of what's for dinner? A little easier to answer. Start your plan today and you'll get free meat for life and $100 off your first three orders. Or if you just want to give it a try, you can get $40 off your first order. Instead, just go to goodranchers.com and use my code GENIUS at checkout. That's $100 off your first three orders or $40 off your first order with my code GENIUS this month only goodranchers.com American meat delivered this episode is sponsored by Quince. I love Quint's because the things I have from them actually get used. The Italian leather sling bag is one of my favorite examples. It's classy, practical, and works everywhere from carpool to date night. I have sweaters, leggings, workout tops and jeans, all from Quince. Recently I Needed a fancy outfit for a work event. And I went right to Quint's for a silk top that looked like a million bucks but definitely didn't cost it. Quince uses premium materials like 100% European linen, organic cotton, and ultra soft denim with linen pants, dresses, and tops starting at $30. Everything is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands because they work directly with ethical factories and cut out the middlemen. Refresh your everyday with luxury you'll actually use. Head to Quince.com Genius for free shipping on your order and 365 day return. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com Genius for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com Genius all right, let's get back to what's saving my life. We have already talked about peanut butter, toast and strawberry season, so I might as well stick with, like a couple more food things. So there was a stretch of April where I was so stressed out. Like, oh, my goodness. Everything was happening in our family, in the lives of my friends. The weather was weird. I was just like trying to find my center. And do you know, one of the things I found my center in it was Jenny's key lime pie ice cream. You guys, this is a new flavor and if they ever take it away, I'm gonna be so devastated. Now granted, key lime pie is, like one of my favorite desserts of all time. I love anything citrus, but lime with cream and graham cracker. Stop it right now. So I have eaten many key lime pies in my life. I make a great key lime pie. So I had high standards for this ice cream, you know? And listen, I cannot explain to you how amazing it is. It's just perfect. It's perfect. I nursed that pint of key lime pie ice cream for days. I enjoyed it. I savored it. And because it was during, like, a really busy, hard season, it quite literally saved my life. So thank you, Jenny's ice Cream, for making my ice cream dreams come true. Okay, next up is my earrings. I got a new couple of new pairs of earrings from O Clementine. Have you guys gotten these ads on Instagram? I have gotten Instagram ads for these, like, chunky hoops for quite literally years. And a couple of months ago, I finally gave in. I threw up my hands and I was like, fine, fine, I'll try them. Yeah, they're really, they're really quite fantastic. They're worth the hype. My, my earring game it has always been fine. Like, beloved, actually. I have a couple of simple pairs of earrings that I really, really love that are either gold or black. And then I have, like, some super fancy, dangly earrings that are great for, like, a night out or a special occasion or whatever. But I never had anything great in the middle, like something that was a statement and had presence but wasn't fancy. Right. Or something simple but still sort of stood out. These earrings have bridged that gap, and now my earring game is complete. So I have the super chunky, huggy hoops in two styles, the mid mod and the bright checker. The mid mod, like, they're very, like, mid century modern and are kind of like green and, like a little purple, a little orange in there. Like, they're so great. And then the bright checkered ones, it's mostly white with like, pops of color in, like, a checkerboard pattern, but that's random. They're so cute. I absolutely love them. They have added just, like, the best pop of polish to whatever I'm wearing. And I don't feel fancy or overdone, though, you know, like, sometimes that's hard to sort of bridge that gap or to find that balance of looking put together without feeling like you're, like, overly fancy. So this does sound like an ad. And it's not. It's not. I just really love them. I mean, I found them through an ad, but this is not an ad. I really love these oak lemon tiny earrings, and I'm so glad that I finally gave into the. To the powers of advertising. Okay, we're just going to stick with style since we're here. So another style thing that is saving me a life right now is I found my perfect jeans. I found them. I found. I found them. Now, listen, I have several styles of jeans that I really love. Like, different. Different cuts, you know, different washes, all the things. It's nice to have a mix of jeans, at least for someone like me who wears jeans, like, pretty much every day. But I have finally found my jean. If I could not buy another pair of jeans outside of this particular cut of jean for the rest of my life, to the exclusion of all other jeans, I would be perfectly happy I found them by accident, which is kind of fun. So I was in Brooklyn last November while we were in New York City to see my son Sam March in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. And I went to Brooklyn and I went to Beacon's Closet to shop, because I'm a thrifter. So of course I Had to go to Beacon's closet. I found some incredible stuff there that I still love wearing that I found this pair of jeans that didn't really look like any jean that I had gotten before. They were super wide legged. And I'm short like people always. That's something that I always get when I meet people in person. They're like, you're so much shorter than I expected, y'. All. I'm five, three and a quarter. I went to the doctor yesterday and got measured. That quarter inch is working real hard. But I'm like pretty short. So wide leg jeans. I just felt like these, cause they were so wide legged would just swallow me. But I loved the way they looked, you know, I was like, well, it never hurts to try them on. So I had them in my big pile of clothes that I was trying on. When I got to the dressing room and I put on these jeans, I quite literally gasped. I gasped. I have never loved the fit of a jean on me so much in my entire life. I couldn't deal, but the legs were so wide. And I was like, I'm probably not going to wear these that much, but I have to get them because I love them so much. I didn't. I didn't expect them to become what they became. So I bought them. I wore them every day in New York because I wanted to wear them way more than the jeans that I packed. And then I got home and I wore them so much, like almost every day that I was like, well, we should wash these. And also I need them in black. So I found some on Poshmark in black. Then a few months later, I went looking again because the size of the two jeans that I had, it was too small for every single day of being a woman who fluctuates weight in her middle as much as I do a lot of times in my jeans. I have a couple of different sizes, so I wanted to wear these jeans most days no matter how like, hormonal I was. And so I got a size up again secondhand in these jeans. And then I even found a pair of them. It's the same, like cut and everything, but they had like tears in the knees and they look all cool and stuff. Anyway, these are my favorite jeans. I will keep you in suspense no more. My favorite jean is the Levi 94. Baggy wide legged jeans. I will wear them until I die. I have never loved a pair of jeans this much in my whole life. Now they are wide legged, they are baggy. This is the style I love this is not a style for everyone, nor should anyone assume that someone's favorite style item will work for every person. That's literally the opposite of personal style. But these are my perfect jeans, and I save my life every day because when I put them on, I feel great. They fit my body, they fit my style, they fit all my shirts. They're just, like, the coolest jeans ever. I love them with my whole heart. Plus, now that I know this style, I can always keep an eye out, like on consignment sites or even when Levi has a sale. Not that I need anymore. Like, I have four pairs. I have two blue denim and two black in the two different sizes, and that works amazingly well for me. But the Levi's 94s, man. So good. All right. The next thing that's saving my life is also in the clothing category, and it is thrift store sneakers. What do y' all call shoes that are, like, tennis shoes or athletic shoes or sneakers? Like, what do you call them? I feel like they're a regional descriptors of these kinds of shoes. I don't know. But whatever you call them, I love a good, you know, like, fashion sneaker. I'm not doing anything active in these things. You know, they're just there to look cute. So I already said I wear jeans every day, and I wear sneakers with my jeans most days. And every single pair of sneakers I have has been bought secondhand. I have hot. I have high top vans that are red. I have black vans, blue vans. I love vans. I have a pair of, like, fuzzy blue Nikes, pair of black Nikes. A recent find of white Vejas. Is that how you say that? I think so. Like, almost all of them are goodwill. Like, all secondhand, but all, like, most of them actually at goodwill for, like, $6. I am so in love with these shoes. I love shoes like this, and they save my life because, like, the jeans, they automatically make me feel like myself when I wear them. Like, it's so nice to have things in your closet that you're like, that is me. Let's roll. Plus, they're really comfortable. Like, I will just never. I've never been a heels girl. I will never be a heels girl. Actually, when I went to the doctor yesterday, I found I have plantar fasciitis, so definitely not going to be a heels girl now. But I. I don't. I don't want to sacrifice my body for fashion under no circumstances. Like, if an outfit causes me pain, I don't care how good it looks. I will always find something more comfortable. Comfortable and cool are, like, two of my biggest style words, and that is why sneakers are, like, my favorite. And I also love that they're all secondhand. Like, it's so. I don't know, like, how many. Where have these shoes been? Where have these shoes walked before they got to me? I don't know. They have, like, little stories in them. They're so cute. The vases are the most recent ad, and when I put them in my closet and I, like, looked at all my shoes, I just realized I was like, oh, my gosh, these are. I have so many sneakers, and they're all singing a hand. And that makes me so happy. So it's like saving my life on multiple levels. So that is the next thing is my thrift store sneakers, especially as we get into a summertime. Okay, up next, we are moving away from food and fashion and into books. The next one is the Louise Penny books, particularly the Inspector Gamache series. Actually, does she write anything else? I don't even know. Is that all she writes? Maybe. There's a lot of them. Anyway, so I. I read these. I actually listen to these on audio, and I've listened to the first 10 already. I'm in the middle of the 11th. I have grown to love them so very much. These books are so comforting to me, and I now understand. I did understand, like, intellectually in the beginning when I started listening, why people loved them. But now I understand, like, in my heart, why people get so connected and committed to these characters in the series. I genuinely think that my reading life has been enhanced this year because of this series. It just makes me feel like it's just like, a comfort listen, a comfort read. Even though it's like, murder mysteries. I just love this series. And it started making me think about reading other series and how, like, most of my favorite reading memories are based on a series. Like, I do love a standalone book because, frankly, it's. It's quicker to finish one book compared to, like, a giant trilogy or whatever. Like, big series. They're a commitment. But sometimes I forget how rewarding a series is. Like, my favorite reading experiences are all series. Harry Potter, Hunger Games, Throne of Glass, even, like, Nancy Drew and Babysitter's Club when I was a kid. Series are so fantastic. Starting a new one feels daunting to me, which is why I have a few still sitting on my shelf, like, untouched. Because I'm like, oh, if I start reading one, I have to commit to that whole big block of books right? I mean, wrong. But these Louise Penny books, they have reminded me how much I love a series, how much I love locking in with a set of characters and a specific place. I just started Dungeon Crawler Carl. That's such a hard book to say. Dungeon Crawler Carl, like, just a week or so ago. And when I started reading it, and then I realized there were like, eight other books after it, which I did not know, I almost was like, should I even keep reading? And then I was like, of course I should keep reading. There's so many books. This is what I like. This is what I love, actually. I love being in a series. And now as I say that I'm remembering, I think that what my resistance is like. There have been a couple of series that didn't stick for me. Like, Fourth Wing is the perfect example. I loved Fourth Wing, the first book in the Fourth Wing series. I loved it the second, and everybody was talking about it, right? The second book, Iron Flame. Iron Flame, Iron Flame. It was fine, but I was, like, honestly kind of bored. And then because of that, like, I. I pre ordered Onyx Storm, the third one. I never picked it up. Like, I think I gave it to a friend to read, and she was like, meh, I just don't have any interest to read it now. Now, it might be easy to think that reading Fourth Wing, that first book, was a waste of time because I didn't finish the series. But it wasn't a waste of time because I loved Fourth Wing. It gave me such a rush, man. Even waiting for Iron to arrive on publication day was exciting. I didn't love it as much, and I didn't really care about it in the way that I anticipated I would. But that's okay. It just means that the series itself isn't for me, even though the first book was so much fun. So I'm saying this to any of you who, like, struggle with this too, and definitely saying it to myself, you'll never know if you love a series until you start a series. You're just not gonna know. But starting a series is always a risk, you know, I mean, it's something big that you might not want to finish. So I'm just here to say that if that happens, reading the beginning of a series wasn't a waste. And then sometimes, maybe a lot of times, there's, like, tremendous reward because you get a series that you totally love, which is how I feel about Louise Penny and Inspector Gamache right now. Okay. The next thing that is saving my life is my pedometer that's like a step counter. That's what it's called, right? It's a pedometer. Yeah, it is. Too many. Too many ometers. I don't know. Anyway, I got a step counter. I bought this little, like, $12 pedometer. It's bright yellow, so I can spot it, like, anywhere, which is nice, but it's also, like, really slim. It fits in my pocket. And. And I've been paying attention to my steps. Now, here's. Here's why. Because I'm usually not a tracker of things. I realized recently that I sit a lot. My job necessitates that because I'm usually either writing on my computer or I'm recording in a chair. And while I do like to walk around the block sometimes, and, you know, it's not that I'm sitting all the time, I did wonder. I was like, how many steps do I actually take? Like, I don't know. I don't. I don't have a smartwatch. I don't really like wearing one. I also didn't want something like a smartwatch or an OURA ring or something like that that would give me more than my steps. Like, I just wanted to know my steps. That's all I wanted. I didn't want all these other things. So I got this cute, basic little pedometer just to see. Just to see how many steps I usually take. I wasn't trying to hit 10,000 steps or push my steps at all or, you know, hit a step count. It really was just a measurement, just to know it was just data collection. So on days when I don't do much except work at home and, like, drive the kids to and from school and just, like, do things around the house, just like normal piddling stuff. I take, like two to 3,000 steps. Now, we. We've all heard we're supposed to take 10,000 steps a day. I was like, well, that's not very many steps that I took. But also, what was weird is those days were full. Like, it wasn't like I was laying around all day. I was working and mothering and chauffeuring and all the things. It just happened to be, like, sitting things. So it's just a lot of sitting things. So I'm going to say this right now in case anyone needs permission, like I did. I am not going to tell you to not worry about taking 10,000 steps a day. Like, I'm not a doctor, nor am I a prescriptive advice giver. But here's what I do want to say getting 10,000 steps a day is really hard. If you don't already have a job where you're on your feet a lot, like a nurse or a floor manager, or you don't already have a regular rhythm of like walking or running a few miles a day, which some of you do, and that gets your steps in. If that's. If neither of those things are true, 10,000 steps is tough. Like, even on days when I feel like I've been doing like so many moving things, even if I like tuck in a half hour walk in there, I still might only hit 7 or 8,000 steps. 10,000 steps only comes when I live a regular day plus take like a 90 minute walk, or when I'm doing something unusually active on a regular day. Like for example, once a month I run this food distribution mobile market thing at my church. And I'm on my feet and running around getting things set up for like maybe three hours. Like I don't ever stop. And when that's over, I've usually gotten in about 5,000 steps. And that's three hours of never stopping. And it's only half the steps. So I'm just here to say that 10,000 steps is really hard to fit in for a lot of people. I'm not telling you to not try or to try harder because neither of those things is my job. But I do think it's important to contextualize 10,000 steps. It's no joke and it's not an easy thing to add to the average person's average day. But here's what I have enjoyed about my pedometer. It gives me some data on like how many steps certain things take. You know, I know how long I'm gonna be on my feet and how many steps I take when I do this food distribution thing. And you know, it just like helps me. What it does is it helps me weigh out how many days a week I wanna try to maybe hit 10,000. I don't try to hit that number every day. Like not even close. My weekly rhythm. Here's what I'm hoping for. I'm hoping for two, 10,000 step days a week, just two. Kindly accepting that there's going to be one or two, three, two to 3,000 step days a week and having like the average, the rest of the days being somewhere in the like 5 to 7 step count range. So knowing my steps, what it's done is it's given me permission to tend to my body in a way that feels reasonable for me. As a suburban mom of three kids who drives a van everywhere, I really love my little pedometer and what it's been doing for me, the freedom and permission it's been giving for me. Okay, the next thing that's saving my life is the new green dresser in the living room and my reading nook. So I've mentioned this dresser a couple of times on the podcast. I've even shared a photo of it in a latest lazy Listens email. But, y', all, it really is saving my life. Like, oh, my gosh. Well, first, I just love how it looks. Rarely does a day go by when I don't look at that corner of the room and just smile. Like, it makes me so happy to even have that dresser and, like, the art on it and all the different things around it. Like, that corner of my home is, like, my favorite little corner. The second thing, it's just been so practical. Two drawers. It's a four door. It's like a tall dresser, and there are four drawers. Two of them currently are completely empty, which is great because I have storage available. So, like, praise for that if the time comes. But the few toys and, like, random playthings that we still have in a house with big kids, all of those things go in the bottom drawer of the screen dresser. So they're contained and they're invisible. Both of those things are true. I think that when we are putting things in their place, the cleanest thing feels contained and invisible. All those little toys used to live in a basket which contained all the toys, which was great. And that since the basket didn't have a lid, it did not make the toys completely invisible. Now you don't have to. Just giving you the facts now the toys are in a drawer, and because of that, the room feels more polished and cozy because you can't see, like, the. The edges of the hot pink stacking cups or like the edge of the. The Light Up Simon game. Like, you can't see any edges of toys any, ever, because they're completely invisible. They're contained and invisible. Then the other drawer of the four that has stuff in it, it's done a similar thing. It keeps regularly used items in a great place, but invisible. So in the drawer right by my reading chair, like, where I just. It's like shoulder height when I'm sitting down. So I just. It's right there. I just pull it out in there. I keep my Bible, my prayer journal, whatever, like, nonfiction book I'm reading, pens, extra matches for my candles, like, everything I need for the morning and my reading time in the morning, it's right there in its place. It's easy to get to, but it's completely invisible when I'm not using it. I have just absolutely loved this green dresser. I will never get over how much it has made the look of my living room and how I experience that room, like, wildly better than I ever anticipated. Best piece of furniture I've ever gotten. Okay, two more things. The next one is writing my prayers. So this will be just a quick faith related item, but I mentioned that I keep a prayer journal in my green dresser. So I've never had a, like a regular rhythm of praying. Prayer's always been a harder part of my spiritual life, at least the kind of prayer that is like, daily and intentional and even liturgical. I pray when I need help, I pray when I'm tired, when someone comes to mind. But spending time every day in prayer has not been a regular part of my life. And I realized that the reason that has been historically true is because I get lost in my own head. I am a verbal processor, and praying has always been depicted to me as like an internal silent thing, at least when you're praying by yourself. So I would start praying, but I would, like, get lost in my own words. I get distracted by my own thoughts. I just, like, couldn't. I had no record of, like, what I prayed for or, like, could remember what I saw God do. You know, it's like, hard to remember the faithfulness of God in big and small ways when I was just praying in my own head. Now, some people can do that, and I'm very jealous of you. But I always figured that my prayer life would just be these, like, momentary please and praises. And then anything that is more like organized. Like that kind of prayer would happen only out loud in a group of other people. Like, I just wouldn't have the kind of prayer life that I saw other people having. I just sort of accepted that a long time ago. Then a few months ago, a friend of mine was. She mentioned how she writes her prayers. Now, this is not a. This is clearly not a new idea, but it was really presented in the right way at the right time for me by someone that I like, know and trust and know how she sort of thinks and. And works. And she said what I felt, that she would get lost in her thoughts and she would meander off when she would pray in her own head. Like, she wasn't always praying for specific people or things that she wanted to. So she started writing her prayers she just has a notebook and writes out her prayers as she's praying. And it helps her find her words and stay focused. And it also is a like a record of, of God's faithfulness and presence. And I really loved that idea. It felt like something that might work for me. So I went home, I grabbed one of the many empty notebooks that Lyne neglected on my shelf from 15 years of buying notebooks, and I started writing my prayers. And I've been doing that most days for the last few months. And it has been like surprisingly transformative. Just a really beautiful practice for me. I am keeping myself on track. It's almost like having a rope to hold onto by writing the words. And it's just been so life giving. It's enriched my relationship with the Lord. I can like pause as words come. I can praise, I can make requests. I can thank God for being gracious and kind in small things that I've asked for. And it's like I don't lose my spot. I don't lose my train of thought. Now there's nothing wrong with losing your spot or your train of thought, but that takes me out of the practice of praying in a way that I didn't enjoy, right? So writing my prayers has just been really beautiful for me and it's saved my life in a big way. Okay. The last thing that saved my life is the television show 24 and 24. You guys, are you watching? Are you watching this show? So food competition shows are our favorite genre of television. In the Adachi house, there is very little that we all like truly, but we all like either reasonably or very deeply. Like anything having to do with food and a winner. So like great British baking Show, Tournament of Champions, Top Chef is it Cake Wild Card Kitchen, like all of those. I'll even happily watch an episode of Chopped or Guys Grocery Games if I'm stuck on the couch and I can't find the remote. We really love food competition shows. And since Kaz and I have been watching these shows forever, like since the first season of Top Chef, like however many years ago, 20 something years ago. And since the kids have seen a number of these shows over the last few years, like we know who the big guns are, you know, like all five Adachis know that Jet Tila wants to win Tournament of Champions so bad. All five of us know that Brian Voltaggio has been runner up in so many competitions and we want him to win his own so bad. All five of us have watched the rise of Kevin Lee and Jonathan Sawyer, Kaz and I recognize people from, like, old seasons of Top Chef and, like, we know who Hubert Keller is. My kids know Antonia and Leanne Wong and Gail Simmons and Marcel by name. Like, the Adachis just really love food competitions. Anyway, all of that is what makes 24 and 24 not just a great show, but a great show for our family to watch. So the setup is it's 24 chefs who have to cook and compete for 24 straight hours. No breaks. It's bananas. All food competition shows are like bananas in some way. But having watched so many over the years, 24 and 24 is absolutely the most bananas. They just have to cook, and they'll cook again and then again and then again and again. Like, it's crazy. And they have to not just cook. They have to keep getting judged and come up with, like, new dishes with different challenges and do different kinds of gameplay. Like, I have a hard time figuring out what's for dinner four hours from now, let alone come up with 24 hours worth of competition level dishes when I haven't slept. It's just wild. The tasks are so fun. We have chefs to root for because we're so familiar with the food competition landscape. So we recognize so many people and the production is excellent. We started season one just a few weeks ago, like, on a whim, and then binged it mostly as a family with the boys, like, bowing out here and there. And then we immediately did the same for season two, and now we're week to week with the newly released season three, and we're just, like, all the way into it. Annie maybe the most, like, that's her favorite thing to do at the end of the day, she's like, mom, can we watch 24 and 24? So for a family that doesn't have much in common in regards to television, and, you know, my kids don't like movies because it's too much, quote, escalating conflict. A new food show that is so fun that scratches the itch of, like, seeing old faces from, you know, 15 years of watching food shows. It is something we look forward to. And that, to me, is like, the very definition of what is saving my life. Okay, so that is today's very, very odd list. Per usual. Peanut butter toast, strawberry season, Jenny's key lime pie, ice cream o Clementine earrings, Levi 94s, thrift store sneakers, Louie's penny. Books and series in general. My pedometer, my green dresser, writing my prayers, and the show 24 and 24. And that is what's saving my life. This episode is sponsored by Wayfair. I love a dramatic patio makeover as much as the next gal, but this year I knew I had a very specific outdoor problem to solve and future Kendra would be grateful. 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Save 25% on your first month at ritual.com lazygenius that's ritual.com lazygenius for 25% off your first month. All right for today's a little extra something I'm going to share a decide once that we have been using for like all the years. My Kids have been in school. It's pretty simple. We say no to school pictures and yes to yearbooks. That's it. No matter how old the kid is, no matter how much or how little the pictures or yearbooks cost, we don't buy school pictures. And we do buy school yearbooks. And it's just been so helpful to just, like, know that that's the plan. The school pictures are. Are easy to skip, I suppose. You know, especially now. Like, we all have the ability to take photos of our kids and our whole lives with our phones that we couldn't before. Like, you know, when most of us listening were kids. But my kids, y'. All, this is so weird, but my kids go to a dentist that takes a great photo of each kid before their appointment. Sitting, like, in front of this big picture window that's, like, full of trees. It's, like, kind of magical how good these photos are. And I get them every six months for all three kids. It's like free school photos, but better. But even before we started going to this dentist, we still never got school pictures. It was just a clear decide once early on, because I knew then if I didn't decide I would hem and haw every single year. I would regret years that I didn't get them I or I or regret that I would only get them in some years. It was just like, I knew it would be a whole thing in my head. So I just decided once. No school photos. Super easy decision. But we do always say yes to yearbooks. Even for elementary school. Especially for elementary school. Actually. My kids, like, no joke, they are always grabbing, like, an old yearbook to try and remember if a kid that they know now was in their class, you know, five years ago. It's so funny to watch the growth of my kids from picture to picture, but also their friends over the years. It's. It really is kind of wild how often we refer back to yearbooks. So much so that they're stored in the living room in a basket, like, by the side table next to the couch. Like, that's how often a kid pulls out a yearbook. So no to school pictures, yes to yearbooks. Just an easy decide once. That's been lovely for our family, and that is today's a little extra something. For this week's lazy genius of the week, we have an audio clip from Ellen in Iron Station, North Carolina. Take a listen. Hi, Kendra. This is Ellen in Iron Station, North Carolina. As I listened to your episode about planning trips, it struck me that I should share what my sister and I have started doing. It began last December when she had a reservation and invited me to join her at the beach for a few days of relaxation. While we were there, we realized that it was just a spectacular time for three of our very favorite things, books, naps and snacks. Hence the BNS Society was born. We decided that three times a year we would get away for a few days for a BNS Society time and we would just hang out together and enjoy each other's company as we enjoy our books, naps and snacks. No need to travel very far or to look for an area with a lot of tourist activities. No, we just find us a comfortable place to stay and enjoy our laid back sister time. So far we've had two B&S trips, one to the beach and one to the mountains. We live in between those two areas. And our next trip is already scheduled for August. I can't wait. Decide once, start small. Hashtag schedule, rest hashtag be kind to yourself. Thanks, Kendra. Oh my gosh, I love that Ellen. I also loved the birds and like chimes in Ellen's background. So lovely. That is such a great idea. It reminds me of a recent podcast episode on planning a trip, which is, you know, obviously it's what sparked Ellen to send this in. But when you know why you are going somewhere, it makes all the other decisions so much easier. Like if you're going for books and naps and snacks, you want somewhere beautiful with cozy beds, maybe even like a couch outside for an outside nap or like one of those big porch swings or hammocks or something. But like you said, you don't need touristy things because that's not the point. That's not the point of the trip. This is so fun. I love that you named it too, Ellen. Naming things adds its own kind of magic. So thank you for sharing this idea with us. And congratulations Ellen, on being the lazy genius of the week. And now let's close with a mini pep talk for when you can't see the finish line. I have been experiencing some of this with some folks in my life. Watching them walk like really hard roads where they can't see the end. I'm sure you've experienced that too. If you know the end is coming, or at least know like how long something hard might last, it makes where you are easier to bear. But if you can't see the end, it is so discouraging. So if that's you, whether it's like a life stage loss, a diagnosis, just a big change that has you reeling or even Some kind of trauma or grief response that keeps sneaking up on you, and you thought you were done with that already. My tiny advice in this tiny moment is to be kind to yourself and to let people in. Those are two lazy genius principles, and I think they are crucial. When you're experiencing something that feels like there's just no end, even if it's just like a school year or the crazy month of May and you're like, I will never get to the end of this. Be kind to yourself. Stay soft about your situation. Look for the good that's here right now, and be kind. And then let people in commiserate with other parents who are feeling the same way about may. Tell a friend that you're struggling and hurting, asking for help, even if you don't really know what that is. Like, let people into how you're feeling, even if you feel like all you do is talk about what is hard. And if you're not personally in a season where this is true, where you can't see the finish line, but you're in relationship with someone who is in that place, do what my friend Emily P. Freeman does. This came up at a book event I did with our mutual friend and amazing author, Shannon Martin. So Shannon wrote a fantastic book called Counterweights about living in a heavy world. And she shared about a season in her life that that felt like it didn't have an end. And how Emily came to her and said, tell me everything. You can be that person to someone else. Just enter into their hard season and say, tell me everything. Let them tell you whatever they want so they can feel less alone in what probably feels endless to them and maybe even annoying to talk about yet again. That's the thing about seasons without a seen end. It's hard the whole time, but we feel like it's a pain we're still talking about, you know, and that maybe we're even a pain. You're not. You're not a pain. And if someone makes you feel like that and says you should be over it by now, that is not a supportive person. And that requires a different kind of conversation. You deserve to have people walk with you on the longest road, even if you don't know when the end comes. So let people end a walk with you no matter the road, and be kind to yourself no matter how long you're there. And that is a mini pep talk for when you can't see the finish line. If this episode was helpful to you, or if you've been looking for a way to support the show. Please share this episode with someone that you know or you can leave a kind review on Apple Podcasts every mention and share. It makes a difference and turning people into lazy geniuses. So thank you so much for your support. This podcast is part of the Odyssey Family in the Office Ladies Network. This episode is hosted by me, Kendra Adachi, an executive produced by Kendra Adachi, Jenna Fisher and Angela Kenzie. Special thanks to Leah Jarvis for weekly production. If you'd like a podcast recap every other week, be sure to sign up for the latest Lazy Listens email that goes out every other Friday. You can head to thelazygeniuscollective.com listens to get it. Thank you guys so much for listening. And until next time, be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. I'm Kendra and I'll see you next week. On my new podcast On Par with Maury Povich. We're getting down to the truth behind the names that you know and love. Unfiltered conversations with legends like Leanne Morgan, Kathy Griffin, Ricki Lake to find out when they feel the most on par. We're breaking it down with Don Lemon, Aaron Parnas, Lamani Jones, laughing it up with Josh Johnson, Dan Soder, many more. You know the results are in. Great conversations are always on par, so follow and listen to On Par wherever you get your podcasts. This episode is sponsored by Ello. You're probably not drinking enough water. I'm probably not either. We all mean to and then we don't. That's where Ello comes in. They make the viral water bottles and tumblers you've seen all over Instagram and TikTok. But they're not just cute, they're designed to make daily routines easier. Their Oasis tumbler has a lid that twists to tuck the straw away so it stays clean and totally leak proof. And the pop and fill bottle has a push button lid so you can refill it without unscrewing the top. If you're into meal prepping or love leftovers, their leak proof glass containers are made for life on the go, not leaks in your bag. Ello's mission is replacing single use plastics with reusable products that look good, work well and last. Plus they're backed by a limited lifetime warranty. 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