The Lazy Genius Podcast - #248 - The Lazy Genius Guide to Easier Travel

Episode Date: February 7, 2022

This episode is heavy on the practicality, y’all. There are so many decisions we make when we travel, and I want to give you just a slew of ways you can apply one of the most popular of the 13 Lazy Genius principles - decide once - to your travel. I hope this is an episode that you’ll come back to before you take your next trip whether it’s a family vacation, a work trip, a surprise visit to see a relative, or wherever your life takes you.   Helpful Companion Links Check out all 13 Lazy Genius principles in The Lazy Genius Way, or, if you already have it, preorder The Lazy Genius Kitchen (out May 3!) Episode 210: How to Lazy Genius Kids’ Screen Time The Instagram post where my friend Elizabeth talks about monitoring Episode 165: The Lazy Genius Packs for a Trip The Instagram post about my monthly tear-off calendar All the Best Days with Courtney Cleveland The Traveling Child with Monet Hambrick Local Passport Family with Preethi Harbuck Download a transcript of this episode   This podcast is hosted by Kendra Adachi and executive produced by Kendra Adachi, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hey there, you are listening to the Lazy Genius Podcast. I'm Kendra Adachi and I'm here to help you be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. Today is episode 248, the Lazy Genius Guide to Easier Travel. This episode is heavy on the practicality. There are so many decisions we make when we travel and I want to give you just a slew of ways you can apply one of the most popular of the 13 lazy genius. principles decide once to your travel. I hope this is an episode that you'll come back to before you take your next trip, whether it's a family vacation, a work trip, a surprise visit to see a relative, or wherever your life takes you. But even if you're not traveling for a while,

I encourage you to listen now because listening now is a way that you can magic question travel. Remember, the magic question is what can I do now to make something easier later? A way that you can make your travel easier later is by listening to this episode and thinking through some of the ideas so that you have maybe some helpful decisions already made the next time you go somewhere. Now, let's address real quick the COVID-sized elephant in the room. Traveling is a complicated thing right now, right? Everyone is assessing risk differently.

Some people are traveling. Some people are not. But adjustments are happening all over the place no matter what you're choosing. My sharing this episode is not any sort of stance on travel. Everyone gets to make their own decisions. Also, I understand that if you are a person who loves to travel that you have chosen for now that it's not worth the risk, then this episode title, it might actually kind of make you feel sad and maybe a little resentful because all you want to do is try. travel, but it's not a choice you're making right now. So I just, I just want to kind of cover those bases and know that, like, I see you guys. Like, this is, this is complicated. I realize, I realize that.

It's also kind of a slightly heavy way to start an episode about taking trips, but very little in our lives has been unaffected by the last two years. So I just want to acknowledge the potential complexity that you could be feeling because of this episode. So now, let's talk about how to experience easier travel. For context, I am not an expert traveler. I am perhaps the opposite, actually. I have been outside North America, only twice in my life. The first time was over 20 years ago until a few months ago, I was like a nervous cat when I was in an airport. I am 40, you guys, I am 40 years old. I have never ordered my own Uber. I don't even know if ordered is the word you're supposed to use. Our family is not, we go to the beach in the same state. We're not trying to visit every state in the United

States. We don't camp. I don't have a lot of miles built up from excessive business travel. I am not an expert traveler. I don't even travel that much. I do have experts I listen to, and I'll get to that in a minute. But I think it's important to let you know that I am not a well-traveled traveler with a ton of expertise, which is why I actually think I'm a really great person to make this episode. Traveling is not easy for me. I don't do it that often. It is severely overwhelming at times, but I've had to be a lazy genius about it to make it easier. So if I can feel more at ease with travel, anyone can. Now, the most helpful, dare I say the most life-changing principle that you can apply to any type of travel is Decide Once. If you're new here, Decide Once is one of 13 lazy genius principles. I share in my book,

The Lazy Genius Way, which is the foundational book of all things Lazy Genius. Every podcast episode, every Instagram post, and almost every real life situation that I am personally in is informed by the 13 principles in that book. Now, Decide Once is simply making a decision one time about one thing until that decision doesn't work for you anymore. Why? Because we make so many dang dang decisions. like all the time. So a fantastic way to ease some of your caffeinated squirrel brain energy or to just

create less friction in your life is eliminating repetitive decisions by choosing something once and then letting it roll. Travel is one of the best categories to utilize this principle. And I'm going to give you a ton of ways that you can decide once with your travel. And I'll share some of my own personal choices and experiences that have made my own travel easier. Okay, our foundational thing to remember with us is what matters most to you. If budget is your top priority, that matters the most. Then choosing to always get a rental car from the same place, it might not be a good decide once because another company might have a better rate. Now, on the flip side, you might still comb through rental car sites looking for like the very best deal and get super stressed out and annoyed by that practice.

because what you have failed to name is that ease and simplicity matter more than budget does. So you're spinning your wheels and wasting your energy trying to save $20 when your energy is worth way more than $20 to you right now. So name what matters. Remember that as you hear all of these ideas. Let's do air travel decisions first. Okay, just some quick ideas. Decide once what airline you'll always fly, right? whether you'll choose the window seat or the aisle. Even when you choose to stand up and get in line to board the plane, I see so many people stand and wait around for their boarding group to be called.

The anxiety and the impatience are mounting. Everyone is stressed out by it. Like you're going to get on the plane. We're all going to get on the plane, right? But I think there's a nervous energy when we're waiting for something to happen, and that is extra palpable in an airport. it. So if other people's travel anxiety triggers yours, and I know that's true because I've had many conversations with people over the years about that, you can decide once that you'll stay in

your seat until your group is called. Maybe you don't even start packing up your phone or getting out your boarding pass until your group is called, because you're going to get in line either way. Like you don't have to be at the ready so much unless that matters to you, right? You can decide once the kind of food you eat in an airport, whether you bring a water bottle and fill it up from one of those water bottle thingies, or if you buy bottled water at the terminal, decide once what your carry-on bag is and what you put in it, whether you read or watch a movie when you fly. Now, listen, I'm not saying that you should make all of these decisions, like at all. Some of you are like, Kendra.

I can decide in the moment if I want to read or watch a movie. Like, what is wrong with you? I get that. You're absolutely right. But for some people, the paralysis and frustration comes from the options. Comes from having to make a decision in the moment for multiple things. It's the same idea as scrolling Netflix for half an hour, trying to figure out what to watch, and then it's kind of too late to watch anything.

Or when you have a morning alone without your kids for the first time and forever, or a day off of work for the first time and forever, and you don't know what to do with yourself. And therefore, you spend the first couple of hours. hours just trying to decide what you're going to do. It's the same kind of thing. You don't have to decide if you'll read or watch a movie, but if that decision or something like it makes traveling easier and more pleasant for you, then do it. There are just so many micro decisions that you can make when you travel and while you're in an airport specifically. So knowing what some of those

can be ahead of time, it just really helps. Now, I'm actually going to do a bonus episode later this week specifically about my personal air travel routine. I had to do a lot of flying last fall. I'll be doing a lot of flying this spring. And I have actually lazy genius to my air travel to the point where I don't really mind airports that much. Like I kind of feel comfortable with what I'm doing. I've made it work pretty well. So if you're interested in that, you'll get a deep dive on air travel, how I lazy genius air travel in a couple of days. We'll be right back. Amazon Presents Jeff versus Taco truck salsa, whether it's Verde, Roja, or the orange one. For Jeff, trying any salsa is like playing Russian roulette with a flamethrower.

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Okay, what about road trip travel? What can you decide once when you're in the car? You can decide your approach to the kids that you might have and the screens that they might want. I know some people who, rather than monitoring how much screen time a kid gets in the car, they just let their kids have access to screens the entire trip. It's like, live your life, kids, this is our decision. And then everybody goes about their business. Remember that Instagram post I did?

It was a while ago, several months ago, about my friend Elizabeth who used the phrase, I don't want to give myself something else to monitor. Do you remember that? Some of the decision-making stress is in the monitoring. It's in monitoring whether something is going according to plan. Monitoring, it's just a whole thing. So while the screen time example is just that, it's just an example. There are decisions you can make purely because they remove monitoring from your life. So consider what you monitor on a trip, not just with kids. And if you really, need to. Decide once that you stop at rest stops and not gas stations. Decide once that you pack a snack bag instead of getting snacks at the rest stop or the gas station. Or decide once that everybody gets

to pick any snack they want at your first gas refill or you can have a bag of quarters at the car for every time you stop at a rest stop and their vending machines. We do the gas station thing. We love it so much. Every road trip we ever take. We don't actually start the trip or don't worry about starting the trip with a full tank of gas because always in the first hour, we will stop for gas and mostly for kids to get any snack they want from the gas station. They think it's Christmas. Like they look forward to it every single time. So that is a decide once that works really great for us.

Again, think about the decisions that cause you a little bit of stress. Think specifically about a road trip. Where is the stress? Is it trying to decide where you stop to eat? because everybody's hungry at different times and everybody wants something different, then you pack food and people eat what you have when they're hungry. Or on the flip side, maybe you think you should pack a cooler of food because that's what your family did growing up or that's what a friend does

and told you that it works so great for them. But you would actually rather eliminate the stress of choosing what to put in that cooler and packing the cooler and dealing with any whiny kids who want to stop at McDonald's. And instead you just decide once to eat a McDonald's. Where are road trips successful? Decide once to keep those specific things going. What decisions cause you to get unsettled and overwhelmed? Decide wants to keep those things from happening.

What questions are your kids asking that you don't want to monitor? Go ahead and decide something one time now, so you don't have to keep deciding those things later. Packing lists are another way that you can decide once. You can have a standard packing list already written in a planner or typed out on your notes app, especially if remembering what to pack is a stressful decision for you. I have an episode about how to pack for a trip, by the way. I love it so much. It helps you name what kind of packer you are

and then some ways to apply lazy genius principles to that packing style. So the whole process is easier and works based on what matters to you. But even naming what kind of packer you are is a decision you can make one time because now you know what to focus on and what to let go of when you pack. So we'll put a link to that episode in the show notes. Now personally, I do not have a packing list. I make a new one for every single trip. Now, that might feel like a waste.

But because of how my brain works, making a packing list is how I process the trip as a whole. I think through all that I'm doing and therefore when I need to pack for it. But the process of making the packing list, it helps me see this broader strokes of what matters about my trip just in general. And that is more important to me than the packing list it produces. It's like a few weeks ago when I shared on Instagram how I use my monthly tear-off calendar. I have like a pad of monthly calendars. And I often need to kind of calm down my swirly brain. And the way that I do that is processing out on that calendar what is coming up, like through the month so I can see it.

And then often I throw away the page when I'm done. because the process is more important than the actual plan. So the same is true for me with packing. It's better for me to make a fresh list for every trip because it helps me think through more than just what to pack, but the trip itself. It's good for my brain. Static packing lists, they just don't work for me.

So that's not a place that I decide once. You can decide what works for you. I also think you can decide once on the travel advice you listen to. It's so easy to Google things about easy travel, but you don't always know who is worth listening to. And before you know it, you've spent more time Googling things rather than listening to a voice that matters and getting something done. My favorite practical road trip travel guru is Courtney Cleveland from all the best days. She is hilarious.

And she helps me figure out how to travel well based on what matters to me and my day. I also love Monet Hambrick, who runs the Instagram account, The Traveling Child. Her mantra is, if kids live there, kids can visit. She's so fantastic. Her family is beautiful. I love them so much. I have bookmarked so many things that she has shared about international travel, especially because that's something I would really like to do with our family in the future.

And then finally, Preeti Harbuck from Local Passport Family. Her blog is especially fantastic. I've marked a ton of trip ideas from her. her account. She just announced she's writing a book about family travel, which I was all excited about. So when I need practical travel advice, I look to one of those three women almost exclusively. That is one of my favorite ways to decide once. Have a specific resource for travel ideas. Now, a few other quick thoughts. Decide once the same meal you'll have the night before you leave for a trip or the meal you'll have when you come home. Decide once that you'll do grocery pickup on your way in.

I remember someone having the best idea. I feel like this was a lazy genius of the week a while ago. This person came home from a trip and she would take all the dirty laundry to the laundromat, even though she has a washer and dryer in her house. But that way she can get some vacation off ramp time from her family, get the laundry done all at once, but get to like read and silence in a laundromat a bit after her trip. Absolute genius. But think about leaving and coming home too from a trip.

What are some ways you can lazy genius the stress of those? Decide Once is your best friend. Now, I'm not going to go into any more ideas because honestly the list is literally endless. But what I do want to do is I'm going to post on Instagram this week where all of you lazy geniuses can share your favorite travel decide once. I have no doubt because this happens other times that y'all share your ideas that you all will get at least like several practical Decide Once ideas that are so much better. than anything I could come up with because seeing what other people do, it always sparks creativity and thinking about our own lives. And y'all are stupid smart. Like it's fantastic, the ideas that are in the comments in Instagram, especially about Decide Once stuff and lots

of categories. So we will do a travel version of that this week. We can be logistically inspired by each other. So look for that post. And if you don't already follow me on Instagram, I'm at The Lazy Genius. And again, later this week, I'm going to do a bonus. episode on how I lazy genius being in an airport. Very specific, but hopefully very helpful. Okay, before we go, let's celebrate the lazy genius of the week. This week, it's Kate from the Instagram account, Gaining Kate. She tagged me in a post of her wearing those Amazon overalls. I told you all about in the last episode about what is saving my life. And I just wanted to share her blessing for all of us. She posted this photo on December 30th and said, may we all

waddle into 2022 with the courage, strength, and energy of a confident toddler. And I just died laughing. And then I kind of teared up a little. I was talking to my husband Kaas just this morning about him being sad when our daughter Annie loses her little girl sparkle. And I was like, no, she'll always have her sparkle. We will not let it die. We had also talked recently about how adults laugh a significantly less amount than kids do. And what a sad thing that is? Anyway, all of that to say, Kate's post, it felt really poignant to me personally in light of conversations I've been having in my life. So I will repeat her words again. May we all continue waddling into 2022 with the courage, strength, and energy of a confident toddler. And I will add with plenty of laughing and sparkle along the way. And isn't that part of what we're doing here, right? We're learning how to be lazy geniuses so that we can. get things done, but also so we can continue to uncover and live into who we already are, into the truest parts of ourselves, the parts that sparkle. The more we become like ourselves,

the more I think that we will laugh and we will have all that confident toddler energy. So thank you, Kate. Thank you, Kate, for sharing your words and for being the lazy genius of the week. And then one more thing before we go, in case you missed it in my newsletter last week or in Instagram, the release date for my next book, The Lazy Genius Kitchen, has been moved from March 22nd to May 3rd. You guys, my books were on a boat that was in a storm. We still don't know if the books are in the bottom of the sea. It's nuts. But even if they're not, the boat is delayed to the point that the books can't get off the boat and to the warehouse in time to ship for a March 22nd release date. So if you have been planning on getting the Lazy Genius Kitchen,

Thank you so very much. And also, it'll be a few weeks later than we thought. However, it could have been fall. So we will celebrate that at least it's still in the spring. I cannot wait to tell you more about the book in the near future. Okay, that's it for today. Thank you 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. I'll see you next week. Have you ever felt like you were living just a B or B plus life? It's so dangerous to live that more dangerous. than a B minus or a C plus life because when you're living a B or B plus life, you don't change it. You think it's good enough. Is it? I'm Susie Welch. I host a podcast called Becoming You. People think, okay, an A plus life is not available to me, but there is a way. We are all in the process of becoming ourselves. Listen to Becoming You wherever you get your podcasts.