The Lazy Genius Podcast - #28: The Lazy Genius Creates Space

Episode Date: July 3, 2017

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Amazon presents Laura versus Fruitflies. Swarming your fruit and terrorizing your kitchen, these little freaks multiply at a rate that would make a rabbit say, yo. Chill. But Laura shopped on Amazon and saved on cleaning spray, countertop wipes, and fly traps. Hey, fruit flies, your baby boom ends here. Save the Everyday with Amazon. Hey guys, it's Kendra and you're listening to The Lazy Genius podcast. Here I'm going to help you be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. Today's episode, episode 28, The Lazy Genius creates space. Here's the pitch. We all crave more space in our lives. More time, more rest, more laughing. But most of the time, we feel like we're just surviving. If you want more than just

moving from crisis to crisis with a little Instagram in between, this episode is for you. In the playbook today, we'll talk about five simple ways to create space in your life. And I'll share with you why this is the last episode of the Lazy Jeans podcast for just a little while for a couple of months. More on that later. But first, here are five simple ways to create space in your life. Number one, decide what space means. This is the biggest trick. This is the most important thing. We assume space means quiet or free time or sitting on a front porch swing with a frosty glass of freshly squeezed lemonade. That might sound magical actually, but it also might sound like the worst depending on who you are. We're all very much the same and what we want in life. Love, fulfillment in our work, in our relationships, safety and acceptance.

These are the basics we all share. But how we feel loved, how we feel fulfilled, how we feel safe and accepted, those look different from person to person. We all want more space in our lives as evidenced by the fact that probably in recent days you have uttered the phrase, I can't take this anymore. That is a little siren in your head saying, like, woo, maybe create some space in your life. but you can't assume that we all need the same kind of space. Okay, so what is the goal of space for you? Is it to feel less stress every day? To have more time to do things that make you feel like a person,

to be available to the people around you without having to shift a schedule around for every request? Is it just to be alone more often? You decide what space means. What's the goal for you? What does it look like? it could mean a weekly Zumba class or being able to sleep a couple of extra hours on the weekend or to have a little time every day to yourself to write in a journal or maybe you just want to use

the bathroom alone. I mean, oh my word. Decide if space comes in like one big chunk every week or so or if it's something that you need daily. Of course, we would all love both. But for the purposes of really making it happen in your life and not just thinking about how nice it would be to have more space decide what it means decide what space means and don't feel badly if it doesn't look like everyone else's version of space right you know yourself best you know what makes you tick so do that thing do that thing number two say no of course you know this one this is this is definitely not new information but it's worth mentioning again and again and again because it is so easy to forget okay The foundation of being a lazy genius, you guys, is being a genius about the things that matter

and lazy about the things that don't. The best way to be lazy about things that don't matter? Don't do them. Say no to them. By saying no, you automatically create a ton of active space in your life. But every time, I forget, I don't know who actually said this the first time. I've heard it like several places. But every time you say yes, you're saying no to something else.

Time is finite. And most yeses require time. So don't waste your valuable time on things that don't matter to you. We won't go into all the different versions of this because they are varied and very personal. But if you don't start learning to say no, you're going to have a really tough time creating space for the things that you want to say yes to. So start saying no. Number three. get others on board.

This is especially true if you live in a house with other people. You can say, I would like 20 minutes every morning to do a little yoga and drink my coffee on the porch and silence. Okay. But if you don't tell your family that, it will not happen. Like, it will not happen. If your spouse doesn't know, like, how much of a priority that is, or, like, if your roommate likes to talk in the mornings,

likes to have, you know, like breakfast chats with yours and thing. Or if your kids, like, don't have the fear of God in them to stay away from you during those minutes, you will not get those minutes. You're just not going to get them. Once you decide what space looks like for you, you need to get others on board. Yes, it's so they'll know to actually give you the space. But it's also to help keep you in check if what you're after is maybe a bit more challenging. The classic example of this, I would say, is just exercise, right?

When you do it, you love it. It's just the getting going that's really hard. And so this is, you know, the perfect example of having someone on board and having a workout buddy, right? You get someone else on board with your desire to create space to move and sweat and to feel alive if that's what exercise does for you. Otherwise, when it's time to go for your walk or to go to class or whatever, you're going find an excuse really quickly, right? But if you have someone on board with you, if you have a workout

buddy, it's much harder to say no. And in fact, you might even be excited to say yes. The same, I think, can be said for creative work, right? When you're a maker, you get stuck a lot of times. It can be very isolating when you're making something. You might think it's dumb and that you really should just be doing something else, like more worthy of your time. Get someone on board to, you know, send you like an encouraging text on the day that you have set aside to create like within that time that space right um have a team to cheer you on it might feel a little uh like i don't know silly and maybe even like self-indulgent but having people in your corner to help you fully realize who you are and to spend time doing that it is invaluable it's so important plus you know again

if your kids don't know that 8 a.m. it's like hardcore mommy time. They will destroy that time. They will destroy it and you will not be able to spend it on what you need to do. You can't create space in isolation. So go ahead and get others on board. Okay. So number one, decide what space means.

Number two, say no. Number three, get others on board. And number four, don't assume it'll just happen. I think this is the biggest downfall, right? when you have free time, if you don't like actively choose something that feeds your soul or your creativity or your need to sleep or whatever you really need in that moment, what you're going to do is just end up like scrolling Instagram and mindlessly eating chips standing up in the kitchen, right? Now, you love, you love chips.

You love Instagram. Those are not bad things. But just because you have done, just because you have done, just because you. have said no to some things just because you know your spouse has taken your kids out for a couple of hours so that you can have some space it doesn't mean that space is automatically going to be life giving you can take all the right steps to create space but you have to be intentional about filling it and that can be kind of difficult i think um mostly because of phones my i mean that's really what it's so it's such a siren song it's so alluring to just open it up and before you know it's like an

hour later and you have done zero things and you might even feel kind of bad about yourself. The key in space is you want to feel full and alive in that space that you've created. Again, that looks different ways for different people, but the feeling is the same. So know what those things are. Know what the things that make you come alive are and do them. They're always worth it, even if it might be a little bit harder to get started, then it would be to just like use your thumb and tap icon. for two hours, right?

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Join me for Cities of Aw, a special series on how our public spaces can spark awe, wonder, and enhance the quality of public life. You can find us wherever you listen to your podcasts. Finally, number five, which is about the most basic, it actually is the most basic thing in the world. It's breathing.

if we don't breathe we die right it's pretty basic life math but deep breathing like intentional breathing um i know it feels i don't know might sound a little bit like wacky and hippie-dippy and it's not really worth the time of doing it because you're already breathing like it doesn't matter right but deep breathing is one of the best things that you can do to help create space especially emotional space. Okay, so the times when I say, I just can't take this anymore, are usually in the moment issues, right? It's, there are kids yelling or kind of the regularness of life is poking me in the ribs

really hard and making me feel frustrated. And see, I can't, I can't take a break from being a mom. You know, that's always going to be a thing. I can take tiny breaks, but I'm always a mom. mom. I'm always a wife. My life is actually to create space for the people in my family, right? I make their food and wash their clothes and keep their daily lives afloat so they can have space to go to school, to go to work, to come home and play and rest. I am a professional space creator. If you are a mom, you are a professional space creator. but we don't always get a break from that okay i can't create space my way out of that you may have

a similar situation that has nothing to do with being a mom if your job may be that way you may be taking care of a parent who is sick or your house is on the market and you are basically in like house cleaning limbo and it's the worst right some things you can't create space your way out of at least not in really big chunks like we so desperately want sometimes. So if you want to create space where you can't actually do it, breathing is your friend. That is what you need to do. It slows you down mentally. It slows your heart rate.

It lowers your blood pressure, lower stress hormones. It gets your blood circulating even better. It makes your body work more efficiently. Like breathing is the simplest. It is so lazy genius breathing as you guys. breathing is the simplest change that you can make with a huge impact and we ignore it we just ignore it way too much um i have been doing Andrew wheel is I you say same W-E-I-L the guy with a white beard um I have been doing his 478 breathing technique and it is so great it's really calming and centering um it helps me get through

the moments of feeling like I'm going to throw a child out the window and it takes less than a minute it like that's a super good trade off so if you want to try it it's so incredibly simple um it's 4 7 8 those all you have to do is remember those three numbers 4 7 8 and what you do is you breathe in your through your nose for four counts you hold your breath for seven counts and then you breathe out through your mouth for eight counts okay um the length of the counts is not important but the consistency of your counting is what's important. So as long as the ratio of the 4-7-8 is the same, it doesn't matter if you count one, two, three, four, or one, two, three, four, as long as your rhythm of counting is the same for the 47-8. And so you do it four times, like a cycle is four times

of four-seven-eight breathing. So basically it's like four inhales and exhales, right? And then you do that like two or three times a day. And you can feel a difference. It's so, cool. It's so cool. It's very weird. It's very cool. So give it a try. But ultimately, just pause and breathe. I mean, really, that's what it comes down to, especially when you can't create space in a place that you so desperately need it. Breathe. Pause and breathe. Okay. So to recap, five very practical ways mentally to make space, right? Decide what space means. Say no. Get others on board. Don't assume it's just going to happen. And breathe. Okay. Now, I mentioned at the top of the show that this would be the last episode for a couple of months. This is indeed true. I had intentions

when I restarted this podcast several months ago that I wouldn't miss another week, that there wouldn't be seasons anymore. But things change, right? My life has been a lot busier in recent months than it usually is. I usually have a lot of space on purpose in my life because I don't like to feel stressed. I just turn into a crazy lunatic if I have too much on my plate. And I'm just not a good person. I'm just not a good version of myself if there's too much to do.

do. So I am an active no-sayer. But in the last recent months, in recent months, it's just been a little busier than usual. And it's all really good things. But it's time for a break. I just need a break. I need to create space. And so for this summer, that means not recording any podcast episodes or writing blog posts or sending lazy genius collective emails on Sunday. I am taking the summer off to hang out with my people and to breathe and to go to the pool with the kids and to not feel like every single nap time has to be filled with something very, very, like, you know, successful and, like, productive. I don't want to have to be productive all the time. I need a break from being productive. I mean, I love feeling productive. I love being creative.

that really does make me come alive as a person. But I feel a pull to let that rest for a little while and just not be Kendra the creator, not be Kendra the wife and the mom and the family space creator. So we're just going to take a couple months off. We will keep voting for our wonder women. You don't know what that is.

Let me tell you. So on the blog right now at the lazy genius collective. com you can we're voting bracket style for our favorite Hollywood actresses they're like seated there's a pool of 128 like it is so fun we've we've gone down I think we finished the first round at this point but um it is so much fun to go vote it's so much fun so we're gonna keep doing that for the summer until we get our champion um if you're new around here we did a bracket of guys that just finished up like this spring spring of 2017. Matt Damon ended up being the favorite lazy genius collective guy, which he is my favorite. So I got to say, you guys became

even more awesome when that happened. But the point is we will keep doing that. But everything else is going to take a break for the summer. So I'm going to really miss you guys. I'm going to miss this. I mean, it sounds like I'm dying. I'm not. Because this is just one of my favorite things to do, but even favorite things mean space, okay? And that is so true of you too. Creating space, it doesn't mean like cutting off all the terrible things that you hate. Sometimes it means just choosing what matters right now

and then making it happen. So this is me making it happen. This is me getting you on board. I'm getting you on board with the situation. But thank you for being such a good community. Like it's, I just really I'm so grateful for you guys listening and commenting and I'm following me on Instagram at The Lazy Genius. I'll still hang out there.

I mean, yeah, I do stories more than I post pictures because you guys who are like awesome photographers, I mean, props to you for being able to make anything look pretty. I am not that person. I don't have that eye. So I take 40 pictures before a good one shows up. But I am on Instagram stories a lot and I'll still be there because it's just too fun. But in terms of the blog and the podcast, we're going to take a little bit of a break. but thank you for listening and reading and all the things that you do and I can't wait to see you

again on those things up in September, first of September-ish, so that's the plan. But until then, I hope you guys have fantastic summers that you can create some space for yourself, whatever that means for you, and I can't wait to see you back here soon. So be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. And I will see you next time. 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.