The Lazy Genius Podcast - #425 A Pep Talk for the Middle of the Year Blur

Episode Date: July 7, 2025

Is anyone else feeling blurry? I’m feeling surprisingly exhausted and a little slower than usual. The summer stretch is lovely in its spaciousness but can feel oppressive on a dime because it’s a blur that will never end. So today I want to remind you of a few things that will hopefully help your middle of the year blur. Helpful Companion Links Share your thoughts with us via our 2025 Listener Survey! Order my new book The PLAN or ask your library to consider carrying a copy. The Essential Calendar (use code LazyGenius for 10% off!) Sign up for the Latest Lazy Listens email. Grab a copy of my book The Lazy Genius Kitchen or The Lazy Genius Way! (Affiliate links) Download a transcript of this episode. 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

Welcome aboard via rail. Please sit and enjoy. Please sit and stretch. Steep. Flip. Or that. And enjoy. Via rail, love the way. Hey there. You're 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 425, a pep talk for the middle, of the year blur. Is anyone else feeling blurry? Just yesterday, I was walking around Target with a friend and our daughters shopping for, you know, lip gloss and bananas like you do. And my friend and I, who are, we're similar in age and life stage working rhythms, all the things. We're both like, holy moly, are you so tired right now? Like we were both surprisingly exhausted, feeling a little slower than usual, not sure what was going on for our people even that evening. let alone next week and just felt all around blurry.

And I think that summer does that to us, especially people who have kids around. Now, not exclusively, but the demarcation of the season is quite stark with kids, plus you're still being pulled in numerous directions by multiple people, and it's with less daily structure than normal. The summer stretch is lovely in its spaciousness, but like on a dime that spaciousness can feel oppressive because it feels like a blur that will never ever end.

There's also the inevitable energy around whatever is coming next, no matter how far away it is. We just, we all tend to do that, at least sometimes. Once we hit July, which we now have, school feels around the corner. And that makes the fall close, which means the fall and winter holidays are close. and all of a sudden we are worried about Thanksgiving in July. If you have read my book The Plan, you might recall me sharing a story of when I was sitting by the pool in July. I was doing a brain dump because I was feeling kind of blurry and stuff.

And I wrote down in my brain dump Thanksgiving dinner because I was already thinking about it. The slope is a slippery. And I think that's just part of the deal around this time of year. So today I just want to remind you of a few things that we'll. hopefully help your middle of the year blur. Get a little bit clearer. Here's the first thing. Time moves faster in our heads than it does in real life. Your middle of the year blur, it might be caused by anticipation of the next thing. And a fairly normal next thing to be thinking about right now is the

start of the next school year. Our first day back is August 25th. Some of you might be a lot earlier than that. and I mean frankly it's not that far we can see the first day of school on our essential calendar that's hanging on the wall in our house like we can see it it's coming but it's still six weeks away now you might be like six weeks oh no six weeks there's nothing that's fine I will allow that but also I want you to think about six weeks ago that was the week before Memorial Day and in North Carolina, we still had multiple weeks of school to go. Now, I'm not saying that you will feel the same way that I do, but six weeks ago feels like a lifetime compared to six weeks from now, right? Time moves faster in our heads than it does in real life, especially when the blur has us

like a little off our game and worried that we won't have enough time, which leads me to the second reminder, you probably won't have enough time. Now time for what? I don't know. That's your own list. But we all have some list in our heads about what we hope to accomplish in a season, especially the summer, and then how prepared we're going to be moving into the fall. I cannot tell you how many people I have heard over the years say that this year is going to be different. This summer, where I'm going to plan better, I'm going to get the projects done. I'm not going to feel rushed, getting everyone ready for school. I'm not going to feel stressed about this at all. This year I'm going to be prepared. Even with lazy genius principles and strategies and

mindsets and all the things, you're still going to feel stress sometimes, y'all. You're going to. Now, you can definitely make things easier, but you cannot eliminate stress altogether. In fact, there are simply times of the year and times of life that are going to be stressful and overwhelming, they are going to sneak up on you no matter what you do. You're going to feel rushed and underprepared no matter how prepared you are. So let's do a quick review of why preparation is important, but why it cannot be the only thing. Aw, isn't something we need to travel for. It's something waiting for us in everyday life, whether in a city street or a moment with a work of art. I'm Dr. Keltner, host of the Science of Happiness podcast. 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. I created something called the Plan Pyramid, and it is a visual that can help you gain perspective on managing your time in a reasonable, compassionate, helpful way. So we start building this pyramid by, let's throw a triangle shape on the ground. Okay, that's where we start. This is the base of our pyramid. And that base is what matters to you in your season of life.

Not forever right now. Now, right now, the majority of you are living in the summer. A majority of those people are with kids and you have needs, many, many needs with your many children. And you also have anticipation of what's coming next if it's kids at school. So what matters during this summer? It is going to be individual to each person listening. And it could be a lot of different things because of how we all spend our summers and who we are, right? But the benefit of naming what matters in your season. So right now, this summer, this summer, this July, naming that is so huge. It impacts how you make decisions and how you spend your time.

It also helps keep what doesn't matter in its proper place. It's like, well, this doesn't matter right now. One of the things that matters to my family this summer is independence. My kids are 15, 13, and 9, which is such a wild thing to say out loud. My oldest is learning to drive. My youngest, a weekly babysitting gig, like two different families. My kids are doing more chores without supervision. They have more freedom on how they spend their time. This is a summer of embracing independence. That word alone, independence, has changed multiple decisions that I have made this summer. It has helped guide me in how to approach my kids and their time, their requests, you know, how they choose to fulfill their responsibilities that I give them and they're doing it in a way that

is different than I would choose? What matters this summer is that my kids feel empowered in their independence and my choices are going to follow that, right? So what matters in your season of life? It has a huge impact. So that's the base of the plan pyramid. What matters most during this particular season. Next, we have the three sides of the pyramid. And those are three words from the acronym plan. Prepare, adjust, and notice. Prepare and just and notice are the three sides of the pyramid. And they all work in equal measure with each other, right, to make that shape. One is not bigger or stronger than the other. They're all equal. And those three things together help us with the point of the pyramid, both literally and figuratively, and the point is to live. That is the

L of the acronym. If you want to really live your life, if you want to be present and enjoy yourself and do what matters and not get hung up on lofty expectations, if you want to remain kind to yourself and to others, if you want to make a difference in this world, you have to prepare, adjust, and notice an equal measure. everyone is naturally gifted at one of those three everybody every single person and i will say many of you who are listening are gifted at preparation but focusing only on preparation and not equally on noticing the nuance of what's going on and also how things might need to adjust away from what you prepared you will keep spinning and spinning and running and running.

You will run a race that has a moving finish line, thinking that one of these days you will prepare enough to not be overwhelmed anymore. Listen, reducing stress does not come because you're adequately prepared. Reducing stress comes because you're cultivating the skills of adjusting and noticing in addition to preparation. You're doing all three because stress is often caused by unmet expectations. by preparation that didn't go according to plan. You know, you think you've crafted this way of handling moving into the school year.

But if you hold tightly to that without being willing to be flexible and adjust, if you hold tightly to that preparation and that expectation and refuse to release what you prepared in light of what you're noticing to be true now, you know, that you're in this situation, you will remain tightly wound on the verge of pissy at all times. And you're not really living. Living requires us to be okay that things aren't always okay. There's an ease and contentment around failed plans. There's an acceptance of seasonal stress.

And there's kindness when we hold too fast to the things that don't really matter. So back to that second reminder, you're probably not going to have enough time to do all the things that you hope to because life is life and momentum is hard and sometimes things shift beyond your control. You also definitely won't have enough time to adequately prepare for the next season in such a way to remove all stress because life will be stressful no matter what. It might be like a little less, but it's going to be a little stressful. you can't hack your way to making every season that transitions into the next one free from friction

and stress. It's just not going to happen. And while this is just anecdotal evidence that I'm about to say is still pretty obvious to me that when you instead focus on creating ease in your own body and soul, in your expectations, and your posture towards stressful situations, you're actually going to experience less stress. It's not about your preparation. It's not about manufacturing the experiences. It's about how you think about it, how you think about your preparation. The overwhelm often happens within us. So adjusting our expectations and being at peace with a stressful season and tending to it in really small ways one thing at a time, rather than trying to control it completely from the jump, it will make your season easier.

So you won't have enough time. And that's actually okay. And the third reminder for this middle of the year blur is to focus on contentment, gratitude, and joy. Contentment, gratitude, and joy. When we're blurry, it's hard to see, like literally. Right now I am extra blurry because of some personal things going on. and my blur, it can feel numbing sometimes.

I'm sure you've experienced that where you feel like you're going through the motions or like you're living a week's worth of life in one day and you're in a bit of a day with how time is going. Like last night I sat down to write in my one-line-a-day journal. Like I do every night before I go to bed. It's next to my bed. And I read the previous day's entry. and I was like, that was yesterday.

What is happening? It felt like four days ago, right? And when that happens for me, I can personally feel detached like I'm outside of myself a little bit. I'm just like going through the motions. And when that happens, I have to cling to contentment, gratitude, and joy. I remember that good is here right now. I look around at the small moments, the small interactions, and actively say thank you for them.

I remember what brings me joy and I move towards those things. Contentment, gratitude, and joy are all grounding and very clarifying. Like they help us get back to life when we feel like we're floating out of it, you know? They help me see when things are blurry. Now I can't see everything. But I can see today. And today's enough. So this middle of the year blur, it will likely come.

Just write it out. Don't try and control it. Instead, keep in mind that time moves more quickly in your head than it does in real life. Six weeks ago was probably so much time. Six weeks from now doesn't have to feel like it's tomorrow. Remember that you're not going to have enough time. And let that be a comfort. Preparation is not going to save you.

But balancing that preparation with adjusting and noticing, it will help you tend to whatever matters most in your season. And then cultivate contentment, gratitude, and joy. Those three things will bring an ease to your spirit that you only wish preparation could. And that's your pep talk for the middle of the year blur. again if you want a reminder about the plan pyramid as it relates to like general time management not just this particular season you can get a copy of the plan written by me anywhere you get your

books in fact i think still today it's been on sale on a candle like the amazon ebook version of the book it's been on sale for 299 and there's a chance it's still on sale right now so maybe you can jump on that i think this sale is supposed to end today so if you're listening or on Monday, July 7th when this episode comes out, go check real quick. Is it still there? And you can grab it. You can even gift e-books, which is cool. So if you have a friend who you're like, you know what, she would really, she could really

use this. This would be really encouraging to her. You can even gift it. So, but that book is available anywhere you get your books. Okay. I would like to ask you guys to do something for us. And there is the possibility of a prize at the end of it. So it is time for our annual lazy genius survey.

where we want to hear from you about how this podcast and the emails I send and my books and all the things can be the most beneficial to you. If you would be willing to take maybe five minutes or so to fill it out, we would be enormously grateful, so grateful. So Team LG is gathering for our annual team retreat in just a couple of weeks. And the information from this survey is crucial, absolutely crucial in the decisions we make for the upcoming year and there's some big ones coming. Potentially, there's some like, you know, different deadlines and things that we're like,

are we going to do this again? And we want to make sure we hear from you before we make those decisions. We really need your opinion. It matters to us so much. Also, as a thank you for filling out the survey, we're doing a giveaway. So there will be five random participants. As long as you give us a way to contact you, which is in the survey itself, you are going to receive.

five of you will receive a $100 gift card to the store of your choice, either Target, Amazon, Walmart, R-E-I, Sephora, Bookshop.org, or you can even use it in a lazy genius store if you want to. You can, like, get two playbook bundles instead, you know, like if you would rather do that. And then you could have playbooks for like next year. You could give one to a friend, so that could be fun. Now, you can choose what you would like when you fill out the service. survey. Even though we will have a lot of people fill this thing out, somebody has to win. So it might be you. Either way, your feedback, it meets the world to us. So thank you for taking

the time to fill it out. The link will be in the show notes of this episode. Or if you got the latest lazy letter last week, you are tongue twister. You are going to find a link in that as well. So if you haven't quite read that yet, you can know that it's there. And then if you want to access the show notes to get the link. Just look at your podcast app like right now. Different apps have different ways of displaying those show notes, but it's underneath the episode description. You just click the link that says fill out the survey or whatever, fill it out real quick, and then you can be entered to win $100 to get something fun. And we are so deeply grateful for your opinion. Okay, before we go, let's celebrate the lazy genius of the week. This week

it is Catherine Duncan. Catherine writes, I use what can I do now to make life, easier later with clothes that need mending. Whenever I put on clothes and realize there is a hole, a loose button, etc., I instantly get out painters tape and put it next to the hole or defect and add it to my repair pile in my closet. When I take the pile of clothes to the tailor, the tape saves me from searching around for the spot to repair. Everything is already marked so I don't have to remember what's wrong with each item and they know exactly what to fix. What a great simple idea. If you were someone who goes to the tailor or like even sows yourself and you have a pile of clothes to repair. I bet this idea is a game changer.

We always think we're going to remember things, right? It's like the lazy genius of the week from a few weeks ago, and it was someone who had like a little notebook, like a TV show notebook for her family, so they would remember what they were watching on what streaming service, because we always think we're going to remember stuff. And then we do not. All our like mental grocery lists are proof of this. We don't remember. So making note of what matters, while it's fresh on our mind is so helpful. So thank you for the great application of the magic question, Catherine, and congratulations on being the lazy genius of the week. This podcast is part of the Odyssey family and the Office Ladies Network. This episode is hosted by me, Kendra Adachi,

and executive produced by Kendra Adachi, Jenna Fisher and Angela Kinsey. Special thanks to Leah Jarvis for weekly production. Thanks y'all 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. like you are 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.