EP. 194.5 — Monday Motivation with Kendra Adachi

Jenna [00:00:03] I’m Jenna Fischer. 

Angela [00:00:04] And I’m Angela Kinsey. 

Jenna [00:00:06] We were on The Office together. 

Angela [00:00:08] And we’re best friends. 

Jenna [00:00:08] And now we’re doing the ultimate Office rewatch podcast just for you. 

Angela [00:00:12] Each week, we will break down an episode of The Office and give exclusive behind the scenes stories that only two people who were there can tell you. 

Jenna [00:00:19] We’re the Office Ladies. Hello!

Angela [00:00:24] Hi there! 

Jenna [00:00:26] Oh, this is an exciting day. 

Angela [00:00:29] We are so pumped. Jenna and I are smiling ear to ear. 

Jenna [00:00:34] This is a special episode of Office Ladies. It’s a Monday motivation. And we have a very exciting announcement, which is why we’re smiling so big. 

Angela [00:00:44] Do it, do it! Say it, lady! 

Jenna [00:00:46] Okay. We are growing our company and we are now the Office Ladies Network! 

Angela [00:00:53] We’re a network! 

Jenna [00:00:55] Yes! 

Angela [00:00:56] It’s so wild even to hear you say it. 

Angela [00:00:59] Okay, here’s the thing. You guys know years ago when we started this rewatch podcast, Jenna, we didn’t know. We knew we were going to watch an episode of The Office every week, right? 

Jenna [00:01:09] Yeah. 

Angela [00:01:09] We didn’t even know if we’d make it through them all. 

Jenna [00:01:11] We didn’t know. 

Angela [00:01:12] But we are doing it. And you guys have been with us every step of the way and we so appreciate it. And, you know, we just love doing this podcast. And we started thinking about what’s in the future for Office Ladies? And well, we were like, maybe we can help our listeners find people that we also love who podcast. 

Jenna [00:01:34] That’s right. We want to stay in this business of podcasting. We want to expand our company. And so we have started the Office Ladies Network. And the first podcast that we are adding to our network is called The Lazy Genius. I know a lot of you already know about the Lazy Genius, especially if you follow me or Angela on Instagram. I found the Lazy Genius podcast about four years ago and I was immediately hooked. And as Angela can tell you, I wouldn’t shut up about it. 

Angela [00:02:04] That’s true. 

Jenna [00:02:05] And so when we were talking about expanding into a network, it just made so much sense to reach out to Kendra and ask if she would like to join us in this adventure. 

Angela [00:02:16] You know, Jenna, you always say that Kendra would be like if you and I had a best friendship baby. I don’t know. 

Jenna [00:02:22] Yes, we say she’s like the missing link between the two of us. She’s all the fan of Angela mixed with all the spreadsheets that you get with me. You know? She wants to help you organize your life in the way that works best for you. But she also wants you to have fun and be relaxed while doing it. 

Angela [00:02:40] But the best person to tell you about the Lazy Genius is the Lazy Genius herself, Kendra Adachi. And we’re going to talk with her about some of our favorite Lazy Genius principles. And Kendra is going to tell us where The Office characters fall on her scale of lazy to genius. I cannot wait. I really need to hear her thoughts on Phyllis and the rest of the Office gang. I mean, can you imagine Kendra on the party planning committee, Jenna? 

Jenna [00:03:08] Oh, she’s the thing we’ve needed! 

Angela [00:03:10] I know! 

Jenna [00:03:11] Well, let’s take a quick break. And when we come back, Kendra Adachi, the Lazy Genius herself, is going to be with us, giving us some Monday motivation. You don’t want to miss it. 

Angela [00:03:21] Yeah. You’re going to love it. 

Jenna [00:03:33] Kendra! Hello! Welcome to Office Ladies! 

Kendra Adachi [00:03:36] What a treat. Oh, my goodness, this is so exciting! 

Angela [00:03:40] Oh my God, I’m so excited. 

Jenna [00:03:43] We are such big fans of yours, and we can’t believe we get to have you all to ourselves today. 

Kendra Adachi [00:03:48] Oh, I could say the literal same thing. This is amazing. This is so much fun. Thank you for having me. 

Angela [00:03:54] You know what, I realize as I say this is I’m going to sound like such a cheeseball, but when you’ve heard someone in your head, like on your AirPods or just in your car for so long, and then you’re sitting there looking at the person, I realize Jenna and I do this too, but I’m just looking at you and I’m like, that’s her voice and that’s her. And I can see the mouth it’s coming out of! 

Jenna [00:04:14] She’s here!

Kendra Adachi [00:04:18] I do the same thing. Audio is like such a it’s such a sweet thing to be able to, like, listen to someone. I just it’s- you become friends with people so quickly, and so I feel the same. I’m like, look, it’s your it’s your faces saying the words. Like right now. I know, it’s so fun. 

Angela [00:04:35] Well, you know, Kendra, we love your podcast, The Lazy Genius. And we would love for you to tell our audience what is a Lazy Genius? 

Kendra Adachi [00:04:44] A Lazy Genius is someone who is a genius about the things that matter, and lazy about the things that don’t. So the thing that the problem is that there are a lot of voices that are telling us all the different things that should matter, and we want to be like good rule followers and like decent people. And we’re like, okay, well, this should matter. I’ll work hard on this. I’ll do this thing. And then we just like end up with adrenal fatigue. It’s like a whole thing. So I want to give people permission to choose what matters to them based on their own lives and their own seasons of life and their personalities and their families and all of that, and then put energy into things that matter to them. Like, it’s not that you have to like “messy hair, don’t care” your entire life away. You can care about stuff. You can be good at stuff. Like, I think that’s a wonderful thing. You want to be a genius at certain things in your life. But in order to do that, you also gotta let some other stuff go. You got to be lazy about some stuff. And I just give people principles to help do that in their own way. And then also I have this podcast that kind of breaks it down topically to kind of help you be a Lazy Genius about whatever the thing is. And so it’s a I’ve been doing that for, I’ve been teaching people how to be a Lazy Genius since 2016. 

Jenna [00:06:05] Well, Kendra, the very first podcast I heard of yours was called something like How to Organize Paper In Your Home

Angela [00:06:13] Oh she talked about that so much, Kendra. 

Jenna [00:06:15] All the paper that comes in your home. And this was my introduction to you. I didn’t really know what a Lazy Genius was yet. And so when I clicked on that podcast, I thought you were going to literally prescribe to me what to do with all the papers that come into my house; all of my kids artwork, all of the school forms, all of the, you know, insurance follow up from when you go to the doctor, all the things that accumulate in a pile or multiple piles. And to my surprise, you did not tell me what to do with the paper. You asked me what mattered to me about these piles of paper and and it was it was such this light bulb for me. Because you’re right, I can I watch Instagram and there’s all these videos of, like, special frames that I can put my kid’s artwork in and I’m like, should I be doing that? Should I be buying the frames where I cycle the different paintings in and out? I tried it, I never cycled a single thing. And what I learned from your podcast, Kendra, was that a lot of that paper didn’t matter to me, and I could let it go. It was okay if we looked at a piece of the artwork and we appreciated it, and then we let it go. And it was it was great. It was very freeing because you helped me name what did matter to me about it, and then you helped me allow myself to be lazy about the other parts. And it was transformative. It really was. And it was so simple. But you do that on your podcast all the time. You did one about packing school lunches that changed my life. 

Kendra Adachi [00:07:52] I’m so glad. And here’s the thing that I think is so vital to this is your decision to go, we’re going to look at this paper and go, yes, this was so lovely. Into the recycling it goes. You are just as- because we’re talking about like in that context, kids artwork, like you’re just as good of a mother as someone who cycles through the artwork. Like we have this sort of, it’s almost like a gas gauge, you know, of, like, we have to be all things we are- it’s like a full tank. In order to be a full tank of this kind of person, you have to care this way. And that’s just not the way it goes. And so I just love that you’re like, we’re going to we’re going to look at this and go, remember this? This was so fun. But we don’t have to keep it in order for that experience to matter. So I, I’m so I’m so glad. You’re right. That’s and that’s what the the entire show, all 300 something episodes at this point, it really does- I really want to help you see more than help you figure out what to do. You have to see it your way first before you can do anything anyway. So I just try to set you up with like, the right pair of glasses, you know? 

Angela [00:08:57] What I like about it too, is that you let everyone approach it their way. It’s not- there’s no one path to like, how do we save art? How do we appreciate our kids art in that pile of paper? And I never feel like whatever choice I make is less than. Because it’s my choice and it’s it’s what makes us happy as a family, what makes us work. And I just love that because, you know, sometimes people will tell you how to do something. And there’s this implied thing of like, and this is how it’s done, but that’s not the case at all. I just love it. We love you. Wear your fan club, lady. We are your fan club. 

Kendra Adachi [00:09:34] It’s so nice. It’s so nice. You guys, Angela just called me lady. 

Jenna [00:09:39] You’ve been ladied. 

Kendra Adachi [00:09:42] It’s like Paul’s handshake on Bake Off. It’s like I just got ladied. 

Angela [00:09:47] You got the Paul Hollywood. 

Jenna [00:09:50] Kendra, we’re really curious, how did you become the Lazy Genius? 

Angela [00:09:55] Oh, yeah. What’s your origin story? 

Kendra Adachi [00:09:57] My origin story? Well, I was bitten by a radioactive spider. No, I, I actually, I have always been a very responsible old soul. Like, my friends in middle school and high school called me mom. I was voted most dependable by my senior class. Like, I was not fun at parties, but I was like, really I could really help you figure out a homework strategy that would get you through school. So I’ve always really loved finding ways to do things. I love finding systems for things and making things kind of efficient. But I had not yet gone to therapy, and so I really started out just being a natural, trying to be a genius at everything. And what that meant was that I didn’t try anything new. I just was like, I’m going to if I can’t be awesome at this, I’m not going to do it. And so I, I swung this one direction of like, I’m going to be amazing at everything. And then I had my first kid and I realized like, oh, wow, trying to be good at everything when you have a human baby that you have to tend to, this is tough. This is a tough look. And but I tried real hard. I had a y’all I had a calendar on my fridge that was a year. It was a full annual January to December, and I made a cleaning schedule- 

Angela [00:11:17] For the year? 

Kendra Adachi [00:11:18] For an entire year on a year that I had a baby. What on earth? That is- that is genius energy going in the wrong direction. That’s genius energy without any sort of tempering. That’s like, wow, girlfriend, you need to calm down. You need to go take a nap. Well, then I had a second kid two years later and I swung the other direction where I was like, well, I don’t care about anything. If I can’t make any of this work, I’m not going to care about any of it. And then I was also kind of sad because, like, I care about things. I want to do good work and things. I want to like put time and energy into stuff that matters to me. But I didn’t have the language for that difference yet. So I was just- I was just like swinging like this rough, caffeinated pendulum of like, genius, lazy, genius, lazy. Like, it was really intense. And then I had a third kid and I guess I have, like, these big life realizations when I have children- and thought, there’s got to be a better way. Like, I don’t have to keep going to these extremes. What if I was a genius about the things that I care about but I could let the other stuff go? And I was doing some work on the internet already, just in a different category, and and just pivoted the business to this, where I started to talk about this. Because this was such a common problem among women especially, because we’re told to care- you, you do it all, you have it all, you be it all, you know? And we can’t. We we literally can’t. But the the alternative is not to just give up. It’s not try hard or give up. Those are not your two options. Your option is you can be a Lazy Genius. So that’s where the actual kind of business started is I wanted to create a language for people and permission for people to not do what I did, which is lose their minds trying to create an annual cleaning schedule or never cleaning their house at all. You know, it’s like, huh, I feel like there’s a third- there’s a third path here. Let’s find it. 

Angela [00:13:12] And who knows what’ll happen if you have a fourth baby. 

Kendra Adachi [00:13:14] Listen. After- I know- after this podcast set in, I was like, okay, babe, I think snip snip, no more babies. I think we’re set. We did it. 

Angela [00:13:24] We did it. We found that middle ground. Okay, so Kendra, we’re very excited to ask you about The Office characters and where they would fall on your scale of lazy to genius. 

Kendra Adachi [00:13:37] So I think a great way to kind of humanize this idea is I want to actually talk about Angela. 

Angela [00:13:44] Angela Martin?

Kendra Adachi [00:13:45] Angela Martin. Yes. 

Angela [00:13:46] Okay. 

Kendra Adachi [00:13:47] Because listen, Angela is all genius, no, lazy. Like we all know this. Like she’s just this is how it’s done. This is what you should care about. And no one else is going to tell her otherwise. Right? Like is Angela lazy about anything? Like I don’t know. Maybe fun. Maybe she’s lazy about fun. 

Angela [00:14:08] Maybe she’s lazy at fun. No, I think she’s all genius. Except when she moved- she had that, that patch where her and the senator broke up and she wasn’t sure where she was going to live and she came into the office all disheveled, her hair everywhere with, like, a giant like one of those, like, big 7-Eleven Slurpee cup things. Do you remember it? 

Kendra Adachi [00:14:28] I never loved Angela more than in that moment because it was like, oh, she’s breaking, she’s doing it. She’s breaking the facade. 

Angela [00:14:39] And I will tell you that screengrab image of how she walks into the office that day, people send it to me, like how I’m feeling right now, and I’m like, oh, okay. I’m a I guess I’m a meme. But yeah. 

Jenna [00:14:51] That was Kendra after her second child. That meme sums it up.

Angela [00:14:53] Yeah, I would say I think that- And then when she broke, she went hard the other way. 

Kendra Adachi [00:15:00] 100%. Okay, Jenna, where do you think Pam is on the Lazy Genius scale? What would you say? 

Jenna [00:15:07] You know, I think she is a pretty good Lazy Genius. I’ll be curious what your assessment is, but I feel like she has a pretty good balance. And she’s also relatively flexible. 

Kendra Adachi [00:15:22] Yeah, I think the same. I think she’s like if you’re looking at it like a sort of like a gas gauge with genius on one side and lazy on the other, I think she skews more genius than lazy, but she’s like much more- she’s a lot closer to the middle. And I think one of the biggest reasons is that I think she actually really wants to be a Lazy Genius. It’s more that she really cares what other people think. A lot. And when we think we care- it’s totally normal to care what other people think and want to adjust and respond to that- but like if you’re doing that over and over again at the expense of what matters to you, that’s why I, like we all love when she walked across the coals, because it was like, I’m doing this for me. Like no one’s telling me that- I’m going to do this for me. And that and then, like, coming alive in that moment, like, was such a such a lovely thing. But yeah, I think, I think Pam’s actually like, she’s not, in my opinion, the most lazy genius person in the office, but she’s pretty close. She’s actually pretty close. I actually said- I said out loud one time when I was watching The Office, I said, man, I wish Pam would read my book. I think Pam would really benefit from reading it. 

Angela [00:16:31] Who do you think is the most Lazy Genius? Because you said you you had one? 

Kendra Adachi [00:16:35] I do, I think it’s Phyllis. 

Angela [00:16:38] Really? 

Kendra Adachi [00:16:39] I do. 

Jenna [00:16:40] Oh, I’m seeing it. 

Kendra Adachi [00:16:41] I think it’s Phyllis. 

Jenna [00:16:42] It’s coming into focus for me. Yes. 

Kendra Adachi [00:16:44] Because she’s so, like, confident in what she wants to do and how she does it. I actually think this is- this kind of a straight thing. I think Phyllis is the most Lazy Genius because, yeah, she cares where she needs to care. She doesn’t mind letting things go when she wants to. Like she’s going to pick her fights with Angela in whatever way. You know, she’s like, I’m not- I don’t have time for this. Whatever. Like just leaving. But I also think someone who else is kind of a Lazy Genius, but who doesn’t have, like, a Bob Vance to love him into confidence is Toby. I think Toby, if if loved well,  I think Toby would be such, such a great Lazy Genius. You know who is like almost doesn’t fit? There are three people who almost don’t fit on the scale at all, and it’s Michael, Ryan, and Kelly. Because they, all three of them, in my assessment- and I’m curious what you think about this- they want to be geniuses about the things that matter to them, but those things matter to literally no one else. And so they’re just like bulldozing through the room and you’re like, what are we even? Well, no one else cares about this right now, Michael, what are we doing? What’s happening? It’s so like it’s so unsettling, which is what made it great TV. But, yeah, I had a hard time characterizing the three of them. They’re like all three below the scale. They’re like, in their own… 

Angela [00:18:09] Subset? 

Kendra Adachi [00:18:09] Their own world. Yes, they are. 

Angela [00:18:12] Well, I think they definitely want to be geniuses about things they think are important, but like you said, aren’t. And then they have no follow through. So that’s the problem. They they’re not going to do any work to get to that genius place. 

Kendra Adachi [00:18:27] Yeah, it’s pretty great. 

Angela [00:18:28] I think two geniuses that end up together are Dwight and Angela. 

Kendra Adachi [00:18:32] Yes. 

Angela [00:18:33] And I’m always curious when people say, do you think Dwight and Angela are still together? How do you think that’s going? I’m like, they either like, had a War of the Roses moment or they are running the country. You know what I mean? Like…

Kendra Adachi [00:18:50] That’s right. There’s not a lot of middle ground there. It’s they’re taking over everything or they’re no longer together. 

Angela [00:18:55] Yeah, exactly. 

Jenna [00:18:58] Well, Kendra, you have done this amazing thing where you have created for us a visual scale of where all of The Office characters fall on the lazy to genius spectrum, and that is over on your website, lazygeniuscollective.com. Everyone should go check it out. Angela, you’re going to put it in our Instagram Stories. 

Angela [00:19:17] I am. And shout out to Iliana who helped us with the artwork for that. But it’s great. Office fans, you need to see it. 

Kendra Adachi [00:19:25] It’s pretty fun. 

Jenna [00:19:26] Well, why don’t we take a break and when we come back, we are super excited to share about a particular Lazy Genius episode that changed our work life, me and Angela. And it also deepened our friendship. And we want to talk to you about it. 

Angela [00:19:39] We’ll be right back. 

Jenna [00:19:50] We are back and Kendra, we’re super excited to share about how one particular episode of The Lazy Genius transformed our work life! Angela, tell Kendra what it was. 

Angela [00:20:00] Okay, well, it was episode 297 titled Five Things for More Ease at Work. And it really, really changed how I approach emails, which was a stumbling block for me for a long, long time. Kendra. So long. I’m sad I hadn’t listened to this episode years ago. I’m so thankful. 

Jenna [00:20:21] I’m sad she hadn’t listened to it years ago. 

Angela [00:20:22] Just, just wait. Jenna’s going to let you know. But it really changed how I approach emails so much. And it was so obvious once I listened how I was looking at it wrong. Anyway, I just want to share with you about how that affected our work life. 

Kendra Adachi [00:20:38] Yeah. So what was? Because I have no idea what- I did not know about this. So this is a this is a surprise to me. So I’m so excited. So what was your relationship with your inbox like before the episode? And maybe how that was in work. Like what did it look like before and what does it look like after? 

Angela [00:20:53] Okay. Well. This is this is like, show me the scary nook in your closet. But, okay, here’s the thing. Right now it says I have 2333 emails. 

Kendra Adachi [00:21:08] I’m not going to cry about that. It’s all fine. 

Jenna [00:21:10] It gives me heart palpitations. 

Kendra Adachi [00:21:12] That’s a big red number, Angela. 

Angela [00:21:14] Okay, it’s a big number, but it was like 7000. So there are a lot of like backlogged emails now that are just spam and crap that are taking me forever to get rid of. But whenever I have like a long flight or something like that, I’m going through and I’m unsubscribing from things and, you know, stuff, just the clutter. But where it really helped me was with my day in, day out work emails. Jenna and I at any time have multiple projects going on, and the toughest thing for me wasn’t just so much how much I hate email because I hate email, but trying to understand what was a priority when you have multiple projects and multiple things. Because I’m much better at school emails. They sort of make sense to me because they have a real timely manner to them, and it’s very easy for me to understand what’s a priority and what’s not. But with our work emails, that was a struggle for me. And you talk about five top things for more ease at work, and the first one is prioritize. Then it’s essentialiize, organize, personalize and systemize. But because I couldn’t prioritize my work emails, I couldn’t get to any of the other steps. And I was drowning in them. And it was affecting my work life and Jenna’s work life when she needed something that was a timely answer for her but I didn’t understand it was timely. And that, you know, that really was something that she shared with me, that finally she hit her breaking point and was like, Ange, I spent all this time on this email, you haven’t checked it for like four days, and that’s not okay. I put a lot of work into that. And I was gutted because I love her so much, and I take such pride in our business partnership and our friendship. And so for me, the idea that me not understanding that she needed an answer so quickly, and then me not being able to find it because now it had like fallen into the abyss of opened emails and I panicked. And I also felt horrible because I wouldn’t ever want her to not feel valued in our relationship in any way. And me not checking that email, but it was- it was a buffet. It was years and months of me not being on top of this. 

Kendra Adachi [00:23:33] This is such a great example of something that happens in relationships all over the place. When you and someone that you love have different priorities about the same thing, and you haven’t named that yet, it does. It can cause so much chaos. And you’re like, what just happened? It’s just fill in the blank. It’s just email. It’s just laundry. It’s just pick up. It’s just whatever. But that’s why that first step is to prioritize. Because if you try to like, organize your inbox before you name what matters about it and before you actually a centralize and be like, what’s in the way here? If you try to organize things you don’t need, you’re going to crawl in a hole, you’re going to go off the grid and you’re never going to be on email again. And it’s so it’s so frustrating when, yeah, when we have a different priority than someone we love, but we just haven’t said it out loud yet. So the saying it out loud, it sounds like that was like a huge thing is being able to name that together, I love that. 

Jenna [00:24:29] Well, for me, you know, the thing is, is that I know in our business, from the moment we started the business, that we had the same interest in the business, we valued it the same, we have the same like work ethic. We put family first. We have this creative energy. So all of our broad strokes are very aligned. But when we started to get into the nitty gritty of how we like to each work, how we’re most effective doing the work, we’re so different. And I know that Angela is best with text and audio message. 

Angela [00:25:09] I’m a dinosaur. I just want to talk to you. 

Jenna [00:25:13] Yes, this is the best way for her to process is to speak it. I love to type it and see it and read it over and get it perfect and then send it. And the problem was that for the most part, I could adjust how I worked to this texting audio way of messaging. And we were making it work and we figured it out. But from time to time I needed it in an email. That was the best way for me to organize my thoughts and for me to also like, have it as a tangible thing that I could find later. Because my email system is very clear to me and I don’t lose things in an abyss in the same way. But what was getting frustrating is if I sent Angela an email, in order to get a response, like a few days later, I would have to text her that I sent her an email and maybe resend the email to put it at the top of the 7000 messages. And I eventually said I don’t think that’s fair. 

Angela [00:26:15] It’s horrible. It’s horrible.

Jenna [00:26:16] I don’t think I should have to do that. 

Angela [00:26:19] Remind you mind you that I already emailed you. 

Jenna [00:26:22] Yes. Because that’s extra work for me. 

Angela [00:26:25] And I really heard that. I heard that. And and I hadn’t thought about it because we text so much, you know, and sometimes we’ll be like, oh, remember that thing we talked about last week or so and so emailed us, we haven’t answered that. So like it was sort of jumbled and all that. But what I wasn’t seeing was how it affected her on a regular basis. You know?

Jenna [00:26:46] I knew that it wasn’t because Angela didn’t care. It wasn’t because she didn’t value me or our work. I knew that this was in the nitty gritty. This was in the like emails don’t work for her. And so when she listened to your episode and figured out a way to make emails work for her, and now my emails, like get seen, it was so transformative and exciting. Because I told Angela it used to be like, if I wrote her an email, it could be similar to me typing on or on a piece of paper, crumbling it up and throwing it out my window. 

Angela [00:27:19] Oh, that’s so bad. I’m so sorry. 

Jenna [00:27:23] Like if I wrote her an email, I would need to print it out and, like, run it over to her house. You know what I mean? Like, I’m exaggerating, obviously, but it’s like I knew that this was a system problem. This wasn’t a caring problem, you know? And that’s important, too. You know, when you’re in a relationship with someone, if you’re able to see like, oh, this doesn’t mean this person doesn’t care about me or doesn’t value me, but our systems are not in sync. But we need to figure something out because we work together. 

Kendra Adachi [00:27:53] Right. 

Angela [00:27:53] Yeah. And we work really well together. And we are really great creative partners. So just some of the tidying of business, I don’t know, I had to figure out for myself. And here’s what I did. I had listened to a different episode of yours a while back and it came back to me. It was in episode 254; Chores I Do Every Day. And I am really good at zoning and batching. You know, like in my house, I’m very good with tangible clutter, you know? And so I had remembered that episode when I was listening to Five Things for More Ease at Work. And I thought, you know what? There’s got to be a way that I can zone and batch my emails the way I do the clutter in my house. So I started watching YouTube videos on how to organize your email, and I forget the fella’s name. You only saw his hands. I never really saw his face. But anyway, wherever you are, that guy that made an email video was really helpful. 

Kendra Adachi [00:29:01] Just your hands. 

Angela [00:29:02] But in Gmail you can make labels and folders, and you can assign emails that all those email addresses will go into different labels and folders. And I know a lot of you out there listening already know this. And you’re like, yeah, duh. But I had never done that. So all of my general emails all went into one spot. And that is every project I’m working on Office Ladies, our live show, our book, plus anything I’m doing with Baking with Josh and Ange, plus the school, three kids. At one point I had a kid in elementary. I had two in middle school. Those are two different principals and oh my gosh, so many emails. Plus anything I’m doing outside of this, like if I was doing a TV show or I was, you know, auditioning for some commercial or all of those emails. And I took a day and I went through and I found all my contacts and I made all these labels and folders. So now I have one that is just Office Ladies. And what’s great is I can look at Office Ladies like today I can check my Office Ladies folder, I have no unopened emails, guys. 

Kendra Adachi [00:30:11] Wow. 

Angela [00:30:12] So I might have 2333 and that big general craziness. But in my Office Ladies folder I have zero unopened emails. And yesterday I only had 12. And 12 is a lot easier to find and tackle. And also what I learned is what my business partner needs- I don’t need this. I can send you an email and and I know Jenna will have read it and sometimes I don’t need an answer. But I think one of the things that Jenna likes is that I read it and I say, got it. Let me look that up. If I don’t have an answer yet. Because I used to not answer an email until I had the answer. And sometimes that process takes a day or two. So then it’s two days that Jenna hasn’t even heard from me, that I’ve read it. So now I just I’m very big now on confirmed, received, will look into it. 

Jenna [00:31:03] I have to say, I don’t know if you can hear it in Angela’s voice, but she’s super excited about her emails and her batching. And this enthusiasm, it’s like, this is not something that was just for me. This is like a thing that she’s excited about now. And so I think that’s another reason why it’s working. You know? Because you talk about your emails all the time now! It’s really fun! I’m like, welcome to emails! 

Kendra Adachi [00:31:30] Welcome to emails.

Angela [00:31:33] I really hope someday I don’t ever have to send another email. But I’m realizing now that’s probably not going to happen. 

Kendra Adachi [00:31:40] Well, you have named… This is a great avatar. It’s such a great example of things that happen in our lives all the time. Like, it’s not that you have to just be like, well, oh well, I got 7000 unread emails. This is just the way I am. Or that you have to commit to inbox zero at all times. Right? There is such a wide middle to most of the problems that we have. And it just comes down to naming. Jenna, you said it so well. It’s like this is not a caring problem. This is a systems problem. I would guess, Angela, that if you’re naming what matters to you about email, actually your partnership with Jenna matters more to you than your comfort around the email. 

Angela [00:32:28] Yes. 

Kendra Adachi [00:32:29] Like you’re willing to have some discomfort and some like, oh, I hate this, but I’m going to do it because Jenna matters to me more. 

Angela [00:32:37] Yes. That’s exactly right. 

Kendra Adachi [00:32:38] So that’s the thing. So if you name what really matters about something, and almost always when we’re in conflict with another person, what matters the most for the people both is connection with each other. Like there’s very little that you’re going to put over connection with that person. So it just opens the door to like, okay, well, what matters the most to you about this? What matters the most to me about this? And we can find a way to make this work. You can take the skills that you have in batching and zoning with your clutter. Like you can do that to go like, oh, that’s a system that kind of works. Let’s see if I can apply some of these same principles to this other thing, rather than being like, this is the seven step program that I have to follow that this random dude told me to do. You know? Like it’s this is just- I love this so much. Because this is what it’s about. It’s about naming what matters to you. It’s acknowledging what matters to someone else that you care about or you work with or you live with or whatever, and then kind of slowly and kindly finding a way that works for everyone. And now you’re excited about email. Like, what a world. What a world this is.  

Angela [00:33:47] Well, I think it’s a stretch to say I’m excited about email. But I am happy to have these folders because I like folders. I like putting things in their place. 

Jenna [00:33:58] It’s like the baskets of the computer. 

Angela [00:34:02] Yes.  

Jenna [00:34:02] And you love a basket. 

Angela [00:34:03] I do love a basket. Kendra, you know, when you talk about your papers and all the papers, so I had, you know, had in our friendship, I had a baby first. And then when it was Jenna’s turn, I said, listen, they’re going to give you a lot of papers at the hospital. So many papers. And you’re not going to know where all to put all the papers, and then you’re going to need them when you leave, and there’s going to be stacks of papers. And I gave her a basket. It was a basket that someone had given me a baby gift in at the hospital, like little wash rags and diapers all rolled up in little bows. And I taken everything out of it and put all the hospital papers in it. And I walked out of the hospital with a basket of papers, and I gave Jenna that same basket. I was like, trust me, you’re going to put papers in it. And Jenna, you were so cute. You were like, said to your husband, you’re like, Lee, we have to have the basket for papers. 

Jenna [00:34:54] I did! Well, Ange, you might not remember this, but when I broke my back in New York and they sent me home from the hospital, we got back to the hotel and you were there and people had sent, you know, fruit baskets and cupcake baskets. You dumped everything out of one of those baskets, and you put all the hospital papers in it. You did. You love a hospital paper basket. 

Angela [00:35:20] I just needed an email basket. That’s what I needed. An email basket.

Jenna [00:35:23] And now, you have it! Now you have your email baskets! 

Angela [00:35:26] I have it!

Jenna [00:35:27] I have one question for you, Angela. Would it bring you great joy if the folders on an email looked like little baskets? 

Angela [00:35:35] Oh, yes. 

Kendra Adachi [00:35:36] Oh, you can change the iconography. 

Angela [00:35:36] Yes I would. I would like that. 

Jenna [00:35:40] Can someone do that for you? Imagine how excited you would be to put things in it! 

Angela [00:35:44] I would be excited to put things in it. And then I’d also be excited when it was empty. Like the trash basket on your desktop. I get very excited when I empty it. That would be a tangible gift to me. 

Jenna [00:35:57] I think someone needs to make this because it might transform other people’s lives as well. If you could pick what the thing is that you put stuff in. 

Angela [00:36:06] Yes! 

Jenna [00:36:08] Kendra, thank you so much for coming on this special Monday motivation of Office Ladies today. Everyone, you can find episode 297: Five Things For More Ease At Work, and listen to it. Maybe it’ll transform your life. But Kendra, you also have a new episode out today. It’s episode 351 and it’s called How to Lazy Genius Your Whole Life, which is kind of the perfect episode if you’re a new listener. Kendra, you said it’s kind of a beginner’s guide to the Lazy Genius, but also a good reminder of the whole reason you’re doing this, which is, like you said earlier, you want to make this a lifestyle and a mindset, and not just a random choice that we make every once in a while. 

Angela [00:36:49] You also had a great episode last week called Starting Fresh When You Can’t Start Over. It’s all about the January pressure to change everything, and your episode is so great because it really encourages people to start small. 

Kendra Adachi [00:37:02] And that’s one of the- there are 13 Lazy Genius principles that are in my first book that are basically the the foundation of everything I talk about. And one of the principles is to start small, and it’s the most annoying of all the 13. It’s so annoying. Nobody wants to start small, including myself. You don’t see any progress right away. It just feels like it’s not really going to do anything. But honestly, those small steps over like even a long time, those are the things that stick way more than these big systems that we built over three days in January that then fall apart. So I do love that this is a good reminder of like, hey, we’re going to start small with this, and that is actually going to make it more doable and accessible and probably even work in a way that you want it to work, even though it’s annoying. Starting small is so annoying, but it really does help. So yeah, I’m excited for y’all to listen to that. 

Jenna [00:37:50] Kendra, I have your sticker that says Start Small on my computer. 

Kendra Adachi [00:37:56] That’s so fun! 

Jenna [00:37:58] And it’s crazy because I lost my computer on a flight. I got off the airplane once and I left my computer on the plane, and I can’t believe it, but Air Canada found it. It had flown to multiple other cities, but they managed to find it. And when they asked me, how can you identify your computer? And I said, it has a sticker on it that says start small. And they said, we found it. 

Kendra Adachi [00:38:27] We’ve got your computer. Oh, that’s so great. That’s incredible.

Jenna [00:38:31] And it was all because I was so committed to the Lazy Genius principle of starting small. 

Kendra Adachi [00:38:36] Yeah, yeah. 

Jenna [00:38:37] And I love it. 

Kendra Adachi [00:38:38] It’s a good one. It’s a good one for people who are who skew genius, who lean that way a lot, and who are like, let’s roll, let’s go, let’s get it all done right now. Because we can run that direction until we we fall down sad and crying. And, and so start small kind of helps us temper that a little bit. It’s like the kindness little break tab, you know, it’s like, hey, let’s- we’re all right. We’re all right. Start small. Bringing it back to the podcast, that’s really why I love this work that I do, because the 13 principles and the way the Lazy Genius method, all of these things are really versatile no matter how you operate. No matter how you think, no matter what your life looks like, no matter what season you’re in, like they really are tools for everyone because they’re personal and versatile and they work. They are not like self-help steps that only work for a certain kind of person. They’re they’re much broader and kinder than that. So it’s really fun work to do because it helps anybody who is interested in being helped and wanting to see their life this way, it really does help. It really does work. So it’s a it’s such a fun treat to be able to share that with the Office Ladies listeners, this is so fun. 

Angela [00:39:41] Well, you’re so, so fantastic at it. We’re so thrilled to have you on Office Ladies, and we can’t wait for people to hear your episodes. 

Jenna [00:39:49] Yeah. We are so excited for you to be joining The Office Ladies Network! 

Kendra Adachi [00:39:53] I know! 

Angela [00:39:53] Yeah, we’re a network! We’re a dang network, y’all. 

Jenna [00:39:57] Now we are! 

Angela [00:39:59] Yes! 

Kendra Adachi [00:40:01] I love it. 

Jenna [00:40:01] Everybody, please go subscribe to the Lazy Genius. And guess what? You will hear us on Lazy Genius next week! 

Kendra Adachi [00:40:08] That’s right. 

Jenna [00:40:09] We’re going to be your guest! 

Kendra Adachi [00:40:10] I know. Everybody’s going to lose their minds. It’s so fun. It’s so fun. Thank you all so much for having me. 

Jenna [00:40:24] Thank you for listening to Office Ladies. 

Angela [00:40:27] Office Ladies is produced by Earwolf, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey. 

Jenna [00:40:31] Our senior producer is Cassi Jerkins. Our in-studio engineer is Sam Kieffer. Our editing and mixing engineer is Jordan Duffy. And our associate producer is Aynsley Bubbico. 

Angela [00:40:40] Our theme song is Rubber Tree by Creed Bratton.