I so badly wanted to love this book. On paper, I’m the target demographic - I’m a plannerholic who is always positive I’m one purchase away from getting my life together and MEETING ALL THE BIG GOALS. “The Lazy Genius Way” and “Lazy Genius Kitchen” were favorites that I have gifted to others. I adore Kendra’s podcast, and I like the way she thinks about using time and focusing our efforts. She is an absolute gem of a human, and I’m convinced she’s just as lovely in person as our one-sided friendship would suggest.

But. But. A sad but. Her message on planning didn’t translate well for this particular reader. There were helpful takeaways. Gentle nuggets of wisdom. She addresses the complexities of planning as a woman who experiences hormonal fluctuation. She talks about the double standards that saturate our patriarchy, acknowledging the real emotional and actual labor disparities. I found myself nodding a LOT. I just didn’t find myself taking many notes on what I learned or rethought.

I kept waiting for an aha moment that didn’t come, the same way it came with her other books. Maybe that was an unfair expectation on my part. The constructs she set up as a way to consider planning felt hard to follow and fell flat for me. They may be multi-dimensional and sing like angels for you. I hope they do. This is probably a great book - it just wasn’t great for me. And that’s okay.

Kendra Adachi's book is the voice of reason that so many women need to hear in their lives. I’ve been a weekly listener to her podcast for over four years and have read both of her other books. The copy I read was an advance digital copy, but I would highly recommend a physical copy of this book. This is the type of book that should be read slowly to digest the ideas. This would make a great book club book that meets for multiple sessions. I would have loved to have read it with others to help flesh out the ideas and how to practically implement them in my life. The quick reference guide at the end is an amazing summary of the principals of the books and really just pulled it all together. A physical book would have let me reference it often. This is the kind of book you are going to want to highlight. It is full of ideas you won’t read anywhere else. At the same time, as a long time listener, I thought the book did a great job of organizing and systemizing the ideas and mantras Kendra has been using for years. It is for the overwhelmed woman who needs practical ideas. It is kind and encouraging and helps the reader see that you are not alone. As a mom and wife who works three part time jobs and whose children part time homeschool, I found many ideas I could implement even while starting small as is suggested. Compassionate time management needs to be practiced more in our society today and this book shares how to do it.

Kendra Apache's THE PLAN was everything I'd hoped for, yet not at all what I expected. Ostensibly about planning for real lives being lived by real women, her excellent book is that life-changing cup of tea across the table from a wise, articulate, funny friend who tells it like it is, was, and can be. I loved every moment of it, even the parts that made me cringe a little in tirades about the patriarchy and menstrual realities. I loved it all, especially those parts, because they challenge my rock-solid, incredibly useful world view about how to live a meaningful and productive life and left me gape-jawed at the genuine truth of our unlimited possibilities. Hyperbolic? Perhaps. But my genuine experience with a deeply enjoyable woman through her words. I received a copy of this book and these opinions are my own, unbiased thoughts.

⭐️⭐️⭐️💫 3.5 stars

As always, a refreshing perspective from Kendra Adachi, The Lazy Genius. I appreciated the emphasis on focusing on where you are (day, year, or season of life) and aligning your hopes, dreams, and to do lists accordingly.

“Your new goal is to live an integrated life that starts exactly where you are” “it’s not optimization or efficiency or taking on the world.”

Thank you NetGalley and Convergent Books for the advanced digital copy! Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

I did not realize how much I needed this book until I read it. Adachi’s premise is that traditional productivity advice simply doesn’t work for most women, and most certainly not for women entrenched in caregiving roles. (Parents, for example.)

My parenting days are far behind me, but I still found much to use in my current season of life.

Adachi offers a framework or approach for not only doing the important work, but also navigating the unexpected. I love her idea of honoring seasonality— not only the seasons of the year but also of our lives and roles.

Since reading the book I’ve embraced the idea of starting where I am on any given day and working on the most important things from there. It’s helped me get through a busy time with more grace (for myself) than I usually inhabit. I recommend it for busy women everywhere.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this eARC.

Kendra Adachi, known for her practical and compassionate approach to life management, brings her signature “Lazy Genius” philosophy to the realm of time management in The PLAN: Manage Your Time Like a Lazy Genius.

This book is a refreshing departure from traditional productivity guides, offering a more humane and realistic approach to managing one’s time.

Adachi structures the book around the acronym PLAN, which stands for Prepare, Live, Adjust, and Notice. Each section delves into practical strategies and insights that help readers align their time management practices with their personal values and life circumstances. The book is designed to be both a guide and a companion, encouraging readers to adapt the principles to their unique situations.

Adachi’s writing is warm, engaging, and often humorous. She adopts a conversational tone that feels like advice from a trusted friend rather than a strict instructor. Her ability to blend practical advice with personal anecdotes makes the book relatable and inspiring. The inclusion of real-life examples and light-hearted commentary helps demystify the often daunting topic of time management.

One of the standout features of The PLAN is its emphasis on self-compassion and flexibility. 

The PLAN is about living wholeheartedly and intentionally. Adachi explores themes of self-awareness, adaptability, and the importance of aligning one’s actions with their values. 

The PLAN: Manage Your Time Like a Lazy Genius is a must-read for anyone overwhelmed by traditional time management systems. Kendra Adachi offers a compassionate and practical alternative that empowers readers to take control of their time in a way that feels authentic and sustainable.

Whether you’re a busy professional, a parent juggling multiple responsibilities, or simply someone looking to live more intentionally, this book provides valuable insights and tools to help you manage your time like a Lazy Genius.

I was looking forward to this time management book, and while a quick and easy read, I wasn't really left with any solid takeaways and feel this will probably be totally forgotten by next month. Totally agree with another reviewer that this was both too much and too little information, and didn't really feel like it will stick. I enjoyed the Lazy Genius Kitchen, but this one just didn't feel cohesive and just slapped together without a solid plan. It was an easy read, but by the end I was just bored and ready to move on.

This was great! Everything Kendra touches is good so this was no exception. Love a time management book that is actually practical. Great book!

It never occurred to me that the reason time management books weren't helpful was that they were written by men, for men, and women's experience is so different. I loved Kendra's previous books, and this one is great as well. It explains so much about women's situations, and it gives an easy to follow, relatable framework for evaluating what you have going on and how to accomplish things. I love the section of pep talks, all the advice, and the Quick Reference section at the end. This is the book I didn't realize I was waiting for.

I was sold on this book from the first page. This is not your average time management book. It's the first of its kind and it is stellar, per usual from Kendra (the Lazy Genius.) If you're a woman you need this. The end.

I'm a fan of the Lazy Genius Way. I was really anticipating the advice Kendra would give in The PLAN because she tends to bring the broad picture into focus with practical advice. I felt a bit overwhelmed by the PLAN. There are steps that are pulled from her Lazy Genius Principles, but the advice is general to reach a broad audience, rather than specific to application. The book is introduced with the discussion of time management books being primarily written towards men who don't have to deal with hormonal cycles each month. Interesting and helpful fact. But, the repetition of the steps along with the repetition against the patriarchy was tiresome.

If you're looking for ways to simplify life, I'd stick with the other Lazy Genius books. If you're implementing those effectively, you'll almost be putting the PLAN into action.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest feedback.

Thank you, NetGalley, Kendra Adachi, and Convergent Books for the review copy of The Plan!

I have been looking for a gentler method of planning from the moment I started using my first Franklin Planner! As a chronically ill, low-energy person, none of the methods out there worked for me, and the hustle culture certainly did not resonate with me, even on my good days (which would invariably be followed by several bad days, thanks to the hustling). The Plan takes into account anything that might impact one's ability to get things done, including one's biological gender (because men and women's bodies do work differently) and energy levels. The discussion of the effect of a women's cycle on her energy levels and productivity is especially informative, particularly because Kendra relates it to the seasons of the year, which can affect everyone.

I do take issue with Kendra's insistence that the current planning/hustle culture is focused on and designed for white men. I think, rather, that is is focused on and works best for persons with high energy levels: men and women of every color and race who simply need less sleep, less rest, and have more “get-up-and-go” than others. Anyone outside of that group would benefit from a planning system that accounts for natural fluctuations in energy and productivity, and Kendra Adachi's The Plan does just that. If you've been frustrated that your plans never quite fit into your available time; that you don't seem to be able to get it all done; that everyone around you seems to be managing “just fine,” this is the book for you.

This book, oh my lord. It feels weird to gush about a time-management book, but I have never felt so seen and affirmed by *anything*. The PLAN is written specifically with lady-people in mind, for the way or brains and bodies and minds work and the ways we’ve been socialized, with *specific* attention on the ways that most of the advice we get about time management, goal-setting, and productivity are just. Not. Built. for our lives and the spaces we inhabit. The suggestions will feel familiar to readers of Adachi’s fantastic first book, The Lazy Genius Way (also brilliant), or listeners of her podcast (also fab) but they are specifically, deeply rooted in a kindness-to-self perspective that is just so necessary, especially those of us late-wave GenX-ers who quickly figured out that feminism had, by the nineties, gotten us to the point not of having it all, but of having to DO it all and also never complain, but then didn’t know where to go from there. And she folds those of us with neurodivergence right in to what she has to say about how to shift your thinking away from productivity culture and into being productive in a way that is personally meaningful and doesn’t wear you down right out of the gate, by focusing on what actually matters to you in a given situation or season of life, and then building from there. Adachi does this with so much grace and humor and kindness, and without making promises about quick fixes. The PLAN is a process, a way to settle into the fact that life is a perpetual work in progress, a way to find some stillness in the chaotic ocean of daily life, and a way to learn to trust yourself and your body even if you’ve always been taught that you can’t or shouldn’t. I feel like a book about getting organized maybe shouldn’t move you to tears on a commuter train, but this one certainly did me. Adachi has made I think a conscious effort to fold in women in a wide range of life stages and situations - so there’s advice that might be most helpful to moms, but also advice that’s helpful to ladies with no kids but long commutes or stressful jobs, and ones with caregiving responsibilities, and many of the other daily-life challenges that we all face. This book isn’t promising you that you’ll set the world on fire, or retire at 40 with a frillion dollars in the bank, or that your days will be perfect, glassy surfaces of uninterrupted productivity where you silence notifications for hours at a time or rigidly block out “deep work” or create complicated workflows or to-do lists that magically tick along towards finished. She’s offering the world we already live in and a way to learn to adjust to the fact that it isn’t static from day to day or week to week, we can’t control everything or sometimes anything, and curveballs don’t just come from the mound but from all the bases and sometimes the outfield or the grandstand or the bleachers or straight out of the heavens. This is so practical, so necessary, and so validating. I can’t say enough nice things. If you are struggling with your self as you are, with your own imperfections, with feeling like everything is out of control, with feeling like your brain went on a long walk in a post-apocalyptic hellscape in the pandemic and never came home, I truly think this book will help you, even if your only takeaway is “Hey ma’am, I see you over there, and you are not alone.”

The PLAN is a productivity book for women. I'm not big on productivity books in general, I find that a lot of them are the same and make me feel worse about myself rather than being helpful. I really liked Kendra's approach to different phases of hormones. The idea being that when you have energy, use it but don't feel bad when you don't was resonant. The pep talks were probably my favorite part of the book.

I liked Kendra's other books much more. Her Kitchen book was very useful.

Thank you to the publisher for the advanced reading copy.

Thanks NetGalley for the ARC of this book. As a fan of all lazy genius content, I find that some of the books can be repetitive of the podcast content. It’s easy to understand why they’d be shared in both places, but it does give you a bit of “haven’t I heard/read/seen this somewhere before” vibe.

The book content, however, was made for me. I love a good self-help book and her research and statistics about men writing most of them was eye-opening. I’d say I usually ignore those and read women-written books 95% of the time. I was glad to see some call outs in this book that convicted me and think this was an easy, kick-in-the-pants read that I may pick up when I’m feeling especially helpless and without a plan of my own.

I’m excited to go to the Chicago stop on her book tour and get a physical copy! There are many pages I was to highlight and bookmark. My favorite call out was this:

“You want to make hard things a little easier and enjoy life more often than you endure it.” It rings really true for how I want to spend my time.

Thank you for the opportunity to read this early. The author of The Lazy Genius provides time management tips to try to simplify one’s life and make things less overwhelming while living the life you want.
One thing I didn’t love is the use of so many acronyms. There were also parts that were repetitive. Maybe the author just really wanted the reader to focus on those points and thought by doing this, they’d stick?
I feel like this is the type of book that one would need to use as a reference book and go back to certain sections if wanting to implement them into your life.

Big-sister energy meets time management! A refreshingly practical guide for those tired of productivity overload. With humor and simplicity, Adachi helps readers discover how to prepare, live, adjust, and notice what truly matters—right now, not someday. Find freedom from the hustle and embrace what works for your life today!

I wasn’t even 10 pages in when I realized, "Oh—this is the management companion for every millennial and Gen X woman who obsessed over the Barbie movie!" It has strong "it is impossible to be a woman in a man’s word” vibes. This is the productivity guide for the hormone-tracking, energy-identifying, self-compassion-giving woman who craves a balanced life—and Kendra truly delivers. The steps are so accessible yet undeniably insightful. The go-with-the-flow girlies wouldn’t typically pick up this self-help book, but you should! I was a little overwhelmed by all the acronyms 😅 but there’s no other book as wittily engaging and breathtakingly grounded in self-compassion and practical wisdom.

I primarily read the ebook because I wanted to take more notes on my kindle. But Kendra’s voice is so soothing on her podcast that I couldn’t resist listing along to some chapters 🥰 Both format are super engaging!

Perfect for you if you like:
Living fully in the present, not for an imaginary future
Small, practical steps for where you are
A productivity guide that feels more like coffee with a friend
Insightful, transformative tips

Similar to:
Tired of Being Tired by Jess Connolly
Do Less by Kate Northrup
The Lazy Genius Way by Kendra Adachi

The Plan is such a refreshing approach to determining the best way to manage our lives. It doesn't tell us specifics regarding routines and the "best" or "proper" way to do things. Instead, it gives you the tools to decide how to set up the things that you need structure around. While initially, you may see this as a shortcoming in the book's premise, as you continue to ingest the information you realize how freeing and truly helpful the Adachi way is. It is not a planning system as much as a mind-shift system. This means that it can apply to any and all, and adapt to each person's needs. Other planning/organization books are either "right" or "wrong" for you and help or don't. You could need to buy several books to find the one that works for you and then you could need to buy other "right" books later as your needs change. That won't be the case with The Plan. It won't be about "replacing" it as your life shifts but about re-reading to soak in the message that will help guide you down the path that works for you in the now. While I was excited and honored to get an advanced digital copy, I look forward to getting my hands on my physical copy so I can wrap my hands and mind around the printed words of wisdom and further use them to illuminate answers to my planning needs to add order to my life.

Kendra has done it again! This is a wonderful book. It is very much written for a female audience, but it is a read that will empower, enrage, and force you to re-think how you go about the development of your life and plans.

Like all of Kendra's work, this is written from an understanding of that you need to first know what matters most to you. I appreciate that about this book.

I also appreciate that this is written from the perspective of a woman and is deeply critical of the existing productivity space as it's not built for women (and especially those that are moms).

I love how I could hear Kendra’s distinct voice in this. Her writing is so concise, so specific, and so right. The whole book feels like getting a hug and practical advice from a bestie. I always feel affirmed after listening to Kendra’s podcast, and this book made me feel both supported and encouraged.