Killing the Sunday Scaries
Tomorrow comes today
As the sun sets over a majestic I-10 afternoon on the drive back from Austin [read: are we fucking there yet?] a little bit of dread overcomes me. It’s that existential crisis many of us suffer from on Sunday afternoons, particularly after a fun weekend. It’s the knowledge that “real life” begins again in a few short hours and many of the tasks we wanted to accomplish over the weekend were not accomplished.
Although slackers stuck in a teenage state of mind like myself suffer from this more often than well-organized adults, it’s a strangely universal vibe. I experience it often as a procrastinator in a professional role that only rewards proactivity. I live in a perpetual state of the Sunday Scaries; knowing there’s shit that needs to get done and feeling like the walls are caving in over the weight of responsibilities waiting to get done.
But here’s the deal: the Sunday Scaries are as real as the monsters under our beds. They’re a figment of our imagination constructed from the idea that there is such a thing as a work-week and a weekend. Sure, as a society we have agreed that the weekend are the two days the majority of us will rest but as any shift-worker knows these are just arbitrary days. The difference between Sunday and Monday, if any, is that Monday forces you to realize that you need to get shit done. The Sunday Scaries force you to think of the present you will face on Monday full of responsibilities you’ve been able to put off for a couple of days.
I’m a believer that proactivity is one of the most sincere tools for self care as it forces you to take control of your future. My mom tried teaching me this when I was a kid with my homework. She’d tell me “If you get your homework done as soon as you get home on Friday you get to enjoy your entire weekend stress-free.” I don’t think I took her up on this challenge often, but when I did, I found it to be a true game-changer in my enjoyment of the weekend. It changed my present from one with the impending doom of needing to do math to one in which I was truly care free.
Treat tomorrow as if it’s already happening because in an equally beautiful and fucked up way, it is. Do your homework and make a habit out of doing all of your homework as soon as you get home (or stay at work longer to finish it). You’ll find that by the time next Sunday afternoon comes around that sense of dread will be replaced by a feeling of fulfillment thanks to a restful weekend with no *stress.
*Unless you’re stuck on the interstate because some asshole couldn’t be bothered to use their blinker and got rear-ended. Ugh.