Hi everyone, ☺
I hope that the beginning of your week is going well. And if it hasn’t gone well, then is post is definitely for you!
Monday is almost everyone’s least favourite day of the week. It’s the day that you have to return to work after a nice weekend break, it’s the first of five days of waking up early – just thinking about it makes you yawn. Unlike Mondays, Fridays are that breath of fresh air where you are full of energy to do whatever you want on your two days off, and wish that the weekend was more than two days because Mondays always gives you that ‘I just can’t’ feeling. Everyone lives for that Friday feeling, but we all hate the Monday blues. And to top it off there’s always that one person who always seems to have that Friday feeling even on a Monday, ever wonder what their approach is to not cope with their Monday blues?
How Not To Cope With The Monday Blues
We can handle Monday’s in two ways; the right way, and the wrong way. The right way is to just take it in your stride and try to make the best out of a bad situation. Keep telling yourself it’s just one day and it will be over before you know it. I like to fill my Monday’s full of different tasks, so I’m too busy to even notice the time fly by. You should approach the day filled with positivity and try to find a few reasons to smile and be happy because it’s Monday. Perhaps you give yourself a special breakfast on Monday to cheer you up? That’s something to look forward to and get you up in the morning!
There are loads of right ways you can cope with the Monday blues, but I want to talk about how not to cope with this feeling. Why? Because the wrong way can set you up with a really bad week that gets considerably worse every day. Lingering negative thoughts can grow, and you end up in a depressed state all because of one day of the week.
So, what shouldn’t you do to cope with the Monday blues?
First off, don’t smoke away the pain. This is something I see all too often from co-workers or random people on the street. People use cigarettes as a smoke screen whenever they’re feeling down or stressed. For most people, they’re at their most stressed on Monday mornings as they go back to work and deal with any work that built up over the weekend. They smoke and smoke, thinking it will relax them, but it just makes things worse. The Monday blues turn into the Tuesday troubles, then the Wednesday woes, and so on. Smoking doesn’t make things better, it’ll just make your stress worse. You develop addictive tendencies, become dependent on cigarettes, and wreak havoc on your physical/mental health. If you’ve been using cigarettes as a crutch every Monday morning, then you need to stop. There are campaigns nowadays to help you stop smoking through your local pharmacy, so it’s easy to get help. Don’t set your whole week on a course for distress by smoking to hide your Monday blues, It’ll never work and will just kick start an addiction.
What else should you avoid doing to cope with your Monday blues?
Well, you should also avoid binge eating to make yourself feel better. I know, I said you could give yourself a special breakfast as a treat to look forward to. But, there’s a difference between maybe eating pancakes or a cooked breakfast, and eating loads of bad food during the day. Their excuse is ‘but it’s Monday’ as if they need this food to survive. In reality, you’re just feeding that depressed state you may be feeling on Monday morning. You start to feel bad because you ate loads of dirty food, and it sets your week on the wrong path. Binge eating will only help you get fatter, not happier.
Is that it?
Not just yet. I want to end this post on by saying that you should try to avoid any kind of destructive behaviour when you’re feeling down on a Monday. Yes, it can be a very stressful day, and a lot of people can suffer on Monday mornings. But, destructive behaviour like smoking or binge eating will only accentuate these feelings of stress. Get your week off on a bad foot and it becomes very easy for every other day to fall like a set of dominos.
So, if you wake up with a feeling of dread every Monday morning, don’t let it get to you. Approach the day with a smile on your face and try to pick out the positives wherever possible. This helps you set yourself up for a more positive week that leads to a healthier body and mind.
I hope you all enjoyed this contribed post on ‘How Not To Cope With The Monday Blues’! ☺♥
I tend to drink way more coffee on a Monday – which probably isn’t a great solution either. I just keep telling myself that once this day is over – I’m one day closer to the weekend!
I know how you feel Megan, lately I’ve been trying to mix things up and try a bit of self-care on a Monday evening (a relaxing tub bath, painting my nails trying out something new etc.) so that I actually look forward to Mondays, thats really helped me out quite a bit. Maybe you should try something similar so that you start enjoying your week days just as much xx