I get most of my ideas for A Day On from itches that need to be scratched, but are difficult to reach. The kinds of nagging aches that, if you found a way to soothe you would be that much closer to solving the mysteries of Life. Tonight, a Sunday night, I feel a twinge of despair that comes with knowing that deadlines loom with tomorrow being Monday.
One of the downsides to the nine-to-five lifestyle was that my anxiety was not confined to my forty-hour (yeah, right!) work week. Sunday-Night Depression is a common complaint among working class that really has no correlation among Creatives who are “off the clock.”
According to stories in the Boston Globe and theDenverChannel.com, Sunday night anxiety is a common complaint among American workers.
You will find over 500,000 results for “Sunday Night Anxiety” on Google, with expert opinions on why we have this malady and answers as to how to deal with it ranging from “reading the Bible” to engaging in “a long, hard hump.” Both of these along with the others, I’m sure will offer some temporary relief.
But, I want to look at this from the perspective of the A Day On philosophy. The easy answer, the one that all the experts point out, is that it is the knowledge that a shift in gears is about to occur. It will happen tomorrow, on Monday. We will have to leave this leisure behind and get back to the regular grind. One man interviewed about his bleak Sabbath’s remarked that Sunday dinner felt to him like a last meal for a man sentenced to death!
A bit extreme, wouldn’t you say! But, sadly, I know just what he’s talking about. A rush of anxiety feels to the person experiencing it exactly like the vertigo of stepping into our own death abyss. We’re not talking about a feeling of “wishing you didn’t have to go to work tomorrow,” but rather an intense feeling of despair. I would take it a step further and say that it more than we are not wishing to go to work tomorrow, we are actually mourning a day that slipped by without us having taken full advantage of it. We desperately cling to it like an unfulfilled life going too soon.
So, from the Day On perspective, a possible cure for this Sunday-Night Anxiety is knowing that Sunday was not wasted, but rather, well-spent. The Catholic (non-practicing though it may be) in me yells out an objection. But, it is forbidden to work on Sunday! Well, okay, as with all Biblical dictates, this one is open to interpretation. If Sunday is meant for worship and recreation, then go worship. And re-create yourself. This is the fundamental basis for A Day On: recreating yourself. Nothing makes me more carefree throughout the week than knowing I have put in a solid day’s work and have made some real, measurable progress. Sleeping well and being able to enjoy things other than work demand that I am satisfied that I have accomplished something for myself and to my liking. While many of the experts recommend intense and pleasurable activities that delight and exhaust you on Sundays, might it be that the cure for Sunday-Night Anxiety is not in finding ways to get Monday out of your mind, but rather in finding ways to better spend our Sunday’s.
As I write this on this last Sunday evening in November, I post it hoping that I have struck a note that rings true to the importance of asserting individuality through work.
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