Beat the Monday Blues
Mondays can be very heavy on the mind. The start of a workweek tends to trigger overwhelming feelings of anxiety, sadness, or stress.
Alexander Kjerulf, an international author and speaker on happiness at work says “The ‘Monday Blues’ describes a set of negative emotions that many people get at the beginning of the workweek if they’re not happy at work”.
To help you better get through the dreaded Monday Blues, here are five (5) tips to try out:
- Identify the problem.
“The first thing to do is to ask yourself what’s wrong,” Kjerulf says. If you have the Monday Blues most weeks, then this is not something you should laugh off or just live with. It’s a significant sign that you are unhappy at work and you need to fix it or find another job. This may seem radical, but there is literally no substitute for peace of mind.
- Prepare for Monday on Friday.
To battle Monday morning anxiety, be sure to leave yourself as few dreadful tasks as possible on Friday afternoon. Rita Friedman, a Philadelphia-based career coach says “By taking care of the things you least want to handle at the end of one work week, you’re making the start of the next that much better.”
- Unplug for the weekend.
If possible, try to avoid checking work e-mails through the weekend, especially if you’re not going to respond until Monday anyway. Friedman says “It can be tempting to know what’s waiting for you, but drawing clearly defined boundaries between work and personal time can help keep things in check. When you leave the office on Friday, leave your office problems there and focus on enjoying your time off.”
- Get enough sleep and wake up early.
Go to bed early on Sunday night and be sure to get enough sleep so that you wake up feeling well-rested. Friedman says “If you’re only running on a couple of hours of sleep, it’s unlikely that you’re going to feel good about going anywhere when the alarm goes off Monday morning.”
- Keep your Monday schedule light.
Mondays are traditionally busy days at the office. A good strategy is to keep your Monday schedule as clear as possible. Ryan Kahn, author of Hired! says “When you’re planning meetings ahead, try to schedule them for Tuesdays and Wednesdays. This will help you to come into Monday with more ease from the weekend.”
We hope these tips can help you take on the weeks ahead with ease. Mental health is a hot topic for us at TW and we hope to help our readers discover and better care for their mental health.
There are lots to learn on our day out in Lagos for women’s mental health in the video below
Click here to find read more about the unforgettable day.
