Make Mondays Suck Less
Can a case of the Mondays be a good thing?
It’s late Friday night.
I just finished a long week of work and I’m on my way to the airport to pick up my wife’s relatives who are staying with us for the weekend.
We go to the beach, my son’s friend has a birthday party, we take the kids to art camp, and the whole family goes out for a nice dinner—and that’s just Saturday!
Sunday is more of the same. It’s great family time, but it’s far from relaxing.
My wife and I end the weekend in scramble mode after getting last minute notice that our youngest son’s daycare will be closed on Monday.
We both work full time and need a plan ASAP…
A case of the Mondays
You know that scene in Office Space when Peter gets accused of having a case of the Mondays and nearly loses it on everyone around him?
That’s how Mondays used to feel for me.
I’d regularly roll into my work week hot on the heels of a busy weekend, check my to do list for the most important tasks I needed to get done and realize I was already exhausted.
Conventional wisdom made me feel worse.
Look up anything on productivity and you’re bound to find someone telling you to always do your most important work first.
Does that ever work for you?
It doesn’t for me.
I find it hard to get into deep work first thing on Monday after a fulfilling, but very full weekend. Mondays used to see me struggle to ramp up my burned out brain and attempt to tackle my most important tasks right away.
I regularly failed, felt guilty and started my weeks with entirely the wrong vibes.
How to make Mondays suck less
I decided to ignore conventional wisdom.
Doing deep work on Mondays wasn’t working for me. So, I tried shallow work instead.
Here’s what I do, you can try it too:
Create a list of all your mundane tasks (need doing, but don't need maximum brain power to do them)
Jam them into whatever space you have available on Monday
Get as many of them done before end of day as possible
I focus on building momentum. Not on the most important, hardest to do tasks, but on all of the smaller ones that need doing and get in the way of bigger deliverables.
Examples of great mundane tasks include:
reviewing/providing feedback on documents
reading meeting minutes
clearing out emails
attending status meetings
driving your kid to your parent’s house because daycare is closed
Momentum Mondays
It’s much easier for your Monday brain to tackle mundane tasks first.
With them out of your way, your week will be clearer for you to dive into bigger deliverables when you’re better able to go deep.
When you accomplish a lot of mundane tasks on Monday, you’ll feel momentum that carriers you through to more successful weeks—that feel better too!
Today, when I hear someone call out a case of the Mondays, I smile. I actually like Mondays now that I focus on momentum.
I just wish our daycare had given us slightly more notice so the grandparents wouldn’t have had their Monday flipped upside down.
Try it yourself: Make a list of all the small tasks you need to get done and do them next Monday.
See how you feel when they’re out of your way, leaving the rest of your week free for your biggest tasks.
😂 P.S. A terrible joke, try not to laugh…
After Monday and Tuesday, even the calendar says WTF…