Relax, Rejuvenate, & Refresh: Three Ways to Shake Off the Weekday Business Blahs (and still feel prepared for the week ahead)
Friday night doesn’t come soon enough, and before you know it, Monday morning looms in the back of your mind. Weekends might be the only time you have for home repair issues. Rounds of cleaning, yardwork, helping kids catch up on homework, and running errands can all eat into your weekend time.
For many people, it feels like their favorite weekend moments always melt away before they get the chance to really enjoy them. This problem is compounded if you already feel burned out at work. You might know you need to prepare for the week ahead, but maybe you can’t get yourself to do one more thing.
Been there?
Try these three easy ideas for mixing week-ahead prep work with weekend fun.
Unwind with a Family Walk
Personal relationships are one of the top indicators for happiness, so keeping your loved ones close should be a top priority. The trick is learning to relax together in ways that feel beneficial to all of you.
Starting out the weekend with Saturday morning walk can be a fun way to reconnect. Put on something like your Gravity Defyer athletic shoes and hit the sidewalk. Leave the electronics behind, use eye contact, smiles, and hold hands if you can.
Simple touching like hand-holding has the power to lower blood pressure (a common side effect of too much stress) and it releases oxytocin, which builds your interpersonal bonds.
If you need a deeper chat with your partner, head to the park where your kiddos can play while you talk. This is the perfect time to discuss the past week and plan ahead for things like upcoming business travel, carpool responsibilities, and precious time alone.
Make it a Race
Rather than shooting for perfection, create a series of races for housekeeping that everyone can participate in. You can divide up into teams so that you and your partner can both supervise childhood chores. Draw cleaning tasks from a hat, set a timer for fifteen minutes, and see how close both teams are to finishing their jobs when the timer goes off.
After a few rounds of this, you can reward your children with some outdoor playtime while you and your sweetie finish cleaning up together. Set the timer for yourselves, too—can you scrub the kitchen floor before he finishes the vacuuming? Complete any necessary ironing before he gets the car washed?
What kinds of rewards can you give each other?
Shh. Don’t tell. Just save it for later.
Combine your Watch Time with Household Work
You might already watch television while you fold laundry, but you can expand this trick to make so many other jobs enjoyable.
How about YouTube videos on your phone while you pull weeds? Maybe you can start a new Netflix show while you chop and prep veggies for the week ahead. You could also up your personal or professional development on a learning platform like Udemy or Coggno while you sweep and mop.
This isn’t as much about multitasking as it is about making the moment enjoyable. If there’s something you’ve been looking forward to watching or learning, enjoy it.
You can do those easy, non-thinking jobs in the background and then reward yourself for completing tasks with more watch time later—double the fun!
