Your Monday Mood Is a Diagnostic Tool

The 'Sunday Scaries' are more common than we might think. A recent Wall Street Journal article highlighted the growing Sunday Scaries, citing a FlexJobs survey in which 57% of U.S. workers reported some degree of weekend unease about work. I've been writing about this since I published my book, Finding Passion in 2013.

Here's what I want to say about this experience. Sunday Scaries is not something to fix. It's something to understand.

Having that avoidant feeling before the workweek starts can actually tell us important information about ourselves.

Sometimes Monday feels heavy before anything has happened because of what we've already decided the week will require of us.

Things like:

• We expect the week to be "hard."

• We expect unexpected problems to show up.

• We expect we might work late, get interrupted sleep.

• We expect that we can't handle one more thing added to our plate.

Notice we're not focused on the logistics of how much work, how many meetings and the deadlines themselves. When Mondays feel heavy, it's often due to the internal expectations we carry.

Before asking what's wrong with Monday, ask what you're asking of yourself.

Here's what people often misunderstand about a positive mindset. It's not about convincing yourself everything will go well. It's about noticing the assumptions and expectations you're bringing into a situation before it even begins.

Before your alarm goes off on Monday morning, you already expect difficulty. But who is doing that to you?

Are you responding to the week that's actually ahead, or to the version of yourself you believe you'll need to be to get through it?

Then ask yourself, are the expectations you have about the week ahead right-sized, or are they based on idealistic assumptions and herculean efforts?

When expectations are unfounded, they elevate your stress level. When expectations are realistic, we may not like what we see, but we can use that information to decide how to approach the work.

Before Monday begins, give your expectations a quick reality check:

• What am I already assuming about the week?

• What am I expecting of myself?

• Which of those expectations is actually necessary or true?

The result is the difference between a Monday morning where you say to yourself, "This week is important, and I'm ready to show up for it" versus "This week is gonna suck, and I'm not going to get any sleep."

Neither week has happened yet. But notice which one you're already preparing yourself to experience.

The week may still be demanding. But when you approach it with right-sized expectations and an open mindset, you give yourself more room to respond, make decisions, and succeed on your own terms.