Sunday Scaries

Hey Sunflowers,

Happy New Year! I hope each of you used this past holiday season to actually collect your thoughts. 2020 was a whirlwind of WTF and I have genuine hope that 2021 will be better.

I recently interviewed with a law firm and the partner interviewing me responded to a question about their personal experience at the firm with, “I knew I liked my job when I didn’t get the ‘Sunday Scaries’.” She must have noticed the utterly confused look on my face because she followed up with an explanation. “The ‘Sunday Scaries’ is the feeling you get on Sunday evening because you really don’t want to go to work the next day.” I smiled and told her how much I loved that. Later I began reflecting, so much of my current world includes Sunday Scaries and that is not okay.

Why do we accept lives where Sunday Scaries have become a weekly familiar experience?

I like to consider my generation the “creatives generation”. It started as a joke but as I got older I realized how many people in my generation are choosing untraditional ‘careers’ and/or multiple simultaneous ‘careers’ usually having to do with something more creative. (I am using the term career very loosely. It typically denotes a long-term role but in this instance I am using it to denote a means of income to support a life or multiple lives.)

As a second year law student, I often find myself thinking about the kind of life I want to create for myself as a young professional. A large part of that is building my blog and remaining professionally and personally involved in film and music. None of that includes allowing Sunday to invoke anxiety about the week that is coming ahead. As I thought further, I realized that I live Sunday Scaries right now and have since at least my senior year at Howard. Each and every Sunday I feel the anxiety that accompanies the long list of tasks I have to accomplish by the end of the week.

We have to begin to demand that our lives aren’t only peaceful or fun on the weekends because so much of our lives are spent in the days between Monday and Friday. Why would we waste so much precious time racing to Friday and anxiously anticipating Monday?

I am sure the interviewing partner made this comment to make me feel more confident about the work life balance at the firm and I did. But why is it still normal, for many professions, to stress people out so much that they suffer anxiety weekly and trudge the week ahead just hoping to get to Friday?

I wish I had the answer. I wish I could wave my magic wand and change the capitalistic, work until you die, culture in America. It is not okay! But, we also have power here. We have to demand better culture in our work places and be prepared if that means creating your own work place. We have to make our lives full at all times, not just on the weekend or when we aren’t at work. We must choose careers where we are contributing to meaningful things that aren’t just making the rich richer but are bettering communities, bringing smiles to faces and bringing together people for the greater good. It is our duty to escape the Sunday Scaries. Let’s make a conscious effort to build lives that are fueled with peace, joy and love each and everyday of the week.

forever blooming,

Mikaela Amira