I almost always love Mondays. To me, Mondays are a little llike “mini–birthdays,” or mini-New Years, mini- start- of- a- new school year. Mondays are a fresh start, a clean slate.
I know that one of the primary reasons I love Mondays is because I always consciously, intentionally goof off all day Sunday.
Part of my regular Sunday goofing off includes getting together on Sunday morning with a small group of old friends for weekly satsang–or more specifically, coffee, and gab. (There’s no “holy staring” going on at our sunday morning gigs.) Our routine is that we have a “question of the week” thrown out as a starting place. The question also gives us a way to come back from the ozone when we get too far gone. We seem to enjoy our Sunday gatherings, as they have been going on for some years.
Yesterday one old buddy mentioned, somewhat hang-dog-faced, that he had to leave early becauase he had a lot of work to do at his studio. He had been on a project all week and he felt he neeeded to get back to it, getting ready for an art show coming up at the ened of next month. (Next month!)
Having known this senstive chap for a good part of my adult llife, and even partnered with hinm on several business adventures, I know he often works himself seven days a week. A lot of us are like that, though it seems much more common among men then women. I patted my buddy on the back and wished him luck. I didn’t need to add an argument about working on sundays to his already somewhat heavy mood.
Years ago I started a furniture refinishing business– after I’d burned out from being a stockbroker and needed something “hands on” to do in my daily work life, something that didn’t run away overnight. I could start to work on a chest of drawers one day and then leave it-alone that night. It would still be there, in the same condition, when I came back in the morning, unlike the stock I bought yesterday before leaving work that could be completely different animal when I came back to work the next day.
In my new furniture biz, as with all start-ups, I soon found myself with a gazillion things that I felt needed to be done. And soon we had more work to do than we were able to handle, and I had made promises that I wasn’t keeping– regarding when the piece would be ready, etc. So I found myself working on sundays– just to catch up. The one thing I told myself I Wouldn’t do was answer the phone on sundays at the shop. I felt I was being quite brave in stepping back from the commercial inbterests by not anwswering the shop phone on sundays.
But I soon realized I was wearing myself down to the nub by this seven days a week work schedule, and that my work was suffering. I couldn’t sand as artfully as I needed to sand.l And I was crabby on Monday mornings. because I had another long week ahead of me. This is when I learned, again—- through direct e
xperience– I needed to take a break, at least once a week.
Here’s why: I can get too deep into my own stuff. — take it too seriously, get lost in its importance, which means I can easily get lost in my own importance. For my sake, and for the sake of everybody around me, I need a day off from a false sense of my own importance, and the importance of my work. Thus, Sunday goof off day.
Curiously, through my own direct life experience I learned the wisdom behind the Biblical injunction to “remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.” I can understand the wisdom of this. Something larger is happening here than our own worldly ambitions and concerns. We need at least a full day each week (and many moments during week) when we let go of our ambitions and concerns and just good off, let be what be.
So on Sundays I have no to-do lists, not must-do’s, should-do’s. Doesn’t mean I don’t do stuff. I just do it with a whole different attitude. A goof-off attitude. Life is meant to be enjoyable. I find taking one day a week to just goof off helps me experience life to be just that, the whole week long.
