Sunday evening, around the time the TV shows wrap up, something gets heavy in my chest. Monday hasn't come yet, but in my head tomorrow's meeting has already started.
There's a reason for that feeling.
Sunday night is harder than Monday
A study that tracked the moods of about 340,000 Americans by day of the week found a clear "weekend effect," with moods better on weekends. But "Blue Monday," Monday being uniquely bad, was not as big as people assume (Stone et al., 2012).
If so, maybe the heart of the pain isn't Monday itself. Maybe it's the time spent anticipating Monday: Sunday night. You live through something in your head before it has happened. That's the weight of Sunday night.
What the weekend fills
So why do weekends feel good? Not simply "because we get to rest."
Ryan and colleagues tracked working people's mood and vitality day by day to see why weekends feel better (Ryan, Bernstein & Brown, 2010). Much of the weekend effect was explained by greater satisfaction of autonomy (feeling that you choose what you do) and relatedness (feeling connected to people).
What this suggests is that Sunday-night gloom is the sense that what the weekend filled will be lost on weekdays.
So the weight of Sunday night is a signal. If it's extremely heavy, your current job may give you too few things you can decide for yourself, or too few people you feel connected to.
Why switching off from work matters
There's one more thing that makes Sunday night heavy: thinking about work all weekend.
Research by Sonnentag and colleagues shows that psychologically detaching from work after hours matters for recovering from fatigue (Sonnentag & Fritz, 2007). If you check email on your days off and rehearse Monday in your head, your body may rest but your mind doesn't.
The less you really rest on the weekend, the more Sunday night feels like "starting again before I've recovered."
Three things that make Sunday night lighter
- Decide "Monday's first move" on Friday: write down one thing to do Monday morning before you leave. Then you don't need to rehearse it in your head over and over
- Put a small pleasure on Sunday night: a favorite meal, a film, a walk. Make Sunday night "an event," not "the end of the weekend"
- Turn off work notifications on weekends: deciding not to check creates time to detach
If Sunday night is unbearably heavy every single week anyway, it may not be a coping problem but an environment problem. Try writing down what's missing from your weekdays.
Today's exercise
- Write down three things you chose to do this weekend
- Think about whether you have time on weekdays to do anything close to them
- Rate the weight of Sunday night out of 10. Keep it up for four weeks and you'll see what affects it
Sunday-night gloom isn't laziness.
It's a signal telling you that what the weekend filled is missing from your weekdays.
References
Stone, A. A., Schneider, S., & Harter, J. K. (2012). Day-of-week mood patterns in the United States: On the existence of 'Blue Monday', 'Thank God it's Friday' and weekend effects. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 7(4), 306–314.
Ryan, R. M., Bernstein, J. H., & Brown, K. W. (2010). Weekends, work, and well-being: Psychological need satisfactions and day of the week effects on mood, vitality, and physical symptoms. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 29(1), 95–122.
Sonnentag, S., & Fritz, C. (2007). The Recovery Experience Questionnaire: Development and validation of a measure for assessing recuperation and unwinding from work. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 12(3), 204–221.