Whatever happened to the lazy/productive Saturday? The one that you look back on Sunday evening, and don’t regret how much time you wasted. I find myself often waking up earlier than I want, wasting time on social media or lounging around the house, and then heading out to run errands that seem to consume the better part of my day.
Earlier this month, after a weekend plan fell through for me, I set out to have the best lazy Saturday in years. I was getting over a cold and thought it would do me good to just relax and bum around the house all day. My plan was simple and seemingly achievable. Once I woke up that morning, I had a laundry list of things I wanted to do. Despite my desire to be relaxed and recharged, I still had the need to be productive and cross off some housekeeping tasks that I neglect during the workweek.
Something in me still wanted the best of both worlds. I wanted my down time in combination with my productive hours of the day as well. Eventually, I settled on this plan, and it actually did some good.
Despite my yearning desire to sleep in, my body betrays me and cheerfully awakens at 6:30/7:00 am. To combat this defeat, I continued to lay in bed to maintain my relaxed state but I chose to start off by reading a few chapters of my book. Having this calming start to my morning allowed for me to use my time to do something I enjoy and still spend time “relaxing my body” while awake. Plus, the reading was more productive than watching Saturday morning tv (i.e. nothing good).
It can be tempting to lounge around all day in your comfy pajamas. However, it felt refreshing to spend a morning taking my time to get dressed. I took more than the 30 minutes I give myself Monday to Friday to “warm up” by body with some yoga, exfoliate in the shower, and give myself a facial and mask. The extra pampering allowed for me to double my productivity and relaxation. Also, doing so made it easier to “get up and go” when I decided to run errands anyway.
I could not help the fact that I had a few stops on my list even though I wanted to stay home all day. My “errand days” normally take up the bulk of my sunshine hours and drain my energy for anything else by the time I get home. However, on this Saturday, I was purposeful with the things on my list and I did not deviate much from the plan. This way I did not overextend myself.
After wrapping up errands, I finally had the opportunity to “bum around”. I use this term to identify literally doing nothing productive with my time in order to feel relaxed and at ease about not having any plans. By this point I had my productivity out of the way and I completed all of my weekend “chores” that stalk my mind during the week. I gave myself an opportunity to enjoy being home with nothing to do. And what did I do exactly? I took a nap! That’s all I wanted, was that additional sleep needed when you have the common cold.
So there you have it, a quick run down of taking a weekend and making it productive while still relaxing and slowing down the pace from the typical work week.