Weakends

Weekends are a fan favorite. Time for ourselves, hooray. It’s what we look forward to, how we get through Mondays and humpdays – the weekend glistening on the horizon.

And I’m obsessed with weekends. Not because I anticipate them for freedom of my time, I love weekdays, but because I’m obsessed with how to spend leisure time. When we’re free of obligations, what we choose to do speaks to who we are.

Therefore, weekends are the domain of trips, family time, and hobbies. What you’re up to on the weekend is what you care about. It’s free time to be spent on what’s valued.

But I’ve spent so many weekends on superfluous things. Weakened by the weekend. Out of school, I had a parade of parties, and video games, and avoided anything productive. So that’s how I chose to spend time unrestricted by others. What a life.

I was trying to relax. I took a week’s and a life’s worth of stress and decided to dissolve it over a weekend. But I felt more stressed come Monday – hungover, tired, and unsatisfied.

Because on the weekend, I was still striving. I had misplaced bravado about being the best. I tried to be the best at video games, drinking the most, and being the coolest and toughest. And when you spend time on things and get good at them, they become part of your identity. It’s harder to step back and look at your actions because you’re engrossed in them.

But I needed to step back. I did have a lot of fun, and I had lots of incredible experiences. I’m unsure if that was selfish, and exploring those things helped me learn and change. It was part of my growing up.

To be clear, I’m not condemning those things. On the contrary, I love going to a good party. But remembering I love the gathering because of the people there, not to avoid weekday reality, strengthens me instead of weakens.

For example, last weekend I bounced around the city with good friends and went to a comedy show another night. I had a great time, and it filled me up.

What I’m saying is leisure time, weekends, are precious. If you had free time to do anything, what would you do? That’s the question to ask and answer on weekends because weekends are time we can choose to spend how we want.

Oh, the possibilities.

So relax if you need to relax. Work on a hobby, side project, or something that makes you come alive. And spend time with good people.