From Weekend Wary-er to Weekend Warrior
Weekend Getaway? Sign me up!
There’s nothing better than packing up the car for a summer trip. You wake up on a Friday, make your bed for the last time that week, and the day flies by with giddy excitement. For me, it also usually means that dinner is chicken nuggets in the car - YUM!
Here’s my exit checklist:
Pack bags
Pack car
Pick some completely unnecessary task that suddenly must happen or the trip can’t go on (i.e., deep cleaning the dishwasher), usually delaying our departure
My fiancé has the patience of a saint.
Our departure routine is on rinse and repeat (just like the freshly cleaned dishwasher, you’re very welcome), but this summer I’ve added in something new: our “back-to-the-grind” routine.
Yes, you guessed it - this routine happens after we lug the last bag inside, staring glumly at the piles of dirty laundry and empty fridge.
Once that last bag hits the floor, the last thing I want to do is… well, anything, to be honest. Which is exactly why this routine exists.
I realized I was setting myself up for a miserable Monday if I left the remnants of my weekend adventures to sit. It felt like I was behind from the very start of my week. Not only was I only half-relaxing on Sunday, avoiding unpacking but feeling the weight of the impending to-do, but I would start Monday feeling overwhelmed and lacking momentum.
Monday mornings are hard enough. Something had to change.
So here’s what I came up with:
On the car ride back, brainstorm a grocery list
Stop at the grocery store on the way home for a “needs only” shop. I’m talkin’ protein, vegetable, eggs for Monday morning, and get the heck outta there
Pitstop at the grocery store bathroom because, c’mon - there are no stops in the last 30min of a trip. Everybody knows the rules.
Unload at home and immediately unpack. Laundry straight in the wash. Toothbrush back in its spot. Get some tunes going and remind yourself how good it will feel to put your feet up with each t-shirt you put away
Thinking about these 3 steps still discourages me. They feel daunting and impossible at the end of a 3hr drive. But it’s science in action, and doing them takes 30min of hard work to leave me feeling light, refreshed, and ready for the week.
Here’s why it works:
An object in motion stays in motion, and staying in motion takes a lot less energy than starting a new motion. When we get out of the car, we start a motion. Capitalizing on that by unpacking before we sit down allows us to conserve energy, making an already challenging task slightly less painful
Our brains are constantly taking inventory. We can try to trick them that we’re “back home” by physically being in our home space, but our brains know when our belongings are packed. This puts us on-guard and can disrupt our sleep and focus. Truly returning ourselves to baseline by emptying that suitcase and putting it away lets our brains truly rest, meaning we’ll sleep deeper and recover better
A little bit of suffering now saves a lot of suffering later. It feels monumental to tackle one more thing at the end of a travel day. But really, we’re spending 30min to save ourselves 60. Plugging our phone chargers back in takes 5 seconds, compared to the 5min of searching it will take when we’re exhausted and itching to climb into bed. The same goes for washing coffee mugs, emptying backpacks, and hanging jackets back up
This new routine ends my Sunday on a positive note (watching football on the couch) and starts my Monday with a clean slate of possibilities.
It’s taken me from a weekend wary-er to a weekend warrior. Not to mention it makes packing for next weekend’s trip a breeze!