Weekends weren't the most favorites of my days while growing up as a kid. I do not know quite well what was it like spending weekends for other kids in Nepal in the 90s but I sure wasn't very happy about not being able to leave home or potentially enjoy my leisure time wishfully. My strongest memory from childhood about weekends is the notion that my father would be home all day and I won't be able to do things I love doing. Of course, I used to be happy that I didn't have to go to school. But it wasn't just me, my brothers or my mother who stayed home. My father didn't have to work on most Saturdays. In Nepal, we still have Saturdays as only day off in a week, except for national holidays. My father used to be a very strict parent. Especially on Saturdays, he ensured that we woke up early in the morning, after cleaning ourselves up and daily worship, we sat down with books to study. He would have busy weekdays, maybe that's why he wanted to spend his only day off with his kids in his own version of productive way. Whenever, I got chance ( few unsupervised hours because parents would be busy doing something else), I would go out, bike, play, visit friends, read, watch movies. But I seldom planned weekends. Now as an adult in early 30s, with the luxury to decide for myself, not having to adhere to home rituals, I still spend weekends waking up early, but stay stuck in bed, lost, watching videos on youtube or binging Netflix for hours, occasionally reading or being useful but merely enjoying myself to the fullest. At times, after having wasted an entire day not accomplishing much, I regret to the extent wishing I would rather have gone to work or didn't have a day off. I'm not upset that I could have had more fun growing up knowing my leisure time commitments early on. But I'm very concerned about having evolved into a kind of person who doesn't deem planning weekends necessary.
Getting older with exponentially growing work-life responsibilities, it's deliberate that I make the fullest of whatsoever free time I have. I turned my quest to google some useful resources and came across several articles on how to spend weekends. It was extremely fun reading them, getting to know that it's a fairly common topic discussed online, and how many people had awareness on how they would like to spend time during their weekly break. It's not the newness of ideas listed but the well thought and organized approach that added the fresh perspective on things I have been avoiding ignorantly. The whole experience was remarkably impressive. I came across big list of things I would love to do. Catching up with family and friends. Clean, declutter, and disconnect ( refers to work emails, update or phone calls). Spending quality time outdoors ( now that the winter is almost over, also I will save the discussion on things to do in winter for other occasion). Eating out. Hiking. Visiting local parks, museums or a zoo. Searching for new interests. Reading, writing, volunteering.
I came across several interesting posts on "spending weekends". The one that I can't stop myself from mentioning here is " 103 things to do on a money-free weekend" by Trent Hamm. I have no doubt adding that many will find the elaborative list to be pretty useful finding few activities for weekends that would suit their interest. Checking out the community calendar to find a list of ongoing events. Visiting a local library. Getting involved in community sports. Listening to podcasts. Cooking new recipe. Teaching yourself how to juggle. Meeting your neighbors. Potluck. Organizing a self guided walking tour. Taking some photos. Sharing those with others. Start a blog on topic that interests you. Well, the list goes on, I guess I will just add the link below:
Something that caught my attention in particular is " Prepare for the week". Well, it's important to have a layout of what your week looks like but don't forget that it could be a double edged sword. You might want to avoid overworking yourself for a tempting head-start and end up not enjoying your weekend.
The point is do make the most of your time. Above all, plan ahead. Weekends can be immensely useful for having fun, avoiding/healing burnouts, personal growth as well as getting some distraction-free work done. Enjoy.
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