Monday Morning Blues

Hello, everyone...

I have a problem that I'm pretty sure others either have had or have from time to time.

I am having difficulty these days getting myself "revved up" for my Monday morning work. By Monday afternoon, I'm doing fine. I just always feel that my Monday morning students don't get the same quality instruction as the rest of my classes, and I would like to change that.

Today in particular was difficult, as I have a couple of other things weighing on my mind, and am having problems "putting them on the shelf." In general, my mind feels a little bit "foggy" on Monday mornings.

It would be great to hear some of your ideas for this common problem--or maybe it's not so common, and I'm the only one who's blue on Monday morning!

Phil

Well Phil what i do is, get up 3 hours before work and on two of my goals. I Combine walking (exercising) with educating myself on NLP, by listening to audio books by Chris Howard or Tony robbins, by the time i have to go to work, im energised and freshly awake...

Maybe you can do something similar

George,

Thank you for your suggestion.

Currently, what I do on Monday morning (as I do every day) is get up, get myself showered and dressed, then have 30 minutes of silent meditation practice, followed by breakfast and "whatnot" (usually checking email, etc.).

Perhaps some reading or listening to inspirational music is in order for Monday--something special that says, "this is the start of my week--time to wake up!"

I'll keep thinking. Thanks again for your suggestion.

Be well, and at peace,

Phil

Wow George, thats some dedication!

I tend to have less time available and the only change to my normal daily routine for Monday morning is to add in a quick Ayurvedic massage. Hence my routine goes like this:

1) Mind machine in evening to ensure sound and relaxing sleep.
2) Ayurvedic massage with seseme oil- around 10mins.
3) Shower with lemon and tee tree shower gel- very refreshing.
4) Get my three kids up and dressed and out of the house for 8am
5) Have breakfast at work- consists of 2 cups of fresh coffee and bowl of musli.

This usually leaves me feeling bright and ready to take on the day for around 9am.

I tend to identify things I need to do on Monday during my mind machine session and then set my unconscious mind to work on it while I sleep. I then analyse the results of this in the shower-around 10-15mins.

Hi Phil

When I get like this I short cut or bypass Monday Itis and kick start the day.

1. Disengage your thoughts - turn off the mind chatter/pictures about whatever it is that's putting you off Mondays.
2. Replace it with the " Just Do it" inner dialogue.
3. Focus on the future - focus on the benefits and feeling better for having done the activity or focus on the consequences of not having done the activity.
4. Just start doing your funky thing for ten minutes, Decide later to continue or not.

I have placed post it notes on my PC with the bold text as a reminder that I can become motivated to complete anything - even when I am not motivated to start.

Hope this helps,

Have a great day

Frederic

Frederic,

I like your strategy.

Really, it's not so much that I don't want to do what I'm doing, I just feel as though my brain is moving in slo mo, and needs some ramping up.

I'm going to work on some "Monday Morning Music" that I can play in the car on the way to work, to get me revved up.

Thanks for chiming in, Frederic!

Phil

Cool,

Perhaps you could upload the music to the Golden Phil Suit , from way back when, hit the play button and the ramp up button at the same time and watch yourself speeding up the process.

A bit like the Benny Hill sketches where the music is playing at a normal speed but the people and the action is all happening at a fast pace. :cool:

PS. Now remember to record it and perhaps send me a copy too.

Have a great day.

Frederic

The simplest question I've got, Phil, is "How would you rather feel on Monday morning?" 'Cause I know there's something in your life that makes you feel that way already, perhaps on another day of the week (though for a guy who loves his job the way you do I'm thinking Monday morning oughta be one golden time). It could be a combination of the music, remembering some fabulous five-year-old moment, an irrepressible chuckle, and that sound you make to yourself when it's all going SO fabulously. What IS that sound? "Yessssss!" accompanied by the trademark PCA fist-pump and world-class smile? Or something even more dynamic and energizing? Throw it all into a Monday Morning Superstate and rock on!

Hi Phil,

This is just a guess, but my guess is: it's not that you've been "not getting revved up", it's that you've probably been "revving yourself down" with unconscious programs based on your generalisations and equivalences about Monday mornings. It's something you've probably been practising for years ever since you learned what being Monday 'means'. It's just a strategy that isn't working.

You could go for a counter-strategy - a set of things to do to run alongside your current program to pick you up from the state that program left you in, but it'd be nice to actually just run a different program all together.

I'm going to add two suggestions to the great suggestions already made above:

1. Next Monday, whatever you've been doing unconsciously to feel the way you've been feeling, do it consciously and notice what you have to do. There's a bit of 'paradoxical intention' in that, as described in Andrew Austin's great new book. And it's partly to reveal the strategy.

2. Make the first thing you do after that something that you love doing. Which has kind-of been covered above. Do you know what I do first thing on a Monday? I play pool with my boss. It feels great, it's fun, we can talk about the business day ahead and it stimulates my performance state.

It might be worth contrasting your 'Monday morning' strategy with your 'Friday morning' strategy to help design a new one.

If it also helps, I've found that some bad 'Monday morning' strategies have got something to do with chunking and how you've been placing things on your timeline. Maybe you've been putting some 'big chunks' (which may be hard to manage - and would certainly 'weigh a lot', right?) right at the front and putting fun things too far away (or behind a fog, Phil?). Just a thought. Maybe you need to do that Michael Neill thing of just planning on 'the first step'.

When you consciously engage in what you do, pay attention to how you're chunking tasks and time. There may be some juice in that. Another thing that comes up a lot is simply future pacing difficulty rather than ease. Maybe juice there too.

If you have the chance, watch that 'Bandler Effect' DVD where Richard sorts out a guy who 'couldn't' get motivated and all because of the way he represents what he 'has' to do to himself (his choice of modal operators, not mine). Even more clues there.

I'm not going to assume I know a strategy that works for you, but there are a number of choices for you there.

Cheers

Steve,

Thank you for your suggestions.

Here is what I'm really feeling on Monday morning. I will be as clear as possible.

SLOW and FOGGY.

Also, kindly don't get me started on timelines. Ask Bridget what happened the last time SHE did. I discovered that I have a time CLOUD, not a time LINE, which tells you all sorts of things about how I represent time in my mind, doesn't it?

I really just want to have as much fun with my kids on Monday morning as I do any other morning. I am having difficulty feeling physically like I'm able to do that.

Basically, I need a brain DE-FOGGING, and really, a little something to JUMP START MY ENGINE, and then I will be fine.

It's interesting to talk about all this, because I am sure I'm not the only person who has this problem!

More later,

Phil

Hi Phil,

I know. Slow and foggy. Got that. And don't forget the 'weight' thing either. My advice is still the same: rather than 'get slow and foggy' and 'then' do something to counter-act it, how about swapping the strategy that induces slow and foggy for a strategy that does something else instead.

(It's still a strategy.)

Now, I don't think therapy/coaching by forum is a good way to do it so I'm not going to engage in it, so forgive me if I don't start asking lots of elicitation questions. I just want to give you some suggestions about some directions for your own self-coaching.

The guy in that Bandler Effect DVD was similar. When he thought about what he had to do it was an unfocussed mess. He needed to sort out how he represented it to himself. Richard helped him do that. It sounds like that's the kind of thing here.

However, what's interesting is that in your case (unless I'm mistaken) your fog is specific to Monday mornings, which means that on other days of the week you're not starting slow and foggy. That means you're already got a different strategy, it's just not your 'Monday morning' one.

Just one other suggestion. So you "don't" want to be foggy.

(Okay, your specific words were you want a 'de-fogging', which - by the way - presupposes your action, whatever it is, starts with you already being foggy. And you want to 'jump start your engine', which presupposes it's already stalled. Is that really the place to start? Or would it be better to start before that, as I suggest? How about not getting foggy in the first place? How about not stalling the engine in the first place?)

My real point here is: do you know what you do want instead of foggy?

Best wishes and good luck.

Cheers

Steve,

I agree with you that coaching by forum presents difficulties!

I wish I could find a good NLP coach here in Columbus to work with.

So, the ultimate question I am asking myself is...

"What do you want?"

And the obvious answer is,

"Energy, brightness and vitality on Monday morning!"

So, basically, if I were to run a "Wednesday strategy" on Monday, it might fix that problem...

I think I'll do that and see what happens!

Phil

Hey Phil,

Reading your posts a couple of songs sprang to mind for your "Monday Morning Music" ...

Johnny Nash 'I can see clearly now' ...

I can see clearly now, the rain is gone
I can see all obstacles in my way
Gone are the dark clouds that had me blind
It's gonna be a bright (bright), bright (bright)
Sun shiny day

&

Steppenwolf, 'Born to be Wild' ...

Get your motor runnin'
Head out on the highway
Lookin' for adventure
And whatever comes our way
Yeah Darlin' go make it happen
Take the world in a love embrace
Fire all of your guns at once
And explode into space...

Also a quick exercise I find very cool for getting jump started
(from Ron Perry/ similar from Michael Neill)

Sitting comfortably,
Sit up in a kinda neutral position (relaxed-alert)
Allow your muscles to relax from head to toe,
until you're floppy n rag doll like
Return to neutral
Now look up to the ceiling /sky
Stretch your arms up
Spread out your palms & fingers,
Open your eyes Wide
Eyebrows Up
Big Silly Grin (wider, bigger, brighter ...)
Return to neutral.
Repeat a few times
Between relaxed, neutral, energised
Each time increasing relaxation / energy
Notice the difference in neutral.

:-)

Steve,

I think we are on the same wavelength!

I love the Johnny Nash song, and have often listened to it at times when I've just gone through something difficult, and can begin to feel a shift. And that has been more than once for me in the last year!

Thank you for the great suggestions. Music is always the fastest route to my brain, and "I can see clearly now" is going on my iPod when I get home tonight! Hooray!

Steppenwolf would not have been my choice, but blended with the other song, it might just be what I need!:cool:

The Ron Perry exercise looks really good too. Thanks!

Be well, and at peace,

Phil

IN JEST

YouTube - skid row - Psycho Therapy

00
I
U

J

Hello, all.

Happy to report that I cannot seem to find the Monday morning blues anywhere! Even after singing a big concert yesterday, which would have normally put me out of commission for Monday, I am full of energy and ready to greet my students any moment now!

Be well, and at peace,

Phil

Hey, Nice one! Glad to hear it.

Keep it up Phil :-)

Thanks, Steve. I did the Ron Perry exercise for good measure!

Feeling very happy right now!!! And with every breath I take, I feel more positive energy entering my body!

WOO HOO!

Phil

Here's an interesting reflection, now that I'm at the end of my Monday...

My energy level was MUCH better this time...but the fogginess...well, my mental processing skills were just not what I would like them to be.

It's interesting that I fixed one problem (energy, attitude) without the other.

Phil

but the fogginess...well, my mental processing skills were just not what I would like them to be.

Have you considered adding some SUNSHINE or an extraction fan or something to remove the fogginess.

Not knowing what process you used - can you add something to it that will allow you to disipate the fogginess?

Be well

Frederic