20 Ways to Beat Monday Blues

Monday! Monday! Monday!
So full of newness and excitement.
Don’t feel the same way? You’re doing it wrong!
Here are 20 ways to help you beat the Monday Blues:

1. Procrastinate feeling blue. Is a gloomy cloud forming above your head? Ignore it – you’ll give your attention to it later, not now.
2. Wear your best clothes or the cheeriest colour from your wardrobe. You’d be surprise how much your clothes could affect the way you feel about yourself.
3. Early start - bad things happen when you are late, the tension level is high, you are in a rush, you don’t have time for breakfast, when you arrive at your office, people are shoving work into your face. It may seem like a punishment to wake up earlier on Monday but trust me, when you have enough time to organize yourself, you’ll feel like you can conquer the day easier.
4. Treat yourself in the morning – Sit down and eat. Enjoy your food. Monday is Pancake Breakfast day for me, so I actually look forward to Monday mornings. But eat well - although it’s ok to treat yourself, make sure you eat well. I have a good serving of fruits along with my pancakes. Have enough to drink too - your malaise could be a sign of dehydration.
5. Have a list of why you’re having the blues – you might be surprised that there will be things on the list that you can easily work on to make your Mondays better. My problem used to be a completing work from last week (very difficult to gain momentum after a weekend break) which brings us to the next point:
6. Complete as much work possible on Friday – you’ll have less work to worry about on Monday, which lead to the next point:
7. Have everything laid out the day before – your clothes, files, etc. Saves you a couple of minutes in the morning so that you can concentrate on other, more important things.
8. Plan your day in small gentle steps. Apply micromovements throughout the day. You can use a GTD system or simply divide your day into of 1/2 – 1 hour chunks with a goal for each time unit.
9. Talk to a friend – it’s most likely he/she is having the blues too. Keep your conversation short. Remember this is about taking comfort in the fact that you aren’t alone in this, not an hour-long bitchfest about XXX from marketing.
10. Listen to happy songs – a tune can affect your mood. Let cheery, happy songs be the soundtrack to your Monday.
11. Dance - just move that body! Jog in place, stretch, do yoga. You’ll feel less lethargic.
12. Laugh and smile. Recall happy memories or a good joke. If you can’t think of any, do it anyway (fake it till you make it) Some research is saying that even the thought of laughing raises your endorphin (feel-good hormones) levels and a fake laughter provides similar benefits to a real one.
13. Affirmative statements – Today is a great day. I will complete my report today. Stick positive messages around your monitor and take them seriously.
14. Choose to feel happy. If you don’t already know, being happy is a choice, so choose happiness!
15. Buy something new for Monday – it doesn’t have to be big or expensive – a pen, a sketchbook, fancy post-it stickers. Monday is like a birthday for me- I get a present for myself nearly every week. I got myself a sticker for $1 today.
16. Try something new - you’d be surprise how easy it is to feel energized by doing something you’ve never done before. A new dish, a new song, a new route to work.
17. Start working. The thing about work is, it’s usually not the work that makes us tired, it’s the thought of starting work that makes us procrastinate and go into a cycle of unproductivity. Quit thinking about starting work and just work instead!
18. Take short breaks – too much work can be overwhelming and when this happens, it is easy for you to give up. Remember to take short breaks to recharge. If your schedule allows it, you can also take a 10 minute nap after lunch.
19. Plan something special for Monday night – meet a friend for dinner, rent a DVD. The day will be easier when you have something to look forward to.
20. Do not get distracted. Youtube, Facebook, personal emails. Once you allow yourself to get distracted you will be sucked into hours of time-wasting activities. If you don’t have the discipline to limit your distraction to 10 minutes, don’t attempt to do it at all. Reading blogs like this is another time-sucker so now that you’ve reach the bottom of the list, why don’t you get working! :)

Kid’s Answers to Life

My favourite answers from “Kids’ Answers to Life’s Big Questions” by Steve & Ruth Bennett.

Q. What makes rainbows?
A. Pieces of sunset.

Q. What should you do when you feel like hitting someone?
A. Ask them if they want to be hit.

Q. What kinds of things make people happy?
A. John Lennon.

Q. What are some things to be sad about?
A. Running out of coffee. < True

Q. Why do countries fight wars?
A. Because they don’t like cats and the other country has cats.

Q. What does the vice-president do?
A. He golfs.

Got Milk?

Ok, so the high-calcium soya(soy) milk diet I’ve been following religiously for a month didn’t work. I’ve been sitting in my chair for the past, oh, 10 hours, craughing hysterically while trying to maintain enough sanity to get some work done. Enough whining for now, I need to review what went wrong and plan what to do next.

“New research suggests that a diet rich in calcium and vitamin D may help prevent premenstrual syndrome, or PMS.”
CBS News

Could it be that I’m not getting enough vitamin D to absorb all the calcium I’m consuming(the soya milk is not fortified with vitamin D)? But a few minutes of sun a day should’ve been enough, no? In any case, I am thoroughly OVER with soya milk to go through this experiment another month with a vitamin D-fortified version so I’m thinking of trying something else, I dunno, fortified juice, cod liver oil or chocolate milk? Chocolate milk sounds good.

Related links
Calcium & Vitamin D for PMS – CBS
Dietary Supplement Fact Sheet: Vitamin D
Got Milk?
Got PMS?
Get the Glass! Game

Related posts
Testing Out Theories
There Must Be A Better Alternative To This
Still Wishing for a Happy Period
Wish: A Happy Period

Power Control

There was a power failure just now. When I got the power back up, there was a *bzz…bzz* sound coming from the mess of cables under my desk. Upon inspection I found out that the failure was due to…. my cat.

One of my cats had peed onto my multi-plug extension outlet rendering it wet and useless. I’m thinking of banning them from entering the room. I know I’ve thought of this a hundred times before but AAARGH! this time it’s too much!

I’m typing all this on a UMPC with an uncomfortably small keyboard. I can’t do any work now. My computer refuses to start up after the power went off just now. So very, very annoying!

The “No Cats in the Room” rule will be on with immediate effect. At least until one of them gives me the Puss in Boots dilated-pupils, I’m-so-cute-and-innocent look.

Tutorial: Creating Dotted Lines Using Photoshop

In this tutorial, we’ll learn how to customize a brush in Adobe® Photoshop® to create dotted lines.

There are a total of 8 images (about 150kb), not including the masthead, in this tutorial.

Step 1

Select the Brush tool from your tools palette, alternatively, just type “B” on your keyboard.
If the tools palette is not visible, go to the menubar and click Window > Tools.

[Read more....]

Up And Running

Things accomplished this week:

Moved to a new server – after many, many frustrating down times (5 times a week?!! Unacceptable!)
Changed to a 3-column layout – aah much better… my sidebar was getting a bit too long
Fixed the comment bug – there was a bug in the 3-column format.
Wrote 5 posts based on the theme “Entertainment”

I’m inspired by Lady S‘ list of Happy Things. I’ve read the same book — 14,000 Things to be Happy About — some time ago. I do have similar lists, but they are written over multiple entries in my blogs and numerous sketchbooks, so maybe it’s time to put them all in one list. I’m also thinking of tackling the top 100 movies of all time. But which from list? AFI? Time? Rotten Tomatoes?