I have reached that age where I find it important to remember people’s birthdays, but find it impossible to memorise all the dates. There are just too many of them to remember. So like an organised millennial I use all my various electronic tools such as calendars and social media accounts to make sure I don’t forget any important ones.
I was quite interested to notice that my 7 year old daughter seems to know and remember the birthdays of every single one of her classmates. As a minimum I would say she at least knows the month that every single classmate was born in. Why is this the case? Well simply it’s all about incentives and vested interests. She has a HUGE sweet tooth and looks forward to all sorts of sugary delights when it is someone’s birthday. To the extent of memorising the month each individual in her class was born.
I quickly realised that when she included the birthdays of family and close friends there were quite a lot of cake eating events planned for the year. And most fascinating was that every day she looks to the future with optimism because it is only “37 days till Jane’s birthday”. Or only “x many days till Christmas/ Easter/ Parents Anniversary/a birthday. No matter what is going on in her little world, a dose of optimism can be injected every time she calculates how many days until the next cake eating event. Bad day at school or difficult homework assignment? Don’t worry it’s only 10 days till Jane’s birthday… and only 37 days till the next school holiday and so forth.
Ultimately, witnessing this perpetual cycle of hope and optimism unfold before me really made me think. My daughter’s entire framing of the future was based on opportunities to eat cake. She loves cake and as a result her expectations of the future are generally always positive. In my own life I could probably think of future events that will bring me joy and focus on them too. Maybe it was time to embrace the fact that there is always something to look forward to.
Besides birthdays my children look forward to the one hour a day they get of TV time, they look forward to every school holiday, they watch the weather report every day to see if the next day will be warm enough to swim and Wednesday is chicken and chips day. Out of the mundane things in life, they have created a cycle of endless reward, joy and optimism. The don’t dread any particular day. They simply look forward and focus on the fun days coming up.
This is a nice place to park the cake stories and talk about Mondays. Assuming one does not work over the weekend and has a fairly enjoyable living environment it is understandable why so many people hate Mondays. That unwelcome jolt out of the relaxed, safe and restful cloud back to facing the realities of working life and all the accompanying drama. It almost always seems too soon.
My daughter doesn’t hate Mondays. They are inconsequential to her happiness. They are just a stepping stone to something much more enjoyable in the future. They are so irrelevant that she doesn’t even create an event in her brain called “Monday“ . She would rather focus on the next really enjoyable thing you have coming up (eating cake).
If nothing in the future seems enjoyable then set up some treats in your calendar. This could be Wednesday is whisky day or a the next public holiday that you can take a day off. Or even someone’s birthday where you will eat cake. Whatever that thing is, focus on that not on the fact that it is Monday.!
Children always seem to have something to look forward to. For my oldest son it’s his next sports game, especially if against another school. For my youngest son it’s his next computer games session or the next Olympics. These things bring them joy and they are unapologetic about this. But more importantly by focusing on these things they are not consumed by the dread of the unpleasant things they may have to endure in the meantime. As a write this article it is just after 9pm on a Sunday. I have no electricity at home right now and it is said to be restored within an hour. I’m not dreading Monday. I’m just looking forward for the electricity to come back so I can run my dishwasher and go to bed 🙂
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