If you google the question: “Why do we hate Mondays,” you will have access to a plethora of articles about why people hate Mondays. It is both fascinating and educating. And we seem to hate Mondays for a variety of reasons. If you had a great Sunday filled with many enjoyable activities, Monday comes as a cold reminder that Sunday is over and it is back to the reality of work, or school, or what ever you have planned. Typically, the days activities are not considered fun-filled unless of course you are on vacation. We hate Mondays because we have had a weekend (providing your job allows you to have weekends off) to sleep in. You don’t have to wake up to the dreaded sound of your alarm going off. Although I will tell you, back in the day of radio/CD player alarm clocks, I woke up to the sound of Billie Holliday singing “Say it isn’t so.” Just my way of dealing with early wake up calls. And of course, if you read through all the articles, you will find many other reasons. But the one that I found interesting, more than all the others listed, was that we hate Monday because everyone hates Monday. Which made me pause.
Think about what that statement says about us as people. Why in the world do we hate something just because we believe everyone else hates it as well? Of all the reasons not to like something, even a day like Monday, that one seems to be pretty lame when you really think about it. I mean, we tend to pride ourselves on our individual thinking. We want to stand out from others. We want to make our own mark on the world. We want to be unique and yet here we are…we hate Monday because everyone hates Monday. I kind of feel sorry for all the Mondays.
Even more I am concerned that we hate something because everyone else does. This is quite simply peer pressure. We really don’t want to be as different as we claim. We want to fit in. We want to be like everyone else and look like everyone else. We want to be liked. So, we allow others to influence our decisions. We conform to what others think and believe. We don’t want to be different from the crowd. We are afraid to speak our mind, our thoughts, or our desires for our life. We believe a lot of lies in order to fit in. But here’s the thing: being different is a good thing. It gives us diversity of thoughts and ideas and diversity can lead to synergy. And synergy is what takes two or more things and produces something that is better than the individual parts. We need different ideas so they can come together and in listening to one another they can combine to create something even greater than they could have ever imagined on their own. And the only way we can do that is by being who God created us to be in the first place. Which means we should reconsider following the crowd.
In his letter to the Corinthian church, Paul taught that “The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body.” Each one of us is uniquely created and given gifts to use throughout life. I would hope we all use the gifts we have to the best of our abilities and don’t envy the gifts others have. Those are their gifts to use. We have our own. When we come together using our gifts in our own unique way, we create something even better. But we do that when we work together. It is through all the diversity in this wonderful world God created that we have the ability to work through any problems, any issues…anything. As long as we are willing to be who God created us to be and stop following the crowd. Albert Einstein said that, “The person who follows the crowd with usually go no further than the crowd…” I guess the question becomes: How far do you want to go in life?
So, unlike the rest of the world who according to just about every source hates Mondays…I like Mondays. Mondays offer me the time to organize my week and to connect with those I work with in the office. And that is a great thing! So, I hope you all have a fantastic Monday!
Peace
Pastor Beth
Beth's Blog 