Monday Mentality: What it is and how to stop it.
The “Monday Mentality”
Monday is the start of our typical work week and thus makes sense to us as an opportune time for a fresh start. “Monday Mentality” is a mindset to start the week with a positive attitude and motivation, a reset button. Sounds pretty good, right? It could be a good thing, but what happens when we keep pushing the starting line ahead and keep moving it to next Monday? What happens when Monday starts off great, but then something unexpected comes up Tuesday and sets us off our planned course? When Thursday comes around and it’s been a tough week, not everything has gone according to the plan you set earlier that week, do you say, “to heck with it” and binge until Monday comes around again? Think, “I’ll start fresh on Monday.”
We have all fallen victim to the “Monday Mentality,” myself included. In my experience working with clients, “Monday Mentality” can often end up slowing progress by defining a day of the week in which new beginnings and positive changes can happen. It can lead to something Evelyn Tribole, author of “Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Anti-Diet Approach,” calls “last supper eating.” This is when you are going to start a diet (maybe on Monday) and believe you will not have a particular food or foods ever again or for an extended length of time. It causes you to binge on the particular food or foods you believe will be “banned” in an effort to “get it all in” before you start your diet.
The cycle looks something like this:
This vicious cycle can leave us feeling out of control and guilty and ultimately leads to a lack of self-confidence, feeling as if we are inherently broken and have no personal self-control.
So, what can we do instead?
1. Think of every day as a Monday, a daily refresh. Realize new beginnings and new healthy habits can start any day of the week, any hour of the day. Our path to a healthier lifestyle comes one step at a time, one positive choice at a time, and weight loss happens because of all our cumulative choices over an extended period of time. If you started your day off rushing to work and having to grab a convenient and maybe not-so-healthy breakfast option, think about what you can have for lunch that might be a healthier option or go for a 15-minute walk to get some fresh air, extra movement, and a mental boost. Realize that the breakfast you had is not going to thwart your efforts and throw you off your goal unless you allow it to spiral.
2. Rethink your relationship with food. We all want to categorize foods into “good” and “bad.” Studies have shown that when we rigidly limit the amount of food we allow ourselves to eat, it usually sets us up to crave larger quantities of that food. If we accept the realization that all foods can fit in a healthy diet, we can take those foods that are on the “bad” list off the pedestal we placed them on and take away their control. I encourage the use of a food tracking system to aid in understanding what we are eating and how it can all fit within our recommended calorie and macronutrient ranges. Once you have a better understanding of this and have been able to find some consistency, I encourage moving more toward intuitive eating.
3. Be OK in the gray. Often with our diet, we want to be all in or all out, black or white. If we can find a way to stay in the gray, we can find more consistency and therefore more sustained, healthy weight loss.
4. Instead, start “Mindful Mondays” where we utilize Monday mornings to reset and reinforce our intentions for the week. Look at your schedule and plan for how you will accomplish your goals. Review the prior week and assess what worked well for you in moving toward our goal and identify roadblocks. Take the time Mondays to come up with creative ways to overcome challenges and know that there will most likely be others that come up and that’s OK. Take a cleansing breath and give yourself some grace.
Life is not perfect, and neither are we. The perfect life, the perfect diet certainly doesn’t magically happen on a Monday.
If you have goals to improve your health, do not start next Monday. Start TODAY at North Dakota Center for Weight Management and let us help you! Dr. Rachel Faleide, our Nurse Practitioner, and I can help to identify underlying causes of your weight issues and address those with medications if needed, provide individualized nutrition counseling and recommendations, and even help with exercise plans. Together we will get you started on the right track and provide all the support you need along the journey.
Take the first step today and click here to schedule your appointment.
Best of health,
Elise Smith, Registered Dietitian and Certified Personal Trainer