Instructions Before Visiting Monday
This week I'm not going to give you my words first. I'm going to give you someone else's.
A poem hit me hard. It’s called "Instructions Before Visiting Earth" by James McCrae. It's written like an owner’s manual handed to a soul before it's sent down here: deadpan, bureaucratic, almost clinical. He writes, “Don't panic. Your condition is only temporary.” And then, tucked inside all that flat instructional language, the tender bits sneak up on you. You're only visiting. Tread lightly. Listen more than you speak. Come back with some battle scars and good stories to tell.
You can (and should) read the whole thing here: Instructions Before Visiting Earth
I read it three times. And somewhere around the third pass, I realized why it landed so hard on a Sunday.
Because Sunday dread is, at its core, a scale problem. By 4 p.m. on Sunday, Monday has quietly been allowed to expand to fill the entire frame. It's not one day anymore. It becomes the inbox, the meeting you're preparing for, the version of yourself you're afraid won't show up as fully you. Monday becomes the whole world.
McCrae's poem is the opposite move. It zooms all the way out. You're a visitor here, it says. Nothing is owned; everything is borrowed. And when you hold something that lightly, even a Monday, it can't crush you.
So this week, in the spirit of borrowed wisdom, I wrote myself a smaller version. Not instructions before visiting Earth, but instructions before visiting Monday.
Instructions Before Visiting Monday
In the event that you wake up and find yourself facing a Monday, don't panic. Your condition is temporary. This is one day out of thousands you will be issued.
You have been selected for the opportunity of showing up — not perfectly, just fully. Your calendar is a map, not a verdict. The meeting you are dreading will last less time than the dreading did.
While you are there, be a good guest. Tread lightly through your inbox. Don't make a mess in the reply-all. Listen more than you speak, especially in the meeting where you're tempted to prove something. Give more credit than you take.
Do not keep your best ideas locked in a drawer, protected from wear and tear. They'll never make it out alive that way, and the quarter passes quickly. So does the half. So does the fiscal year.
And when Friday comes, because it always comes, return with some battle scars and good stories to tell.
That's the reset this week: Monday is just a visit, not a residence. You're passing through it, the way you're passing through all of it.
Go read McCrae's original. Then enjoy leftovers from the 4th, set out your coffee cup for tomorrow morning, and hold Monday a little more loosely than you did last week.
See you next Sunday.
P.S. If the poem resonates, McCrae runs a writing community called Sunflower Club on Substack. It’s worth a look.