Creating Your Perfect Weekend

In Pursuit of the Perfect Weekend

What’s worse than a weekend that disappears instantly in a mess of exhaustion and chores? But it happens so often. If that sounds familiar, it’s time to work on improving your weekends!

You deserve time to rest and recharge, enjoy family and friend time, work on hobbies and pet projects. The perfect weekend involves doing these things AND being able to start the new week feeling refreshed and organised. You can totally do both.

Before we start, I’ll admit that a perfect weekend probably doesn’t exist. Not in any one format anyway. It’s different for everyone.

BUT you can work on making your weekends close to perfect for YOU. Here are some ideas to help you create your perfect weekend – whatever that looks like.

Does the Perfect Weekend Exist?

There’s a LOT of pressure on weekends. The weekend is your precious time off, time to yourself, time with family and friends, time to run errands, socialise, relax, work out, chill out, sort out the house, get out the house, and all the rest… No wonder weekends can be just exhausting.

The other pressure on weekends is that we often find ourselves feeling guilty about slowing down and thinking about how we SHOULD be doing this or that. We then end up feeling disappointed when we don’t “have a great weekend” and end up with the Sunday night blues.

It’s true that no one bounces into work on Monday morning excited about how they had such an average weekend. But we don’t beat ourselves up about having a really mediocre Tuesday evening, so why does the weekend need to be so perfect? Time to let go of all that pressure. A weekend is two days to spend how you please. No more or less. Being mindful of this can play a big part in how much you enjoy your weekend.

In reality, the “perfect weekend” is going to be one which leaves you feeling both relaxed and energised. So how can you achieve that?

What Would Be Your Perfect Weekend?

What your perfect weekend looks like will depend on lots of different factors. Your lifestyle, family situation, work patterns, and personality type will all influence what constitutes a perfect weekend for you. My ideal weekend when I was single in my 20s looked a lot different to how it looks now years later with kids to look after. (Yes, I still want to spend it sipping cocktails somewhere beautiful, but these days there would a lot more naps involved.)

Your perfect weekend will also change depending on what’s going on in your life right now. Before the pandemic, many of us were desperate for a quiet weekend at home. After a year of staying home, we were desperate for a weekend away. Needs change with the ebb and flow of life.

The Perfect Weekend Challenge

This weekend, challenge yourself to forget all thoughts of what you should be doing, or where you should be going, and create the perfect weekend according to what you need most right now. Start be asking yourself a few questions:

This should help you to focus on what an ideal weekend would like for you THIS weekend.

Perfect Weekend Ideas

Sometimes you don’t need to ask yourself what kind of weekend you want. Sometimes you just know exactly what you want to get out of a weekend, and what would make it perfect. These weekends tend to fall into some of these categories:

The Relaxing Weekend

The secret to a relaxing weekend is to leave everything else at the door – including all those thoughts about what you should be doing instead.

Forget about the niggling DIY jobs or other things on your to-do list that can wait. If it’s urgent, get it done beforehand and then go all-in and commit to a weekend of complete downtime. Watch all the TV you want, have an at-home spa day, order takeaway, enjoy the Perfect Sunday Morning. No guilt allowed.

The Social Weekend

Some of the most memorable weekends are the busiest. Sometimes you need to have a jam-packed weekend seeing friends and family, where you end up exhausted on Sunday night, but good-exhausted.

The Getting-Stuff-Done Weekend

Occasionally, the best Monday morning vibes come from knowing that you were really productive over the weekend and used it to sort out all the little life admin tasks that had been hanging over you. If you don’t have any weekend plans, take the time to sort out your paperwork, spring clean your house, batch cook for the freezer, or any other jobs that you never get round to doing in the week. You’ll cruise into Monday feeling like you’re winning.

The Working-on-a-Project Weekend

On a similar theme, if you have a project you want to complete, like redecorating a room, clearing out the garage, selling all your 1990s collector beanie babies on eBay (can it be done? asking for a friend…) then pick a weekend and get it done. It’s going to feel so good to get it finished.

The Getting Away Weekend

Ah, that weekend away feeling. Heading off on Friday, full of excitement, to somewhere new. If you haven’t had a weekend away since the COVID Beforetimes, then you’re not alone. Get dreaming. Start planning that next weekend away for when restrictions are lifted.

The Unplugged Weekend

Sometimes you want or need to shut out the world and have some proper quiet time (and not see anyone else’s Insta-perfect weekend). Sometimes you should do exactly that. Have a weekend where you only use your phone for essential calls and do Literally Anything Else. Read a book, go for a long walk, do a craft, watch old movies, have a games night, go on a family adventure. Be present. Old-skool weekends feel so good.

The Perfectly-Balanced Weekend

This is probably most people’s idea of the ideal weekend. It’s the one where we manage to fit in something relaxing, something social, and something productive, which is probably the holy trinity of weekend activities. Sounds obvious, but in truth not many weekends actually turn out like that. It might take a bit of planning, but it’s totally do-able. And if you’re wondering where you fit in the boring stuff like laundry and grocery shopping, there are plenty of ideas here for making the most of your time: How To Improve Your Weekend.

Not every weekend will be perfect. Some won’t even be good, because that’s life. But knowing what you want to get out of your weekend and not feeling compelled to do certain things gives you the best chance of making it perfect for YOU. Plus – the important thing to remember is that next week another weekend is coming.