Sunday Scary: What It's Telling You and What You Owe Your Team

The Sunday scary is real. And leaders get it too.

In this episode of Leadership After 5, Kim gets honest about her own Sunday scary. What it looks like, what it's actually pointing at, and why it has almost nothing to do with not liking the work. She breaks down the real math of the weekend, why Saturday is not actually a day off, and what it means when the dread shows up right on schedule at six o'clock Sunday evening.

But this episode isn't just personal. It's a leadership accountability conversation. Because your team is having Sunday scaries too. And what you model on Monday morning is either the problem or the solution.

If you love the work but keep arriving at Monday morning feeling like you already lost, this one is for you.

Transcript

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Welcome to Leadership After Five, where leadership gets real. I'm Kim. Hey, let me ask you something. What time does it hit you on Sunday? For some of you, it's right after dinner. For others, it's the moment you look at your phone and see the week ahead loading up like a freight train. For some, it starts Saturday night and just never really stops. The Sunday scary is real. And before you tell me it's just for employees, I need you to know that leaders get it too. I get it too. Today I want to talk about it. And I want to talk about what you as a leader owe your team when it comes to this. Here's the first thing I want to name. Not all Sunday scaries are created equal. And understanding which one you have matters more than you think. When I hear employees talk about dreading Monday morning, I always find myself asking, well, is it the manager? Is it the work? Is it a toxic environment? Is it just that the weekend went too fast and the couch was too comfortable? Because those are very different problems with very different solutions. When I think about my own Sunday scary, it's never about a lack of interest in the work. I genuinely love what I do. That is not my problem. My problem is exhaustion, depletion. The weekend going by so fast that I didn't get the things done I needed to get done. And now Monday is standing at my door and I am not ready to answer it. That distinction matters because if you are leading a team and you assume everyone's Sunday scary looks like yours, you are going to miss what is actually happening for the people around you. I want to give you a picture of what the weekend actually is for most people. So just picture this you're on a track and you have been running for 50 minutes, five zero, running hard, right? And you only get two minutes to recover. Can you catch your breath in two minutes? Yes. Can you get a sip of water in two minutes? Also, yes. But have you actually recovered? No, not even close. And the moment you start running again, you are going to feel every one of those 50 minutes still sitting in your legs. That is the weekend. That is what two days actually is against five days of full output. And here is what Saturday actually looks like for most of us if we keep it real, right? Friday night, you collapse. Saturday morning, you spend recovering just enough to function. Saturday afternoon, maybe you do some chores, you take the kids to their, you know, games or whatever you're doing. Sunday, you finish up more chores, maybe take them to other the kids to other, you know, events that they they need to go to. And maybe you do something resembling rest. And then by six o'clock, the Sunday scary arrives right on time. You never actually stop. You just change what you were running toward. And then we wonder why Monday feels impossible. Here is what I want you to hear specifically. Your Sunday scary is not a weakness. It is not a character flaw. And it's not evidence that you are in the wrong role. It is data. And the question is whether you are paying attention to what it's actually telling you. For me, it has almost always been pointing at my boundaries. Or more specifically, the boundaries I neglected throughout the week. The yes I said when I probably should have said no. The hour I gave after I had nothing left to give. The meeting I took at 7 p.m. that I am still thinking about on Saturday morning. My Sunday Scary is usually the bill arriving for the boundaries I didn't keep Monday through Friday. So if you back it all the way up, the Sunday Scary isn't really about Sunday. It is about what you allow to happen all week long. And until you address that, the Sunday will keep being scary. Now, here's the question I want you to sit with. What is actually behind yours? Is it indeed the work itself? And if so, is it unfulfilling or just overwhelming? Is it a relationship at work, a peer, a manager, a direct report that makes Monday feel like a mindfield? Is it the volume, maybe too much, too fast, not enough support? Or is it that you have been neglecting your own recovery so consistently that your body and your mind are simply exhausted before the week even starts? Until you can name it honestly, you cannot address it. And you cannot address it in your team either. I'm not going to tell you that Sunday scaries go away entirely. I actually don't think they do. But I do think they can shift from dread to something that feels more like an invitation. Here's what has worked for me. Gratitude sounds corny. I know, I get it. But reconnecting to why the work matters, really sitting with it, not performing it, that changes something. When I remind myself that the work I do impacts real people, real organizations, real leaders who are trying to figure it out, something shifts. The weight is still there, but it means something. And I'll be honest with you, when I get it right, when I have kept my boundaries, when I have recovered properly, when I have reminded myself why I do this, I walk into Monday like I'm that girl. You feel me? Like nobody can tell me anything. Like the week doesn't even know what's coming. That confidence, that energy, that is available to you too. But you have to build the conditions for it. It doesn't just show up because you want it to. I wish it worked that way. The other thing that has helped me is being honest about what I'm actually carrying into Sunday. Not performing okayness, not scrolling through TikTok for hours pretending I am resting when I am actually avoiding. Actually asking myself, what happened this past week that I still need to process? What didn't get done that I need to either address or let go of? That honesty is uncomfortable, but it is the only thing that actually moves the needle. Trying to keep it real with you, because this is leadership after five. So let me just say this. As I speak, as you are having yours. Some of them are dealing with it quietly. Some of them are texting each other about it. Some of them are lying awake on Sunday night rehearsing the week ahead. And what they are watching, whether they tell you or not, is how you show up on Monday morning. If you walk in depleted, reactive, scattered, and running on empty, you are modeling exactly what you are trying to lead them away from. You are telling them with your presence that this is just what leadership looks like, that exhaustion is the standard, that there is no other way. But if you walk in grounded, not perfect, not performing energy you don't have, but just genuinely present and connected to the work, you give them something to aspire to. You show them that it is possible to lead from a place of intention rather than depletion. That is not a small thing. That is one of the most powerful things you can do for your team's culture. And I want to be clear about something. I'm not talking about people who are in toxic organizations. If your Sunday scary is rooted in an abusive environment, a genuinely harmful manager, or a culture that is breaking you, that's not okay. And you deserve real support. I am talking about the leader who is fundamentally okay, who is in a good enough situation, who actually loves the work but keeps arriving at Monday morning feeling like they lost before the week even started. That leader, that leader has options. And the first option is to stop treating Sunday like something that happens to them and start treating it like data that is trying to help them. What if Sunday wasn't scary? What if it was an invitation? An invitation to assess, to reset, to remind yourself why Monday matters, to make one decision about one boundary you are going to keep this week that you didn't keep last week. Not a whole new system, not a complete life overhaul, but just one decision. Because the world needs you on Monday. That is how you have to look at it. They don't need a depleted version of you performing okayness for your team. They need the real version, the one that knows why the work matters and shows up ready to do it. Think about it this way: you don't want the pilot flying your plane to have Sunday scaries, do you? You don't want the person making decisions that affect real people and real organizations to be running on empty, do you? Well, neither does your team. They need you present, they need you grounded, and they need you to model what it looks like to take your own recovery seriously. So they believe they're allowed to take theirs seriously too. Until you model it, it is going to be hard for them to do it. I always say being a leader is one of the most hardest jobs next to being a parent. And this explains it. You are not just in it for yourselves, you're in it for the people that you are leading. You owe it to them to lead and lead well. You don't need to perform or fake it. You just need to be grounded. Find your why. As cringy as it may sound to you, and as played out as it may sound to you, there's actually research on this. Find your why. Understand your own data so that you can show up to them and allow them to even aspire to, whether it's your position or something else, aspire to something bigger. That's the job. That is a leader. Thanks for listening. If this landed for you, please reach out to me. I would love to hear from you. This is Leadership After Five. And y'all, we're gonna always keep it real over in this part of the world. Thanks for listening. Take care. I'll see you in the next episode.