Self-Regulation Sundays

By the time Sunday arrives, my brain has usually opened approximately forty-seven tabs.

School schedules. Work. Practices. Meals. Emails. Things I forgot. Things I’m trying not to forget. Things somebody told me while I was doing three other things and apparently expected my brain to store permanently.

Very bold of them.

Our weeks can be logistically heavy, which is why I have become protective of Sunday.

Not because we have some beautifully optimized Sunday routine.

We do not.

Sunday is actually the opposite.

I think of it as the day we give our nervous systems somewhere to land.

We usually begin on the sandhill.

Early enough that the sun feels good and the sand has not yet become a frying pan.

Moving first thing helps all of us get out of our heads and into our bodies. There is something about starting the day by climbing something difficult that makes the rest of life feel a little less dramatic.

Your body has already received the message: We can do hard things.

Then, ideally, brunch.

I am an emotional-support extrovert, so regulation for me does not always mean being alone in a silent room.

Sometimes it means sitting around a table with people I love.

Building community requires creating actual opportunities for people to gather. Friendship does not maintain itself because everybody once agreed they liked each other.

People need invitations.

They need meals.

They need somebody willing to send the text.

After brunch, we come home and enter what I very professionally call do nothing time.

This is important.

There is no schedule.

No enrichment goal.

No carefully curated family activity designed to produce memories.

Everyone gets to meander.

My girls may play outside. Sometimes water becomes involved. Sometimes they disappear into art.

One of our favorites is watercolor.

I keep Emily Lex Studio watercolor workbooks around because they strike a balance I really love. There is enough instruction that you do not sit staring at a blank page wondering what exactly you were thinking when you decided you were an artist today, but enough room to explore that it still feels creative.

Her books teach you how to mix watercolors and create different effects, then give you sketched images and simple instructions to follow.

I travel with them sometimes because they are light, easy to pack, and surprisingly calming on a plane.

I love activities like this because they create focus without urgency.

Your hands have something to do.

Your brain has somewhere gentle to go.

Nobody needs to be excellent at it.

That last part may be my favorite.

We live in a culture where adults seem determined to turn every enjoyable activity into something measurable.

How good are you?

How productive was it?

Could you monetize this?

Did you improve?

Sometimes I want to paint a slightly questionable flower and have that be the entire achievement.

Later, we usually cook dinner together.

We talk.

We look back at the week.

What felt good?

What was difficult?

What are we thankful for?

What is coming next?

Nothing revolutionary happens.

That is sort of the point.

I spent a large part of my life in environments where my body had to perform.

Dance taught me discipline, repetition, preparation, and control.

Motherhood gave me a completely different education.

It taught me how quickly a nervous system can affect every other nervous system in a house.

Children borrow our nervous system before they build their own.

I remind myself of that often.

Especially when I am tempted to lecture everyone else about calming down while I am internally operating like an air-traffic controller during an emergency landing.

Regulation, for me, is not about becoming a permanently calm woman.

I would find her deeply suspicious.

It is about noticing when I am leaving myself.

It is about learning what brings me back.

Movement helps.

Sun helps.

People I trust help.

Cooking helps.

Painting helps.

Being outside helps.

Having stretches of time where nobody in the family is being rushed toward the next thing helps.

And sometimes the most regulating thing I can do is stop trying so hard to regulate.

Just go climb the hill.

Eat brunch.

Paint the questionable flower.

Make dinner.

Talk to your people.

Start again tomorrow.

Wellness has become much less complicated for me the older I get.

Yes, I care about what I eat and how I move my body.

But I also care about what I say to myself.

Who has access to me.

Whether my home feels like somewhere I can exhale.

Whether my children experience rest as something normal rather than something we earn only after exhaustion.

Whether we know how to come back to each other after a hard week.

Sunday is not a reset because Monday erases everything that came before it.

Nothing magical happens at midnight.

It is simply a rhythm that reminds me I am allowed to return to myself before life asks me to leave again.

And sometimes, that is enough.