Make a Day of It

My Great Aunt Meg loved to browse a department store or a garden centre. She’d potter around picking up tea towels and paper napkins with floral designs for as long as she could before turning to her husband: “Shall we have a cup of tea and make a day of it?”

Incredibly, the cup of tea (and sometimes cake) was always enough to “make a day of it”, turning the morning’s activities into an event and the feeling of a proper day out.

I’m sure many of us have taken a coffee break for granted in the past, yet somehow Aunty Meg managed to let it give a warm glow to the whole day, turning an ordinary activity into a moment of indulgence.

For lessons in the power of small pleasures, we have a lot to learn from retired folks.

How the little things pass us by

I once read an article from Financial Times columnist Janan Ganesh that explored “the holy grail of having just enough”. He explains how having just enough money to fly business class as a rare treat has the power to bring a lot of happiness. However, being able to fly business class as standard brings no extra happiness — you begin to take it for granted and have to get your kicks elsewhere. The more we have, the more we take for granted and the more we need to make us happy.

Famously known as “lifestyle creep”, this phenomenon explains why the coffee we pick up every day on the way to work has become part of our routine and cannot provide the same warm glow as Aunt Meg’s rare garden centre treat.

Why it matters

Follow this phenomenon to its logical end and today’s working generations will wind up as cynical retirees who find little joy in life.

It sounds gloomy but it’s not inconceivable. Today’s workforce has more access to anything than any generation before them: social media, google, and AI instantly fulfill our desire to connect and to learn, budget airlines allow us to travel more often than ever and food delivery apps allow our favorite lunch to land in our laps within the hour.

Many city workers buy a morning coffee, lunch, and perhaps even drinks after work. How can a coffee or a habitual lunch light up our whole day when it’s one of several daily rituals we now take for granted?

Unsurprisingly, as soon as something becomes routine, it no longer has the power to help us “make a day of it”. With so much of the good stuff in life becoming routinely available on a daily basis, we need to work harder to create moments that truly lift our day.

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How to make a day of it

Our days are full of compromises: I can’t go to the bakery to get my favorite croissant so I’ll raid the biscuits in the office instead. I can’t get to the gym today so I’ll do a few exercises at home.

Some compromises feel good (a little exercise is better than no exercise) and some feel poor tradeoffs where we’re the only ones that lose out (had the biscuits, still want the croissant).

What if we took more courage to make time for what we really want on a more regular basis, and reduced our readiness to compromise?

This might mean brightening the odd Tuesday by making the trip to the bakery for a treat we’ll savor more than a week’s worth of raiding the office biscuit stash, or getting up early one day and heading to the park or the beach before work because we’ve been wanting to go for ages.

I’ve talked before about the power of the lizard brain, and our friendly lizard is about to make a cameo appearance: these little breaks in routine are acts of courage because the lizard brain (or amygdala) perceives change as a potential threat and will fight to keep us safe and cozy in the status quo for as long as possible.

Like the idea of going to a new park before work, but somehow never manage to get there? That’s the lizard brain doing its best work, keeping you warm and safe in bed. If we don’t do something habitually, the lizard brain ensures we need extra courage to overcome our urge to stay put.

When we finally take courage a couple of times a week to break our routine and do something that brings us joy, we’ll know we’ve truly made a day of it and we’ll feel good for it.

Where to find the courage?

Get clear on your motivation: why will this activity light up your day or week? Is it worth the sacrifice of time or money? Pick an activity that really excites you. Focusing on the end benefit will help you find the means.

Lay traps for the lizard: anticipate that you will find excuses immediately before the activity and make prior commitments to hold yourself accountable. Invite a friend to join you, leave out your workout gear, preorder your croissant, whatever it takes for you to follow through.

With sales of self-help happiness books through the roof — famous titles such as Ikigai have sold over 5 million copies — there’s no doubt we’re on the lookout for more happy moments. Yet we’re bogged down by our daily routines and slow to seize the opportunity.

Even if garden centers, coffee, and cake aren’t your thing, find your own small ways to break routine and “make a day of it” more often, and see how it lifts your week.

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