The Friday that Changed the Week

Hi dear,

I wanted it to be Sunday, to share with you.

It wasn’t a perfect week. Most of them aren’t. And actually this one, was a busy one and long one. I came home later than I wanted to, most days, and the mornings moved faster than I’d planned. But Friday was different, it arrived, and with it, something I hadn’t had since Monday: enough time, before dinner, for me, to move.

So, I did. I did a session with dumbbells and then forty-five minutes on the treadmill. Not perfect form, not my best numbers. I gave what I had, which on Friday was everything I had left. I finished covered in sweat and genuinely tired.

And then something happened. I took a warm shower to comfort myself and by the time I stepped out of the shower and started drying my hair, I noticed I was happy. Not relieved, not just done. Actually happy. I put on a playlist and found myself dancing in the bathroom, getting ready as if I had somewhere wonderful to go, when my only plans were to watch the Cincinnati tennis matches and sleep.

M came home from his swim, found me mid-song, and asked with a smile: what are your plans tonight? Rest, I said. Watch tennis. Sleep. He laughed. I kept dancing.

There is science behind what happened, and I think it’s worth knowing. When you push your body through a real effort, it responds by releasing endorphins, serotonin, and dopamine. Your brain’s own chemistry for pleasure, mood, and reward. And research shows that the harder the effort, the stronger the release. Our brain, in other words, was designed to reward us for doing the hard thing. Not someday. Right after.

I share this not as a reason to push yourself when you shouldn’t. You already know by now that rest is its own form of preparation. I share it because I want you to know that the happiness I felt on Friday wasn’t accidental, and it wasn’t luck. It was what happens when you show up for yourself, even imperfectly, even just once in a week that didn’t give you much room.

If you’ve had a week that left you little space, I hope you find your Friday. The one small window where you can give yourself something, even briefly. Not because you have to. Because of what waits on the other side of it.

Glad you’re here,

Sandrie

P.S. This week, if movement feels far away, start with twenty minutes. Not as a compromise, as a door. What your brain does with twenty honest minutes might surprise you.