This cosy Danish habit is the antidote to Sunday scaries

A few days ago, friends and I were reflecting on the need to dedicate one day of the weekend – preferably Sundays –to doing absolutely nothing. The dream? To be at home in sweatpants, sans make-up, with absolutely no commitments whatsoever. Maybe you binge watch some rom-coms; maybe you cook a delicious mid-day meal; maybe you catch up on the best books of the year. Regardless, you’re happy as a clam, chilling out at home. “An ideal day,” one friend sighed.

We were all aware of how good it would feel to take a day off from our obligations – and how much we each needed it. But several of us complained about the lack of time. Others, about the guilt we’d feel for not doing something “productive” – even though deep down we all know rest is very essential, indeed.

In Denmark – home of the hygge philosophy – it’s the norm to dedicate one day of the weekend to being quiet at home. In the book The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy Living, author Meik Wiking defines hygge (pronounced hoo-ga) as a sense of comfort, togetherness, and well-being – “a feeling that we are safe, that we are shielded from the world and allow ourselves to let our guard down.” Hygge, in other words, is the feeling of being sheltered from a storm – something that seems very necessary in a chaotic, hyper-stimulated world like ours.

In the book, Wiking also mentions several concepts that are closely linked to the idea of taking time during the weekend to chill out inside: søndagshygge, which consists of using Sundays as “a relaxing day with tea, books, music, blankets and maybe a walk if you’re in the mood”; and fredagshygge, which is hygge practiced on Friday evenings, “after a long week.”

Wiking also notes that these concepts are all about the simple things. For example, “Fredagshygge usually means the whole family curling up on the couch to watch TV. One fredagshygge tradition at home was eating sweets while watching a Disney movie.” In short: the idea is to dedicate time at the end of the week to indulge in the pleasure of hygge in its purest sense … instead of using it to tackle your to-do list or prepare for the tasks ahead.

Maximising coziness has a lot to do with being comfortable – so, naturally, clothing must play a part. You can’t be hygge in rigid denim, after all. To that end, the Danes have a special word that describes the clothing you should wear while spending the day at home: hyggebukser. It refers to “those pants that you would never wear outdoors but are so comfortable that they are probably secretly your favourite,” Wiking explains. As in: “She needed to dedicate a day to herself so she stayed at home with her hyggebukser, without makeup, watching shows all day.”

As to what else you do while wearing your hyggebukser? That’s entirely up to you. But just in case you need some inspiration from the Danes here are some examples: cooking a hearty dinner, knitting, snuggling under a blanket, sipping tea while wearing wool socks, and eating sweets.

Naturally, when practicing any form of hygge, it’s important to set a calm mood. That means lighting a candle or several – as it stands, more candles are burned per capita in Denmark than anywhere else in Europe. The golden rule is “the dimmer the light, the more hygge,” says Wiking.

Although our culture of overexertion has led us to believe that “doing nothing” is not productive, experts say that engaging in quality rest is essential for our wellbeing. “When we do nothing we are not wasting time, what we are doing is investing in our mental health, because our brain needs that rest,” explains psychologist Patricia Ramirez. “If we don’t give it that break at a cognitive level, with the excess of information and the hyperconnectivity in which we live, our brain gets exhausted, like when we train more than we are used to and our muscles are stiff.”

So, go ahead, make your Sundays a day of hygge. Wear your ugliest sweatpants. Watch all your shows. Eat some cake. And, most importantly, don’t feel guilty about it. Not one bit.