Time.news – Blu is the character of sadness in the Disney Pixar animated film, Inside out; Blu(es) is the most melancholic musical genre ever created by man; and blue is the third Monday of the new year, the most difficult day to face in the entire calendar. In short, if on January 16th you see everything black and nothing makes you smile, the fault lies with the date: it is the “Blue Monday”. The reason for the color is obvious: in Anglo-Saxon culture blue expresses despondency, displeasure.
Too bad that the saddest day of the year seems to be a real hoax. The fake news would be the result of a calculation made by Cliff Arnall, psychologist and professor, in 2005, during his evening teaching period at Cardiff University.
Blue Monday would be the result of an apparent complex mathematical operation which would bring together many variables: from the expenses made during the Christmas holidays to the motivational drop deriving from the period of detachment from work, from the weather conditions to the sense of guilt that Christmas excesses bring with them, from the need to change habits to the desire to impose new, and difficult resolutions. In reality Arnall’s would be nothing more than a publicity stunt for the SkyTravel site disguised as a mathematical formulalong since unmasked.
Yet not a year goes by that Blue Monday is not remembered by social users and the media, who even go further by suggesting a list of things to do to fight sadness, like watching funny movies, organizing a dinner with the nicest friends, taking advantage of the anti-depressant properties of chocolate. But perhaps, all you need is a little patience: 24 hours go by quickly. Waiting for the happiest day to come, which always falls on the summer solstice, between June 21st and 24th. The formula – also devised by Arnall – includes six parameters: spending time outdoors (O), nature (N), social interaction (S), childhood memories of summer holidays (Cpm), the temperature (T) and the desire to go on vacation (He), arriving at this result: O+(NxS)+Cpm/T+He.