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Please explain. I like to learn English. I do not really understand the proposal: "Don't hate Monday. Make Monday hate you". Help me to understand this sentence. I am very interested in this phrase.

It will be right or I not correctly think? "Do not hate Monday. Hate the person who created the Monday".

The phrase was taken from pictures:

picture of a note found in a public toilet

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    Cute cat. It might also be an oblique reference to the famous American cartoon series "Garfield" by Jim Davis, in which the cat (Garfield) made frequent jokes about "hating Mondays". See for example, this, or this
    – Andrew
    Jul 9, 2017 at 13:06
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    @Andrew It definitely is. So, basically, this is someone taking Garfield and making their own motivational fork of it.
    – Hack-R
    Jul 9, 2017 at 16:10
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    This joke is similar to Yakov Smirnoff's "In Soviet Russia" jokes.
    – Jasper
    Jul 9, 2017 at 19:20
  • See @Kevin's answer below. Just because it's a cat doesn't make it Garfield. Nor does it being a cat that offers suggestions on how to improve your view of Mondays make it Garfield. Garfield's attitude overall illustrates that he hates things in general, including Mondays. He never does anything about the fact that he hates Mondays. Jun 16 at 13:27

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I like to learn English.

Great!

I do not really understand the proposal: "Don't hate Monday. Make Monday hate you".

Well, it's not really a 'proposal' or offer. It's a motivational phrase intended to inspire the reader to have a better mood and be more productive.

It will be right or I not correctly think? "Do not hate Monday. Hate the person who created the Monday".

No, you're not thinking about it correctly. 1st, Monday is a name, so it doesn't have an article ("the") unless you're talking about a very specific Monday. 2nd, the ancient astronomer who established the planetary hours is entirely irrelevant. People don't hate Monday as a day of the moon; people hate Monday as the return to the work week and its early wakeup time after the respite of a weekend. It's not Monday that's hateful; it's work itself but, that said, people don't usually want to be unemployed.

"I hate Mondays" is just a bit of self-indulgence (when spoken to yourself) or commiseration (when shared with others) that has become a pat cliché in most of the English-speaking world. So, getting back to the heart of your question:

"Don't hate Monday. Make Monday hate you."

is the kind of thing a fairly clever manager would put up in a bathroom after a continuing education course on business psychology. The idea is to take an unhelpful and counterproductive tendency in the staff and, somehow, shunt it into a more productive direction. In this case, the lazy self-indulgence that "I hate Mondays" might condone is being converted into righteous anger against a personification. The idea is the worker, instead of slacking off, will focus on "defeating" her or his "enemy" Monday by working so hard that it's caught off-guard and worn out.

That's the idea, anyway.

The actual staff will just smirk a bit, finish their slash, and continue on with whatever they were planning on doing already.

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    What did you mean by "finish their slash"? I'm not familiar with that idiom.
    – Mark S.
    Jul 9, 2017 at 22:37
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    @MarkS. neither do I, but it's easy to get the meaning from the context. Hint: it'a motivational poster in a bathroom
    – bolov
    Jul 9, 2017 at 23:20
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    @MarkS., if you still didn't understand, here's the Wiktionary link. What's unusual is that they suggest that this sense of the word may have an entirely separate etymology going back to Scots and Old French, based on a term cognate with 'splash'.
    – lly
    Jul 10, 2017 at 3:55
  • en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/slash --- An act of urinating. Jul 11, 2017 at 4:57
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    @SohaFarhinPine There was already a link above, but yes that was the sense being discussed.
    – lly
    Jul 11, 2017 at 5:11
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Don't start your Monday with the thought that Monday is going to conquer you. Start your Monday with the thought that you are going to conquer Monday.

You can replace "conquer" with a pithier phrase, for example "own", or "beat the daylights out of" -- something that would make Monday "hate" you.

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Monday is disliked as the start of the typical work week.

The motivational suggestion is to instead accomplish so much that you've conceptually made Monday work to where it 'hates' you.

Of course, 'Monday' can't feel or express emotion, the point is to make the reader feel good about Monday and what they've done.

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So here's a couple of things:

This is Peppy the Inspirational Cat. Drawn by October Jones (who also did "Text from Dog.)

He used to leave these on trains and take pictures so original poster's picture is wrong.

Anyway: Peppy delivers slightly "over the top" motivational messages. So when people say they hate Mondays, Peppy says "Don't hate Monday" meaning don't just hate a day... "Make Monday hate you!" Means have such a great day that Monday itself will be jealous.

It isn't perfect English and is laced with irony, sarcasm and double meanings.

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On a similar note:

All right, I've been thinking, when life gives you lemons, don't make lemonade!

Make life take the lemons back!

GET MAD!

I don't want your damn lemons!! What am I supposed to do with these?

Demand to see life's manager! Make life rue the day it thought it could give Cave Johnson lemons!

Do you know who I am? I'm the man whose gonna burn your house down

… with the lemons!

Cave Jonhson

Mondays are usually hated, Monday tells you how it is, you don't have a choice, it sucks and that's why most people don't like Mondays.

The idea here is to say: "f* that!"

Be the boss (of Monday)! Show it who's in charge. Don't suffer Mondays anymore, take control of them. Reverse the roles!

This is all very metaphorical and designed to be inspirational speech.

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