Are you ready? Holiday season is here again. Shopping, cooking, baking, decorating, entertaining and traveling are looming over us with greedy notions and time stealing expectations for all we're supposed to accomplish threatening to overwhelm us. Christmas time is here!
The Christmas season is about different things to different people. For some it's all about increasing sales figures, for others it's time for their yearly entertainment schedule. Still others look at it as a time to remember it's origin is the Christ mass celebrating the birth of Jesus. Then, there are those who love the season, with all the foods, music, traditions, decorations and fanfare.
What happened to “the good old days” we're supposed to remember with such nostalgia and fondness? Time tends to enhance memories of our childhood holidays, just as it enhanced the memories of our parents and grandparents. I suspect the memories wouldn't be quite so jolly if we were able to actually go back in time and observe things with an adult perspective.
Why do we seem to have more holiday stress than either our parents or grandparents? Here are two of the reasons:
Today, both parents tend to work (in two-parent families), and
One-parent families usually have less money to spend.
We live in an instant information and communications age today, complete with cell phones, ipods and mp3 players. We don't get the downtime our parents and grandparents had, unless we schedule time for it. When was the last time you sat on your porch or deck watching the world pass by? Can't remember? I did it on Halloween, waiting for trick-or-treaters on the porch steps because our porch light decided to take a vacation. It was fun, but I don't do it often, or often enough.
Try to find a moment each day just to relax and take a few deep breaths. You don't have to do everything! Saying “no,” or “after the holidays” is perfectly acceptable. You don't have to make 10 batches of every Christmas cookie in your cookbooks. Gift cards make great gifts, and they are available in supermarkets, drugstores and other locations, as well as online.
Go to a community concert or event just to enjoy yourself. If there are five gifts you don't get to buy, or foods you don't get to bake or cook, will the world suddenly end? No! You do not have to be super-human at this busy time of year. You do need to keep your sense of humor and your balance as you go through the season. Spend as much time as you can with friends and family.
Relax and enjoy yourself. You'll feel better, and better able to cope with the busy-ness of Christmas.
