Without Denying our Complaints, What Makes this Season Great?
The holiday season can be stressful:
It can bring up feelings of anger and injustice.
- The stupid corporatization of something that used to be beautiful!
- My religion and culture are totally marginalized by Christmas
- It’s not about Santa, it’s about Jesus
- It’s not about Jesus, it was a pagan holiday about the solstice
- Etc.
It can bring up feelings of inadequacy.
- We don’t have enough money to give the presents we want to give
- We don’t have the time to go shopping
- We don’t have as cool of lights as our neighbors
- Etc.
But we can look at the exact same circumstances and celebrate instead. And we can do it without denying the truth of our complaints.
For example, we can see another side of all of these observations:
- Corporations are advertising generosity instead of selfishness (even though they profit from it)
- Every time someone says “Christmas Season” I have a chance to educate them about my culture (even though they did marginalize it)
- We have an opportunity to show the people we care about how much we love them (even though we feel like we can’t do it well)
- Lights throughout the neighborhood can bring us cheer and smiles, as people are basically trying to express an artistic creativity in public (even though our lights aren’t as good)
See if this holiday season you can embrace the spirit of giving, frivolity, joy, and merriment. See if you can find something to celebrate even in the specific things that annoy you most.
Sometimes a little shift in mindset is all it takes to make our day a little brighter.