CHRISTMAS IN OUR HEARTS
Be honest with yourself, you must have wanted to stuff your ears with cotton to drown out the Jose Marie Chan-fest of Christmas songs sometime during these ber months. I know I have; in fact, “Christmas In Our Hearts” has long worn out its welcome to me this holiday season. Aside from being pumped through the airwaves like the next best Kendrick Lamar hit, I’ve had to sing that song twice already (and will sing it once more before the month is over) for Christmas parties.
It almost makes “Pen-PineappleApple-Pen” seem like a catchy tune, by contrast. In order for me not to get my Ebenezer Scrooge on, I’ve come up with an acronym, H.E.A.R.T, to help make the barrage of Christmas songs more bearable. I may actually come to enjoy and miss them when the season’s over (not likely) because of this. In order to calm myself down and get all Zen about it, I just try to remember that Christmas is about:
HELPING
The reason of Christmas is to help those who often cannot help themselves. As much as I want to get new clothes, shoes, or monetary assistance from relatives to buy said items, I need to take a big dose of reality and realize, as a mentor told me, that Christmas is for the forgotten people. This is easy to do when the holiday spirit is in the air, but quite another story in the middle of summer when that feel-good emotion is gone, replaced by a desire to get the best beach bod under the sun. It’s easy to hand out giveaways and treats to those forgotten—the underappreciated security guards and janitors for example —but how many of us remember to ask for their names and actually smile when we see them when Christmas is long past? Which brings me to my second point. Christmas is also about…
EVERYONE
For those too lazy to read on, let me summarize it in a sentence: It’s not about you. No matter how miserable you think your Christmas is (and for many, including me, let’s be honest, they’re mostly #firstworldproblems), there are plenty others who have it far worse. Yes, I understand feeling loneliness is common during the holiday season, but that’s what we’re there for: to make them feel un-lonely. It links up with our first point; that we should stop feeling “sorry” for how our holidays aren’t as perfect as we think it is and should see that there are those who have it worse.
ANGER MANAGEMENT
Now suppose you do catch the spirit of giving. You decide to take time from the busy holiday schedule to buy gifts for those who mean a lot to you. Instead, you end up cursing people in 10 different languages and wishing for fire and brimstone to fall on that slow driver holding up the lane and making your trip home 30 minutes longer. It’s understandable; everyone else wants to get into the giving mood, so everyone decides—like you—to go, at the same time, to buy these gifts. Woah there, pardner. You’re already on the right track; don’t ruin your holidays by fretting over the uncontrollable things. Instead, count to 100, meditate in line, or maybe decide to do your Christmas shopping earlier next year. Whatever your method, managing your anger will go a long way in not ruining Christmas for you.
RIGHT DIET
Let’s be clear here: calories during the holidays are still calories. They don’t magically turn into pixie dust and scatter away at the end of the day. Now, it is a time to get together and catch up with people, so it’s perfectly fine to give yourself a little more allowance to indulge and feast on the more “sinful” gastronomic delights. But be a responsible eater and take the time to manage your calories— don’t eat at every party like there’s famine and pick and choose the times that you will cheat on your diet (if you have one). If you exercise, great, don’t stop doing that. If you don’t and are pretty laissezfaire with what you’re eating, well, don’t be surprised if the pants fit a bit more snugly next month and you scramble to shed the excess pounds by eating nothing but onions and garlic—nobody wins in the end.
TABLES
The last point is inextricably strewn together with Christmas. You don’t honestly expect to sit at the table and dive into your food without acknowledging the people seated near you, right? Christmas is a time when people take off from their normal routines to get together—to sit at the table—and remember that, in the end, company matters the most. The most lavish dinner and program feel hollow when celebrated with people we barely know, and, likewise, coffee in an ordinary café becomes a five-star experience when it’s shared with people who know us forward and backward. We need Christmastime to remind us about the table—about connecting and welding to those dear to us, which is something that money cannot buy.
If all these reminders still don’t make you get over the Christmas song barrage, I think “Total Eclipse of the Heart” on loop will alleviate the annoyance.