by David Lee
The holiday season offers us a chance for both joy and
stress, depending on how we approach this special time of year. The best recipe
for a joy-filled, rather than stress-filled holiday season includes these five
fundamental “ingredients”:
- Taking
good care of yourself
- Challenging yourself
- Recognizing the consequences
of your choices
- Calling forth your highest
self
- Spreading goodwill
Take Good Care of Yourself
You’re more likely to enjoy the holidays – and the
rest of your life – if you have energy and vitality. You’re more likely to have
energy and vitality if you take good care of yourself. Thus, doing the little
things that “keep your well filled” can make a huge
difference in whether the holiday season is a season of stress or joy.
If you think taking good care of yourself is indulgent
or self-centered, think of the difference in makes not just in your life, but
in how you affect others. Remember that the more rested, happy and filled with
good cheer you are, the more you have to give to others. In fact, perhaps the
greatest gift you can give others is by being a happy, vital, vibrant person.
Think of how good you feel when you with such a person. You feel better just
being around them. So taking care of yourself is both an essential part of
enjoying the holidays and your life, and a gift to others.
Putting This Into Practice:
1. If you feel worn out
and tell yourself you don’t have time to take a break, remind yourself that
doing so will bring you more energy. Think of it as an energy investment. Experiment with taking a break. Whether it is
taking an hour to go for a walk, an evening to read a good book, or an
afternoon spending time with a friend, take the break that will refresh you.
Notice how you feel afterwards. Notice how it affects your energy level and
your level of enthusiasm.
2. Ask yourself if
you are building the basic, physiological foundation of vitality: enough rest,
exercise, and healthy foods. Although this is Health 101, many people still
insist on shortchanging themselves on the foundation, and then complain about
not having enough energy. Are you actually doing what you know is important
regarding the physiological foundation?
3. Start the day off
with a few minutes of silence. The positive benefits of silence are almost
miraculous in their ability to bring about a sense of calm, focus, and
stability. Try starting your day without radio or TV, at least for part of your
morning. Sit quietly in your favorite chair for 5 or 10 minutes. If you have
small children, camp out in your bedroom for five minutes before emerging, or
leave the radio off while you’re driving to work. Try this out and notice how
it increases your sense of serenity.
4. Read a few lines,
or better still, a few pages, of uplifting material upon arising and then just
before going to bed. It will give our subconscious mind something healthy to
work with, and it will help set the emotional tone for the upcoming day.
5. Feed your tactile
needs. Just as our bodies have certain vitamin and mineral requirements to stay
healthy, it also has tactile requirements. Research with babies and the elderly
has shown that when human beings don’t receive adequate touch, adequate tactile
stimulation, they fail to thrive. Nourishing yourself kinesthetically, doesn’t
require that you do anything extravagant. You don’t have to go away to a spa
for a week. Simply do the things that work for you. This can be as simple as
taking a bubble bath before going to bed, giving yourself a foot massage,
spending ten minutes stretching or doing yoga, or trading massages with a
friend or partner.
Challenge Yourself
Much of the stress people experience during the
holidays comes from
forcing themselves to do things they’d rather not. Think of how
many people you know who don’t like the holidays because they feel pressured to
buy gifts they can’t afford, spend time with people they don’t like, and pack
their schedules with events they don’t want to attend. Rather than doing things
we don’t want to do, and then feeling resentful and stressed, we can challenge
our beliefs about what we should and shouldn’t do. We can challenge our fears
about what other people will think of us if we don’t meet their expectations.
Doing this isn’t easy, but it is essential if we want to bring more joy and
goodwill into the holiday season.
Putting This Into
Practice:
1. Challenge your beliefs about what
you see as obligations. Think of the things you really don’t want to be doing,
but are, and then ask yourself “What would happen if I didn’t?” and “Who is
saying I should do this thing I really don’t want to do?” Recognize that even
if others disapprove of your choice to not do some of these “shoulds,” whether or not you feel guilty or inadequate is
up to you. As Eleanor Roosevelt noted: “No one can make you
feel inferior without your permission.”
2. Recognize that challenging the
"shoulds" doesn't mean being insensitive to
others, being irresponsible, or thinking only of yourself. It does mean
acknowledging that we are choosing to live by these demands we've made upon
ourselves. It means honestly recognizing the price we pay for those
demands and the price others pay when doing them leaves us tired and
resentful.
Recognize the Consequences of Your
Choices
Choosing to take care of yourself
and choosing to go against holiday convention can bring consequences. Your
family may be disappointed, your co-workers or social circle might wonder about
you, and you might not accomplish everything you believe you should. When faced
with these potential consequences, you and only you can decide whether this is
worth the price of bringing more joy, peace, and goodwill into your life – and
therefore more joy, peace, and goodwill to others.
Often, when faced with difficult choices, people will
say “That’s easier said than done” as if that’s a reason for not making a
difficult choice. Of course most everything is easier said
than done, especially important life changing decisions. No one said
they’re supposed to be easy. No one said that listening to the still small
voice inside and being true to yourself in the face of
disapproval and criticism is easy. But doing so can change your life.
Acknowledging the consequences of our choices and seeing the price we pay for
not being true to ourselves can give us the courage to take the first step.
1. First, recognize
that you have choices. No matter what the consequences of the various options,
you do have options. Let’s say a major source of stress for you has been
attending big holiday get-togethers with your extended family, many of whom
drink too much and become obnoxious. You do have the choice of attending or not
attending. Each brings with it consequences, both positive and negative. What’s
important is not denying that we have choices, just because the potential
consequence might be uncomfortable. So the first step is to practice saying
“I’m choosing to_______”. Notice how different that feels from saying “I have
to _______” or “I can’t _____.”
2. When you do things
you believe you're supposed to do, but don't want to do, consider the price you
pay in terms of stress, anger, and resentment. Consider the cost to others when
they get to experience you in a stressed, angry, and resentful mood. If you're
willing to pay that price, then continue doing those things, but take
responsibility for your feelings about your choices, rather than blaming your
feelings on others.
3. Consider the
potential consequences of doing your holidays differently and ask "Am I
willing to pay the potential price of doing it differently?" Try to get
clear about your fears. Are you afraid of being criticized by your relatives if
you stay for only a couple of hours rather than
days? Are you afraid your relatives won't understand if you reduce the number
of holiday gathering you attend? Are you afraid your children will feel
shortchanged if you don't give them a truckload of toys? Are you afraid people
will think you're cheap if you bake rather than buy, a
gift? When you identify your fears, you can challenge their validity.
(e.g. "Do I really think that friends will be disappointed with the double
chocolate brownies I baked for them?") This is where a wise friend
or therapist can be very helpful. They can often do a better job at challenging
our irrational fears than we can.
4. Remember “We are
responsible for our responses, both emotional and behavioral.” If we don’t like
how we are feeling, if we don’t like what we are doing, it is our
responsibility to do something about it. Rather than wasting our time wishing
society would change or wishing others would be more understanding, we can
recognize that if we don’t like the results – our feelings or actions – it is
up to us to do something about it.
5. When faced with
tough choices and others’ disapproval, remember the Serenity Prayer: “God,
grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change
the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Call Forth Your Highest Self
Have you ever found yourself during the holiday season
thinking: “I don’t like the way I’m acting. This isn’t what the holidays are
supposed to be about.”? Whether it’s dodging in front of another car for a
parking space at the mall, fuming as you wait twenty people deep at the
checkout counter, or responding irritably to a family member, we have all
fallen short during the season of peace and joy.
Because it holds so many opportunities to be less than
our best, the holiday season is an especially good opportunity to practice bringing
forth our highest self. When we do this, we not only feel good about ourselves,
we also spend more of our time feeling kindly and cheerful, which is far more
pleasant than spending our time feeling angry and frustrated. We’re not the
only ones who benefit when we bring forth our highest self. As mentioned previously, others benefit
when we are at our best. When we call forth our highest self in our dealings
with others, we also increase the chances that they will treat others with
kindness and good cheer.
1. When faced with a
challenging situation, think of someone you admire and ask "How would they
respond?" or ask "What is the most kind, compassionate response in
this situation?"
2. When faced with a
situation that appears to pit your desires against others', ask yourself
"What response would bring the highest good to all involved?"
3. Give yourself
permission to read a few minutes each day about how to bring out your highest
self. Not only does this give you helpful ideas and practices for bringing out
your best, it also keep this intention on your radar
screen. The following books have excellent content and short, manageable
chapters: “It’s A Meaningful Life – It Just Takes Practice” by Bo Lozoff, “Awakening the Buddhist Heart” by Surya Das, “No Ordinary Moments” by Dan Millman,
and “Wherever You Go, There You Are” by John Kabat-Zin.
Spread Goodwill
Spreading Goodwill is perhaps the most direct route to
having a joyful holiday season - and a happy life. Think of times you’ve paid
someone a compliment or helped out another. Didn’t you feel great? Spreading
goodwill is such a win/win. Both the giver and the receiver end up feeling
happier and better about the world. Even more importantly, when we spread
goodwill, we increase the odds that those we’ve touched will then spread
goodwill to others. Just as in the movie “Pay It Forward”, one simple act of
kindness can create a powerful, positive ripple effect that can touch untold
numbers of lives.
Often when people think about bringing goodwill to
others during the holiday season, they think about volunteering at a soup
kitchen or some other worthy volunteer effort. Although this is a wonderful
expression of helping others and spreading goodwill, I think it’s just as important
to notice all the simple everyday opportunities to spread goodwill.
When asked at his deathbed for the one piece of advice
he would like to leave behind, Aldous Huxley, who had
spent a lifetime exploring the common themes of religious and spiritual
traditions of the world, replied: “All we need to do is be a little kinder
toward each other.”
1. Do something for those less fortunate.
2. Be on the lookout
for opportunities to give someone a compliment, including strangers.
3. Instead of staring
at your cart of merchandise while waiting in line, make a friendly off-hand
remark to the person next to you.
4. Send a friend or
colleague a little Thank You note.
5. Instead of
engaging a stranger in a stare down for the parking space opening up, let them
have it. Instead of lunging toward the nearby checkout line that just opened
up, let someone else take that coveted position.
6. When paying your
toll, pay for the person behind you.
7. If you see a
parking meter that has expired, put in a quarter.
8. If a clerk is
being testy with you, instead of responding in kind, trying responding with
kindness. Acknowledge that this is probably a hard season for them, or that
it’s probably been a hard day.
The holiday seasons can be a season of stress or a
season of joy, depending on the choices we make in our thoughts and actions.
Make this holiday season more joyful for you and all those you come in contact
with by:
- Taking
good care of yourself
- Challenging yourself
- Recognizing the consequences
of your choices
- Calling forth your highest
self
- Spreading goodwill
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© 2002 David Lee. All rights reserved.
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About the
Author: David Lee is a consultant, speaker, and executive coach.
The founder of HumanNature@Work, he has worked with
organizations and presented at conferences throughout
For More Information:
David Lee, President
HumanNature@Work
Tel: 207-571-9898
E-mail: info@HumanNatureAtWork.com