Article by Make The Days Count Contributor Marie Monroe

 

The holiday season is a season of expectation.  We expect to celebrate, enjoy friends and family, give and receive the perfect gifts. We want the house manicured and the decorations displayed. We expect to be happy and to make others happy as well.   We want perfectionism … just like a Norman Rockwell painting.

 

Holiday Deadlines & Expectation

Anticipation builds as we look forward to specific events.  Most of us will plan multiple events that are scheduled with exact dates and times … the school play, the Christmas concert, dinner at Aunt Susan’s, shopping for presents, the holiday office party … the list usually fills up very quickly.  We will watch our calendars inflate with “happy deadlines” as we work in everyone and everything we want to include.  

 

Happy though all these events may be, they are still deadlines with all the pressures that any deadline implies.  We must prepare and we must arrange.  We must move other everyday routines aside to accommodate these happier “musts.”  On top of that, we begin to think in “shoulds.”  We should do this and we should do that.  “Must” and “should” are the language of pressure.  They are also the language of expectation.

 

Allowing “Isms” to Stress Us

If I believe that the holidays should be a certain way, then I hold in my mind a list of what must happen to make them that way.  We all do this … we have a Norman Rockwell picture of the perfect holiday in our mind (which never existed in the first place) … and when it doesn’t materialize we are disappointed and stressed.  We work all the harder to make the holiday “better.”

 

This is the fertile ground of “ism’s” - those traits, behaviors and beliefs that compel us, nag us and, in the end, stress or even sabotage us.  The ism’s come out to play in full force whenever expectations are high.  The holidays are the perfect time to be plagued by them.

 

Ism’s come in many forms.  Two familiar ones are alcoholism and perfectionism.  Even when the suffix does not fit, the ism’s can be at work.  Expectations, disappoint, anger, overeating, depression, gambling, cleaning … basically any emotionally driven behavior will do.

 

What makes anything my ism is that I resort to it when I am stressed by any strong emotion.  The holidays are filled with them!  

 

We are very invested in our own ism’s and, conversely, we are very annoyed with others who have them.  They should stop those annoying behaviors!  In the irrational world, where all of this lives, there’s really no sense to it all at.  What’s good for us is an irritation in someone else”?  What’s good for the goose is good for the gander?  No!  The holiday goose will turn that rule of thumb upside down.  When the ism’s have besieged us, what’s good for the goose will drive that goose crazy when he’s up against it in the other geese!

 

All of this is the perfect set-up for dashed expectations.  It is also the perfect climate in which to breed irritability, conflict, horrendous encounters with co-shoppers and accident prone drivers.  All of that rubs at our musts and shoulds and threatens to erode our happy expectations.  If the ism’s have their way, we will implode, explode, retreat, withdraw, lash out, be anxious, or work too hard to please.  We’ll feel disappointed, neglected, taken for granted, inadequate, fat, broke and tired.  This is not the stuff of which celebrations are made!

 

”Just the Holiday Blues”

Lottery winners have taught us that even strong, positively perceived events are stressful.  Weddings, babies and moving into the dream home have taught us that as well.  Ism’s come out when emotion is high.  Ism’s come out when expectations are high.  

 

Whether positive or negative, an atmosphere of expectation and high emotion will pull our ism’s to the surface.

 

Some of us will be weepy for no apparent reason, blaming it on “just the holiday blues,” expecting a little more sentiment and emotionality right on time for the holiday season.  Some of us will feel the losses of our lives more acutely during this time.  We might particularly miss our loved ones who have passed on, or revisit grief for other losses incurred by significant transitions: graduation, divorce, job changes, friends we’ve left behind in a move, or the hometown we haven’t seen in awhile.  Even the simple passing of time, marked by the annual season, can remind us of unaccomplished goals, negatively impacting how we feel about ourselves.  For many people, however, the struggles of the holiday season are much more profound than simple “blues.”

 

The holiday season is, sadly, a busy season for mental health clinics and psychiatric hospitals.  Those who suffer more intensely, however, will also experience an increase in expectation and high emotionality during this time.  For these people, the expectation of suffering - often in loneliness - is overwhelming.  Much of what happens in our lives during the holidays is internal, but the holiday season often seems to be an external event–one over which we have no control and with which we cope, either well or not so well.  There is a lot to be said about the “holiday blues,” the loneliness and alienation that many feel, and the increase in drug and alcohol use, suicide and domestic violence.

 

Highlighting the Joys of the Season – Looking to Others

There are numerous sad realities at this time of year, and I say this not to dwell on them, but to highlight the joys of this season.  

 

I think it is not coincidence that our holidays begin with the giving of thanks and continue into a celebration of joy and birth.  The giving of thanks and the acknowledgment of a new beginning shine through.  

 

Here is the turning point of all our holiday struggles.  In thankfulness and new birth, we turn our attention away from ourselves and look out to others and the hope for our world.  All those negative ism’s cannot prosper in an attitude of truly helping others.  Our ism’s grow in self-absorption.  They fall away when we shift our focus to service and gratitude.

 

At this time of year, some of us will take the wish to serve others into the community – to missions, churches, shelters and food lines.  However our service to others does not have to leave our usual circle of loved ones, work and daily routine.  We can wish each other well.  We can smile more consciously, acknowledging whomever we meet in the spirit of this season.  We can let the stranded driver into the flow of traffic.  We can remember the security guards and housekeepers, the cashiers, the dry cleaner, the teacher and policemen with some wish of holiday enjoyment and perhaps a token of thanks.  We can serve our families a special meal with love and an attitude of giving.  We can focus upon the gifts of our hosts as we admire the labors of preparation they have made for us.  We can let others serve us because we know the importance of being able to serve.  

 

Our gifts do not have to be large or perfect.  In fact, our gifts can be anonymous … all the better.  Is there someone you’ve noticed that really needs something?  Send it from a “Secret Santa”!  Open yourself to service and get out of the way.  Being of service needs no acknowledgment.  

 

Being of service is the payoff!

 

Opening ourselves up to serve, focusing upon what we can do in service even to a passerby … that is the climate in which an ism cannot grow.  When we take self out of the holiday equation, expectations fall away, emotions settle down and the ism’s transform into our holiday wisdom!  

 

We stand a much greater chance of beating the holiday blues when we come out of our self-absorption and focus on what we have to give.

 

“One of the things that my parents have taught me is never listen to other people’s expectations. You should live your own life and live up to your own expectations, and those are the only things I really care about it.”
-Tiger Woods

 

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