How to survive Christmas and thrive this season

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas …..

I heard this song on the radio this morning. Now I do love Christmas, but in December and no earlier! But as Michael Buble is quick to point out (wee sneaky listen here if you’re in the mood…..), there are indeed toys in every store, notwithstanding the Christmas lists being compiled in this house.

How to survive Christmas? [a question many are asking, given the nearly 190 million results if you google that…]

Consumerism again seems to reign supreme, what with Black Friday adverts, Christmas adverts, advertisers everywhere telling you what you ‘must have’ this year.

Says who?

What are ‘must haves’ in your house as the Christmas season approaches?

Delicious food, and friends and family to share it with?

Time to relax, step off the busyness treadmill, switch off for a while?

Bracing walks in crisp, cold sunny air?

Carefully chosen gifts that delight the recipient?

Great dramas on the telly?

Pantos, shows, Christmas lights?

All good, all valid, all great fun.

And what about harder-to-quantify aspects of life that serve as great ‘must-haves’:

kindness…

gratitude….

a more balanced perspective….

generosity towards others who have less….

undistracted time to simply enjoy the moment.

A couple of months ago, I was musing here about what it would mean to end this year well.

And lo, we are nearly there, slipping inexorably into the spinning vortex of the Season of Craziness, which is what the lead up to Christmas can turn into. Advent can feel more like an exhausting onslaught of planning, organising, preparation. Less waiting in anticipation, more collapsing in a frazzled heap.

Peace and joy anyone?

So instead, consider with me for a moment:

What would it mean to get to the end of this year and say, that was a good year?

Perhaps there was something that you chose to change back in September, as you considered your WHAT, WHY, HOW and WHO to make those changes (this blog post makes sense of that!).

As you approach year end, how is it going? What is working well that you can celebrate? What might need a little tweaking, especially as these busy weeks approach?

What do you want to have achieved by the end of this year, and how well on track are you with that?

And as we consider how to survive Christmas, perhaps rethink that whole concept. Christmas is the foundation for a season that could indeed be filled with peace, joy, goodwill to all men.

We sometimes feel that we have little control over the busyness and distractedness and purchasing, hence the need to ‘survive’ this season.

But our choice here is one of perspective:

• Perhaps each morning to start the day with gratitude for what we have and what we get to celebrate.
• Relishing little things in the midst of the preparations.
• Choosing to not over fill our time so as to carve out moments to stop…breathe…notice….be thankful.
• Catching ourselves on when we start to slid into over-frazzledness with a reminder of what really matters.
• Cherishing the people around us who we love and not taking them for granted
• Letting go of the need for everything to be perfect, and just enjoying being ourselves
• Reminding ourselves, if faith is part of our stories, of what Christmas is about in the first place

As we approach December, Advent and the season of Christmas, rather than asking ourselves how to survive Christmas, perhaps we can choose a mindset of gratitude and generosity as we seek to thrive in the midst of all that we have and all that we are.