Holiday Stress?
We wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas, blah blah blah…
For a lot of us we cannot understand why someone would not love the holidays. For it is the happiest time of the year, right!? Not for all, for some people it causes a great deal of stress, worry, anxiety, or feeling low and depressed. According to an article in Psychology Today, 45% of North Americans dread the festive season. Now this article was from 2010 and I wonder if that number is even higher today?
The article explains that the reason so many of us dread the festive season is that it appears to have to do with unrealistic expectations and excessive self-reflection for many of us. Some people get depressed and even angry because of the excessive commercialization of Christmas, feeling pressure to spend money on gifts, social events and dinners, getting more into debt to “please” others. Others because Christmas and New Year’s is a trigger to engage in excessive self-reflection and inadequacies of life compared to others (victim mentality), others feel pressure to spend time with family or others they do not like to be around. Can you relate to this?
I can totally relate to a lot of these reasons this holiday season, I started to feel the worry and stress mid-October, when I started to think about and wonder how we were going to come up with extra funds for presents and dinners, when it was a struggle to pay bills every month, let alone all the other stuff. The self-reflection part I can also relate to as this year has been a year of huge change for me, taking the massive leap and risk of quitting my “job” and starting my own business. Would I change that decision though? Not for a minute, but I definitely learnt the hard way, and will share with anyone saying they are wanting to start their own business, that you definitely need several months’ salary saved up as a cushion to get you through the months until your business really gets going after months of dedicated, committed and focused work. I am grateful to say that I do not relate to the stress mentioned above that is caused by being around people you don’t like though, as I am so blessed to say that I am at a point in my life now where I DO love being around all my family and friends, and that all the negative and toxic people have been removed.
If you or someone you know struggles for their own reasons that they may or may not understand, I hope to be able to help with some tips to get through this time of year. Please feel free to share this BLOG in hopes to help more beautiful souls:
Acknowledge your feelings, allow yourself to feel what you are feeling, don’t try to bury it or
ignore it, let yourself sit in it for a few minutes or more, and then release it. It might help to say to yourself something like, “ok, I am feeling sad right now, where do I feel it in my body, ok its ok to feel that, I allow it” Then after a few minutes when it starts to dissipate, say “ok, thank you for