Not Merry + Bright – Honoring Yourself this Holiday Season

A few weeks ago, I ran into someone I knew from a previous workplace at my local bookstore, each of us there doing some early holiday shopping.  We exchanged pleasantries and then she asked a really pointed question….

How f*cked up was that, really?

I was taken back, unsure at first what she meant because of all the levels of antics at play in the world, but also at her candour.

We sat down for a conversation over tea at the bookstore café and I unearthed what she meant.

You see, our common workplace really put its people through the ringer.  It was not uncommon for ‘corporate’ to expect more and more weekends worked, longer hours during the workweek, more business trips that took employees away from their families – the list was endless.

F*cked up indeed. 

By the time my teacup was empty, we landed on the metaphor that it was like being an underground gopher, tunnelling our way through the landscape, occasionally popping our heads up to check out our surroundings, only to see that nothing at all was recognizable.  With a shoulder shrug, the gopher versions of each of us go back underground, repeating the entire process only to pop out of our gopher hole again to find a totally unrecognizable landscape.

My former colleague and I landed on this concept of New Normal.

 

New Normal – Capturing the Current Landscape

New Normal happens so easily when you are in that head down, getting work done mode, constantly reacting to things that are outside of your control that you look up, shrug your shoulders and declare (usually without resistance) that this is the new normal.  Then, like the warrior you are, you carry on.

New Normal could look like more hours worked, fewer weekends off, feeling unable to say no to things that don’t align, less money, more stress, no joy – yielding to the never-ending list of expectations, societal norms and external pressures.  New Normal is definitely not honoring ourselves.

I feel this is relevant now as we approach the 5-year anniversary of the declaration of a pandemic, witness ongoing and senseless wars, rampant inflation, abuses of power, catastrophic weather events like wildfires and floods and then the recent election in the USA which felt like the loss of hope for many and a victory for many more.  Fear, frustration, politicalization, polarization, isolation.  Rinse and repeat.

That’s a lot of New Normal to reconcile.

 

The Added Complexity of Collective Grief

For the last month or so, many of my conversations with the women in my life have been tinged with a feeling I can only describe as grief.  We commonly associate grief with the loss of a person, but it is also a common emotional response to the loss of something significant.  This collective grief, experienced in response to shared tragedies can encompass a wide range of feelings like deep sadness, confusion, yearning and even physical symptoms like utter exhaustion.

You are likely familiar with the stages of grief, famously outlined by Elizabeth Kubler-Ross; denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.  These stages don’t arrive in order, instead doing a spiral dance around someone experiencing grief.  What then does it look like when this spiral dance engulfs a collective group of people?  An entire gender, society or race?

People are experiencing cognitive grief – confusion or obsessive thoughts about the past and/or future.

Some are experiencing behavioural grief – withdrawal from activities and difficulty carrying out daily routines.

We see others experiencing social + cultural grief – grieving in ways that were patterned and modelled for us by our communities and families of origin.

For many, grief is not something that has been modelled for them at all, instead being a feeling that we need to push through, shove down and get over – as fast as possible.

 

Oooof.

 

Forced Festivity – ‘tis the Season for Bypassing our Own Needs

Given the complexities of navigating New Normal and grief, is it any wonder many of us are feeling less than festive as we approach the holiday season?  I had a Jewish friend say that she is scared to put her menorah in her window, many are worried about the cost of putting a holiday meal on the table, others worried about their fundamental rights and economic disaster.  Ringing in the New Year is tinged with a sense of dread.

And yet, in the face of it all we feel we must cling to normal this holiday season- doing it for the kids, or because it’s always been done this way or because it’s what is expected of us.  Living up to expectations isn’t honoring self and in doing so, we are bypassing our own needs, ducking into the gopher tunnel only to pop up in a few months to a reality we no longer recognize.

Super f*cked up.

I wish I had a life hack to offer, or a way we could just hit control-alt-delete and reboot the system, but it’s not that simple.

David Kessler, a grief specialist, offers a sixth stage of grief – assigning meaning after loss.  This stage emphasizes that grief isn’t solely about processing the loss, but also about finding a way to move forward with a renewed sense of purpose.  It acknowledges that while the pain of loss may never fully disappear, individuals can find ways to create meaning and continue living purposefully despite their grief.

Doesn’t that sound like the perfect antidote to the gopher tunnels?  To the New Normal landscape that is constantly disorienting? To the f*cked up ways we bypass our own needs repeatedly in service of other people and the demands they place on us?

What if we declare that the things we go through as a collective are meaningful, if we see our friends and neighbours on a similar grief journey, if we find purpose and meaning in the loss?  What then?

I suspect we would all begin to feel like we are honoring ourselves and our needs.

 

A Grown Up Christmas Wish

What I have to offer this season is this:

• Take time to rest, reflect and reassess.  How are you truly feeling?  What is most important to you right now?  What is your body and soul craving and how can you do more of that?
• Look at the expectations, societal norms and pressures that you are caving to instead of doing what you really want to do.  Can you take even one inspired action toward your needs + desires or is the awareness of it enough to be helpful?
• How can you offer a gift to yourself?  Think in terms of self-care (which is much more than massages and manicures), recognizing your own needs, and prioritizing your well-being like it’s your job – especially during a season traditionally focused on giving to others.  Perhaps it’s your turn to receive.

I say this frequently at this time of year – if Mary gave birth in a friggin’ barn, no one cares about how the napkins are folded.  Your people won’t remember if you made grandma’s shortbread, what they want, and need is you – fully present, imperfect and real.

Could you roll into this holiday season with a declared intention?

• Perhaps you want to feel more peace and so treating yourself to quiet moments sitting by the tree are what you desire.
• Maybe it’s adventure that you’re after and you spend more time exploring trails in different parts of the city.
• Is it comfort you are craving?  That could entail time spent in pajamas, prioritizing coziness over anything.
• If you are looking for joy, gathering with family might be fun, but your tender heart may not be able to cope with Uncle Harold waxing philosophic about the American election and the state of global affairs.
• If none of these words resonate, choose your own intention and anchor yourself to feeling that way as often as possible.

Listen, what I offer here isn’t going to solve everything, but what I can declare is that recognizing the signs of strain and then layering in the impact of seasonal stressors pretending everything is hunky-dory is perpetuating the problem.

The most impactful path forward is going to be redefining your expectations for the season, especially as we navigate this grief-tinged time.  I for one don’t want to pop my head out of a hole on Groundhog Day 2025 to discover a new normal that I didn’t have a hand in shaping.

I want you to read that last sentence again and then consider that Cambridge Dictionary made ‘manifest’ their 2024 word of the year.   You have a hand in shaping your new normal.  The gopher hole metaphor only works if you agree to be the gopher.  Manifestation is not about controlling every aspect of life, but rather about co-creating with the universe and remaining open to possibilities beyond one’s initial expectations.  To manifest you must relinquish control.  Hard to do when you’re obsessing over the napkins, you know?

It’s okay if “merry and bright” feels impossible right now. Your version of the holidays can be soft, quiet, and healing. Celebrations aren’t always about doing more, it’s about doing what matters most.

‘Tis the season for miracles my friends – find them in small moments of comfort and unexpected sparks of joy.

Content provided by Women Belong member  Kristell Court