Sometimes you climb out of bed in the morning and you think, I’m not going to make it, but you laugh inside — remembering all the times you’ve felt that way.”— Charles Bukowski

Holiday Happiness?

Well, the worst part of the year has started for me. While I love Thanksgiving and everything about it, Christmas is quite the opposite for me. Throw in days that are getting dark ridiculously early, can we please stop playing with the clocks and stick with Daylight Savings Time? Long cold nights really kick the crap out of my mood. This time of year, with everything going on, the early dark, etc… it just gets harder to exercise as regularly as well. All of this, along with a lot of negative memories of bad Christmases and this year I have to watch my mood really carefully.

I’m not alone in this, from the National Alliance on Mental Illness:

Feelings of sadness that last throughout the holiday season—especially during the months of November and December—are often referred to as the holiday blues or holiday depression. The holidays are usually viewed as a time of happiness and rejoicing. But for some people, it can be a period of painful reflection, sadness, loneliness, anxiety, and depression.

Even people who love the holidays can experience the blues during this busy season. The holidays are often a time of high emotion and demands, which can leave a lot of people feeling stressed and exhausted. People with a prior mental health condition may be even more prone to experiencing holiday depression. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), 64% of people with an existing mental illness report that the holidays make their condition worse.

So every year around this time I try to post a bit more often, doing some repeats of my holiday happiness posts in hopes that if you’re not so excited this time of year, perhaps these posts might help.

So how do I personally handle the holiday blues? Well first off, as with any other time you always have to focus on the basics. To be happy you have to be healthy and well rested. So I always fall back to the basics as related by the Taoist masters in regards to the basics of life. This means making sure that you are well rested, well fed, drinking enough water, exercising and feeling safe. So this time of year I really try, and it’s difficult because of the demands of the holidays, to become more regimented about my workout schedule, making sure I get enough sleep every night and making a point of not putting myself into emotional situations that will make me feel more anxious and therefore less safe. The water thing I’ve always got, so that’s not something I personally need to keep in mind. I also try and stay close to eating as healthy as possible, for me, this means minimizing carbs and sweets. This of course is the hardest for me, especially since I really like good Christmas cookies and people have a tendency to give sweets and cookies and gifts and thank yous.

I go a bit further as well, I have some traditions around the holidays. First, as an introvert, I carefully monitor my social time. This time of year there are many celebrations and parties that you get invited to participate in. Even for work there is a significant uptake in attendance at campus celebrations. So I make a point of carefully planning my participation. If I can reasonably pass on the event I do, if not, I make a point of pre-determining how much time I’ll spend at the even and sticking to that schedule. Show up, do my hellos, make a little conversation and quietly slip away, the appropriately named Irish Goodbye. On those rare occasions where an event feeds my personal needs, typically meaning finding some deeply engaging conversation, I’ll stay for that as that is something the helps my mood. But generally, I spend a set amount a time at these events a slip out unnoticed.

I also try and be more giving this time of year, probably the one typical holiday thing that I do. However, I’m not talking about working a food pantry or donating to charities. What I try to do is increase my personal giving. By this I mean increasing things I normally do. So at school, I’ll occasionally pay for a student’s lunch if they are behind me in line on campus. I do a lot more of this, this time of year. The same goes for the small things, holding doors open for others longer. We all of this distance in our head when we open a door as to close a person has to be for us to hold it for them. This time of year I greatly extend that distance. I’m more likely to drop a couple of bucks on someone panhandling this time of year. And especially for the homeless folks who aren’t asking, particularly older folks rummaging for cans or obviously struggling I’ll drop a twenty on them. I do this somewhat for them, but honestly it’s somewhat selfish, as doing these things for others makes you feel better as well.

I also really like giving good gifts. I try really hard to buy people gifts they’ll like and that fit their lives. It’s often a tough task for me given that I also have to ship them across the country and am trying to figure this out at a distance. But I try and when I score a really great gift for someone it makes me very happy.

Finally, I’ve come to really avoid the typical image of Christmas. Snow and cold and being caught in the house with bad weather is the worst possible thing for my mood, especially if I’m trapped with people. So my Christmas ritual has become to head for the desert. At Christmas most years you can find me camping somewhere in the Mojave. The ability to have warmth and sun, typically with cool nights for good sleeping, lots of stars and a camp fire to sit around after hiking all day and eating great food really is one of my happy places. This year will be no exception and I’ll be returning to someplace I went for the first time last year, Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada.

So this time of year my friends, whether it’s the best or worst time of year for you, make sure you take care of yourself. Make sure you find ways to get those basics, rest, space, exercise, time alone to recharge if you need it and drink enough water. Don’t over schedule yourself, try not to over commit to people. Take the pressure off yourself to provide the perfect holiday whether or not that means the perfect meal or the perfect party and remember, alcohol is a depressant. If you have kids, they are simpler to make happy this time of year than you may realize. What matters most to them is not the Barbie Dream House they want, but good food, a calm and safe home and most of all, your time and attention. Often a well thought out stocking stuffer or homemade cookie means more than any toy or money they might get. So do you best, and be well my friends, if it all gets too much please reach out, I’m always available this time of year to help pick someone up a bit. Have a happy holiday season. ~ Rev Kane