Deb's Newsletter
Give Yourself a Gift |
November 22nd, 2007 |
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EMPOWER YOURSELF Give Yourself a Gift Tis the season to be jolly, fa la la la la la la la la. Do you catch yourself humming this around your home or, is more like f*#@ la, la, la? We have created fairytale expectations about Christmas and the holiday season. Movies, books, and retailers all romanticize Christmas. They tell us stories and show us pictures of families and friends gathered together, smiling from ear to ear; couples kissing and embracing; cupid like children with smiles as wide as their faces and their eyes dancing with delight. Is this your family at Christmas? It is certaintly not mine. More often than not, Christmas is a time of stress, worry and loneliness for a lot of people. There are so many things to do to get “ready” for the holidays: 1. Shopping: The wonderful, joyous Christmas shopping with the other million miserable people in the malls and stores. How many people do you see pushing an over-flowing cart down the isle with a smile on their face and humming Joy to the World? Sure, there are some, but they were the smart ones that indulged in some Egg-nog before shopping. Not a bad idea! Most of us feel obligated to buy stuff for other people – even people we don’t necessarily like – because it is expected. Hog-wash! I say that if you are not getting more pleasure out of giving someone a gift than they will receiving it, don’t give one! Things tend to get out of control when you circum to expectations regarding gift buying. Where do you draw the line? There are kids, spouses, parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, cousins, friends, neighbors, teachers, coaches, mentors, co-workers, business associates, the person that delivers the mail / newspaper, home care worker, doctor, hairdresser, meals on wheels, transit / handi-transit / school bus drivers, bus drivers, etc. How many other people can you add to your list? 2. Over-spending: This is one of the biggest disasters of the holiday season. So many of us feel like we have to purchase store bought presents as it is the expectation. Then we are stuck paying for the items (and the accrued interest) until spring. With the interest, the gifts that you bought (which you really couldn’t afford in the first place), are now costing you double what you originally paid! We all know this, but we still over-spend. I don’t understand why. Is it to look good in front of others? Is it because of a feeling of obligation? There is only one way to change these habits and expectations – change the rules! Only you have control of this change. In an effort to cut down on the amount of money that I spend for gifts, I have chosen to have conversations with several people in my life that I love very much and are very important to me. These conversations focused on the true meaning of Christmas and how unnecessary that it was to spend money on gifts for each other. Everyone that I spoke to agreed and we decided to do extra little things for each other throughout the year instead. Yes, it was a little uncomfortable having these conversations, but guess what? ALL of the people that I talked to were relieved, as they felt the exact same way but were too scared to speak up. 3. Gifts: What happened to the personal, hand-made gifts? Remember – the ones we made in school that our parents cherished? It seems like we have closed our imaginations to what we can make for our loved ones and friends, and we choose to purchase something instead. A personal gift is such a wonderful way to express your care and gratitude to those you love. Consider the following: a love letter, a poem, a song, a 5- course romantic dinner at home where everything is prepared and cleaned up for you (and it includes dessert), a ”how much you mean to me” letter, babysitting services, a full body massage from your partner, snow shoveling for 1 month (great for a neighbor or elderly parents), a scrapbook of pictures and thoughts of great memories, a gratitude letter. 4. Activities / Social Calendar: Aren’t the first couple of Christmas gatherings wonderful? You get to dress up, have some good food and drinks, mingle and make small talk...…Then, faster than you can say Deck The Halls, it’s time for the 20th Christmas get-together and you have had it! The gatherings are no longer fun and certainly not joyous! They are a pain to get ready for, you no longer want to make small talk with anyone and flannel pajamas are much more appealing than that sexy black dress. It is very common to over-extend and over-indulge ourselves over the holiday season, as we are “expected” to show up at all these functions and be as fresh and excited as at the first gathering. Add to this all the children’s events that “good” parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles etc., are expected to be at: School “Holiday” concerts and plays, choir and band concerts, kids sports team party, parents sports team party, class room party, neighborhood kids party, day care party, etc. Multiply theses single events by the number of kids per family and it equals utter chaos! How can we possibly be expected to attend everything? Well, we can’t. We must pick and choose what we will commit to and which social events we will skip. As soon as you have a good idea of the events happening for you this holiday season, make a list, then develop a plan. Discuss with your family how many social events are reasonable to attend so that you may still enjoy the later ones. Agree on a number then plan out which ones you will commit to. If you look at the big picture first, it is much easier to pick and choose events and then to look forward to attending. Do yourself a favor and spread out the events that you choose to attend as much as possible. Trying to attend a school function on Thursday, a Christmas business lunch on Friday, a work party on Friday night and a neighbor’s party on Saturday night is simply setting you up for complete exhaustion and stress. Choose two of these events to attend and kindly decline the others. Speaking about declining an invitation, most of us also get stressed doing this. We think that we have to justify or make excuses or even lie to get out of something. (So and so is not feeling well, we couldn’t get a babysitter, etc). We feel stressed and anxious to even make the call to thank them for their invitation, but that we will not be able to attend. This is difficult as we somehow feel like we have let someone down or disappointed them. The truth of the matter is, does it really matter if you are there or not? Will the party go on without you? Will other people have a good time in your absence? You know the answers to these questions. Unfortunately, I admit that I got a little jaded regarding the whole “festive season” as I worked in retail for almost 20 years. I witnessed (and was on the receiving end) of many miserable, short-fused, stressed out shoppers. Most looked like they were going to fall over from exhaustion and heat (it’s not fun shopping for 3 hours with a down-filled parka on)! Most shoppers complained to whoever would listen, about not being able to afford all the gifts they were buying. Their kids were crying or whining and wanted to go home. Their feet and backs were killing them. Honestly, very few people had anything positive to say about Christmas or their quest to find the perfect gift. Why then, did they subject themselves to such madness and torture? Mostly, it was because of expectations. Don’t fall victim to the commercialism of Christmas. Give from your heart and not from your pocketbook. Think of creative and personal ways to brighten up someone else’s world with your personal gifts, rather than by buying presents. This month… 1. Make a list of all your social / activities for the month of December. Mark on your calendar the events that you simply have to attend (work, spouses work, child’s school concert, etc). Then, take a look at all of the other events and choose what you can handle to attend with little or no stress. 2. Once you decide what events you can manage while maintaining your sanity, list all of the events on a piece of paper that you choose not to attend (for whatever reason). If an RSVP is required, make that call ASAP to get it out of the way. Simply call that person and without being too apologetic, simply tell them thank you for the invitation, but that you have to regretfully decline. Period. End of story. Empower Yourself – Try This This will be a tough one for a lot of you: Try to eliminate at least one person from your gift giving list AND, from those that are left over, replace at least 2 gifts normally purchased and instead, make them something or give them something from your heart. I promise you – the world will keep on turning. If you have any comments or questions, I would love to hear from you. Please call me at 204-257-4240 or by email at LifeIsWhatYouMakeIt@mts.net. Until next month, warm and stress free blessings to all, Deb Fortier |
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Past Newsletters:
November 5th, 2008 - Own Worst Enemy
October 7th, 2008 - The "P" Word
August 14th, 2008 - Forgiveness
July 10th, 2008 - Who Are You?
May 29th, 2008 - Want More?
More Past Newsletters