What if the secret to a joyful, stress-free holiday season was not about managing your emotions, but feeling them? As the festive season approaches, we take a deep-dive into exploring this concept, reminding you to check societal expectations at the door and put what truly counts at the center - your well-being and spending quality time with loved ones.
Prepare to challenge the norms as we unfold three vital questions; "Who says," "What fits," and "What if it was easy," guiding you to a happier, less stressful Christmas. We share personal experiences and practical advice, especially in managing difficult conversations.
Our focus? Helping you understand and navigate your emotions rather than control others. By the end of this episode, you'll be well-equipped to take control of your actions and reactions, making room for a more fulfilling holiday season. So, tune in and join us as we redefine the often stressful holiday narrative into one of joy and serenity.
There are three simple questions you can ask to make your Christmas more peaceful. They are simple questions. Following through on your answers may be a little harder.
Says who?
All those things you’re feeling you have to do - says who? Question your expectations. Questions the expectations of others.
What fits?
We all have limits. There is only so much time, energy, and money. How do you want to use what you have? How much of what you have do you want to use?
What’s fun?
What if getting ready and going through the Christmas season was fun? What would it look like? What would you do? What would you not do?
Asking the questions is a great place to start. Once you have asked yourself the questions, come back and ask me your questions.
Discipling mothers to disciple generations
Kingdom Mothers Rise Up is here for you. There is encouragement and practical steps to improve your relationship with yourself, God, and your child.
So I've probably asked you three questions to help manage the emotions at this time. I've realized that that's a misnomer from the beginning. God didn't give us emotions to manage. He gave us emotions to feel, because when we feel our emotions, they're giving us important information. So a huge part of managing your emotions, of what we're thinking of managing, is really the behavior and the thoughts that we need to manage. And I think that's one of the things the enemy likes to do is he likes to have us focus on something we actually can't do, so that we don't do the things we can do. Like we focus on the other person's behavior. And if they would just stop and if they would just do this because we have no control over their behavior. So it keeps us stuck. And so I realized like trying to manage your emotions is the wrong goal. The goal is to feel your emotions and then manage your thoughts and your behavior. At Christmastime, emotions seem to be even higher, probably around the world, because there's Western influence everywhere, but it's become so commercialized and so like it needs to be the perfect season and it needs to be the best Christmas ever, every year. So my first question that I ask when I start being like I have to do this and I have to get gifts for these people and I have to be at this event and I have to get Christmas clothes. Whatever your have to's are, fill them in there and I have to do for Christmas. My first question is says who, who told you that all those things have to happen? All the Hallmark Christmas movies you watched growing up where, like things just are perfect and beyond realistic I have to have a real tree, or I have to decorate the whole house, or I have to. You know, the cookies have to be homemade, the pie has to be homemade, the, you know, whatever these things are that has to be. Says who, who told you that? When you stop and look at who told you that it wasn't God. Well, I would think that there's probably not a have to in your mind. That God gave you, so what does it matter?
Speaker 1:
When my older kids were young I don't know, probably starting like six, seven, eight I started asking them what would make this Christmas special to you, and they had a very short list. They wanted to go look at Christmas lights. They wanted to make gingerbread houses with their friends and like presents at grandma's Like that was it. Like they didn't care about having new Christmas clothes or all the things that can get added on of. We need to go do this and we need to. You know we have to make all this stuff happen. They didn't care. That wasn't the things that made Christmas special to them, and so that's a tradition I've continued even as they're now grown and married.
Speaker 1:
Like, what would make this Christmas special? What are the things that are important? So it doesn't have to be the same every year and it won't be the same every year, especially as your kids grow, because you know, now mine are married, they all have other families to do holidays and things with. So just letting go of like it has to be and I'm trying to make this the best ever because, like so the first question is says who? And once you figure out who does, do you want to listen to them? I don't. So I ask the people that I do care about that. I do want to listen to ask my kids, ask my husband, what matters to you?
Speaker 1:
And then that leads to the next question of what fits, what fits in this season. So maybe you do have a child, or yourself. That's like. No, all these things. I want all these things. Okay, you can want all those things, but what fits this year? When you look at your mental capacity, your physical capacity, your calendar's capacity, your budget's capacity, look at all those things what actually fits this year. If it doesn't fit, trying to make it fit is not going to make this the best Christmas ever. It's going to make it more stressful, it's going to make it harder. So just look at what fits. So first you're filtering down like, oh, who told me I need to do these things? If they're not someone important to me, then why am I listening? Why am I taking this pressure on? And then the next question is what fits Like?
Speaker 1:
Maybe in past years had room. You know, when my kids were younger, we were homeschooling and so we went and rang the bell for a Salvation Army. We went and volunteered at the I think it was Salvation Army Secret Santa, no, angel Tree. It was something where families could come in and shop from donated things or we would take their lists. So it was Angel Tury. We would. They did both, sorry, trying to remember. So like we would take the lists where we would go through all the donated stuff and shop for the kids on the list, from their wish list and whatever. We would go and do that. We would go to a food bank and put food together for baskets that were going to go out to people. You know, we did all kinds of things.
Speaker 1:
Now I'm in a season where that doesn't work and that's okay. So what fits, what fits this season? That's the second question. And then the third question is what if it was easy? What if having an amazing Christmas this year was easy? What would you do? What would it look like? Or, sometimes, substituting fun, what if it was fun to get ready for Christmas? And what if it was fun to go to the family gathering? That's always stressful because of this personal you know. What if it was easy? What if it was fun Dealing with the difficult people?
Speaker 1:
Like, what if that was easy? What if, instead of hoping for it to be different this year, you just accepted that that is exactly how they are? And here's how I'm going to respond. When they do that, I'm, you know, going to leave the room, or I'm going to, like, they always ask this question and it's so annoying. So, instead of being annoyed this year, like, here's my answer I'm going to just, you know, ask this question back, or I'm just going to laugh at them and walk away Like whatever, what if it was easy?
Speaker 1:
What if it was fun?
Speaker 1:
What would you do? What would it look like? What things would come off the list because like, yeah, that is not fun. And if there's things that's like, yeah, that's not so fun, but like that really does have to happen, how could you make that fun? You know, if you don't look forward to decorating but you like it being decorated, how do you make decorating fun? Do you have some nieces and nephews come over? Do you put on your favorite music, your favorite Christmas movie? Do you, you know, have a friend that likes to decorate, come over and decorate with you? There's so many different things to make things fun.
Speaker 1:
But I didn't grow up learning to make things fun, so I forget to think of that. I forget that like, oh, this is my life, I can decide how to do this. I don't have to do it the way it's always been done. I can have fun. I need to take a whole bunch of things off my list for it to be fun. That's okay.
Speaker 1:
You know, our kids like things to be the same every year, but at the same time, if you're asking them what's important, you might be surprised at the things. You know. What they really want is your time and your attention, and if that means, you know, sitting down and explaining to them like buying all the things on this list you know might not be in the budget, or like you already are drowning in toys and you don't keep them picked up and that makes mom grumpy. So getting you more, we're just not going to do that, because then it just makes me more grumpy, and would you rather have some toys that you're going to play with once in a while, or less grumpy mom, you know, like, and trying to get you all these things or to get you to all these places or whatever, like it's draining my energy and it's draining my resources, and then I don't have the time to give you to do the special craft or to read the books or to, you know, to spend the time with you, because I'm putting my time and energy into these. So which would you rather have? And they're going to choose the time with you. They're going to choose your attention and you enjoying them rather than you working really hard to make this the best Christmas ever. They want your time and your focus and your attention. So those are my three questions for helping with your emotions at Christmas time is asking who says and asking what fits and asking if it was easy.
Speaker 1:
And what I'm dealing with emotions at Christmas is that we're trying to manage other people's emotions. We're trying to keep others happy so that we don't have to deal with our heart emotions. And when I saw this and myself, it was really hard to see that I was being controlling, because I'm like I am not a controlling person. I am easygoing and let you do your own thing and I don't need to be in control. However, if I am working really hard to keep someone happy, to make sure that they don't get upset and they don't have a problem with me, I am trying to control them and I'm doing it to protect myself, but it's still controlling and that was so hard to see, but it was also powerful of like right. I don't control them, no matter how hard I work to make sure that they're happy and don't get upset with me.
Speaker 1:
I have no guarantee that's going to work, but I do have control over me and so I can decide what I'm going to do and decide what I need and then manage myself in the face of possibly someone being upset with me. Then I can manage myself and I can figure out what's actually possible to do. Excuse me, instead of, like I was saying at the beginning, where we're focused on managing emotions, where we actually need to manage thoughts and behavior, so I need to manage, like see what I'm feeling, because that's going to give me good information. Am I feeling unsafe? Am I feeling unseen? Am I feeling taken advantage of, like whatever I can figure out what I'm feeling, to give me information, to know what to do about it. Because if what I'm currently doing is trying to control how someone feels, I'm not going to get anywhere. I'm going to stay stuck.