Tips for a Peaceful Christmas (Episode 79)

Brent and Janis discuss some simple strategies that can help us all have a more joyful and peaceful Christmas season.

Transcript:

Welcome to Life and Love Nuggets, where licensed therapist, Brent and Janice Sharpe, share how you can thrive in your life, your love, and your relationships. Hello, friends. Welcome back to Life and Love Nuggets. We're glad that you're with us today. We're sneaking up on Christmas here.

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Hopefully, they're helpful to you. This is, I think, number 79 that we have done. And so, anyway, it's been a minute since we started. Last time, we actually rebroadcasted our very first podcast, which was, so, you're going to be with the family for the holidays. We've talked about these family dynamics that happen, challenges of coming together for holidays as an adult. The last few weeks in our practice, we've been talking to a lot of people about this, as they anticipate, well, as they're coming out of Thanksgiving, going into Christmas, just a stressful time of being with these people that are really important to us. We don't spend that much time with them normally, oftentimes, and yet their opinions are really important.

And oftentimes, there's some ongoing unresolved conflict that has happened in the relationships that's made all of this challenging. Anyway, there's just all kinds of stuff that happens. And so, how do we be respectful to others? How do we have an experience that's life-giving? How do we be respectful to ourselves? And so, anyway, we talked about that in the last episode. And in January, we always talk with our clients.

The first part of January is generally about how did we survive the holidays? And- A little bit of detox sometimes. Sometimes it is detox, but sometimes it's how do we plan differently for next year? Yeah. So, this time, we want to shift things a little bit, and we want to talk about some practical tips to help really enjoy your holidays, to make them more peaceful, and to make it so that you really get to have the joyous season that this has meant to be. So, these are some small and maybe some big practices that we're encouraging to really help you enjoy your holiday. And by the way, if it sounds negative, how we talk about this a little bit, talking about the stresses of holidays and so forth, if you have one of those families that life is just smooth and easy and joyous and everything's wonderful, then we are so excited for you.

And this is very happy. Obviously, we're counselors, and so we deal with those that are struggling in this, but we see that there's a lot of stress that people have. And so- And a lot of stress from expectations, but we'll go into that. So, first and foremost, if you're married, ask your partner to sit down, like last week. Or today, since last week has passed. As soon as possible, and getting a schedule, getting everything on the calendar, making sure that we're both, we both know what's going on, we both can anticipate, we can prepare for all the different experiences, the different parties, the different meetings, and there's nothing more frustrated than, now, you do remember the staff parties this Friday night, and the other one's thinking, oh, Friday nights, we're gonna have- We're gonna have a great, we're gonna be able to shut down and relax and do nothing. Nothing else.

The first evening, we have nothing to do, and we forgot. We have a party. Yeah, and so just making sure that we're on the same page is huge. Well, this time's insanely busy. There's so much going on. We have too many parties and plays and recitals. We've got gifts to buy for our families, for our friends, teachers.

We have wrapping to do, which I'm doing a lot of. Yes, making cookies. And so we have to purposely set aside certain habits to make things better during the season. One of them that's not easy is creating quiet. Now, we, at Thanksgiving and on family vacations, we notice that we have three of our grandchildren, six-year-old Livvy and four-year-old Niall and four-year-old Emma, that every once in a while will come to us and go, I need some alone time in the midst of the holidays. We spread them out in separate bedrooms to watch their shows. But we notice Thanksgiving with Livvy, it's like, where's Livvy?

And we found her underneath the sofa table with stuffed animals around her and pillows over the top of her in the midst of the family room where everybody was because she just needed to get away from all of the noise. Yes. Yeah, so in the midst of everything, all the parties, all the December crazy, just take some time away also. It can be just five to 10 minute little breaks where you just get away. And even if you don't think you need it, just know you're gonna need it. We always say when stress levels are high and schedule's crazy, then we don't need just normal time of recovery. We need time to get away and we need quiet time.

We need actually more of that. And so it's kind of preparing for that. And so it might be getting up early in the morning, got your Christmas tree up, sitting by that, just experiencing the moment, but just make sure you get some time away. It might be a walk outside, just taking a few minutes to walk outside, even though it's cold, to just be away and alone or stepping into a back bedroom and taking a few breaths in there in a quiet space. Or you can get under the sofa table and put pillows all over you. This is okay to ask for too. It is.

It's okay to say, I need a moment. I just need to breathe for a minute and then I'll be right back. As trite as it sounds, we do need to remember the reason for the season. So plan to go to some church events or candlelight services, Christmas musicals, but pick one or two that are really meaningful for you. You don't have to go to everything. You don't have to go to every event that's in town. I also encourage people to read the Christmas story by yourself or with your family and or with your family, but actually read it rather than just listen to it somewhere.

Get an Advent devotional to read before bed or in that quiet early time in the morning if you can beat your children awake. And also when we know we're gonna go into busy, busy seasons, it's as if our pitcher, if you can envision a pitcher full of water, it's being poured out and there'll be a lot of outgo. There'll be a lot of thinking about others, taking care of others, and if you're inviting people into your home, just the kind of stresses of being around a lot of people. So a lot's going out of you. So we have to be purposeful about filling our own pitcher up. And so don't let some of your regular healthy habits drop off. Sometimes we think, well, I'll get back to the exercising or the lunch with a friend or I used to journal.

I do that regularly and I'll get back to that in January. Don't let that drop off. Make sure that that's a priority. You'll be fully engaged. You'll have a lot more to offer if you are getting filled up during that time. And so don't let that stuff drop off. Yes, and so even though it feels like you can't fit it in, your family, whether they know it or not, they will really appreciate it.

Yes, they will. If you exercise and de-stress a little bit, things will be a little less crispy around the house and you can enjoy it. The next thing is simplify. You know, store-bought cookies are fine. We don't have to make them unless that's a holiday tradition for you that you enjoy. Not that you've just done for years, but that you enjoy. Buy the cookies.

Buy things that are already made. This is hard for me to say, but use paper plates and napkins, not just for the holiday, but leading up to it and afterwards. And you know what a stretch this is for me because we don't have a holiday without China. Which is still okay, Anna. You can have the main celebration, can be all your China and everything. Which is what we've started to do. The main celebration, we do China and make it pretty.

But then I have fun Christmas plates, paper plates. Of course they're fun. Of course they're fun. Paper plates and napkins. I buy them at Marshall's, little plug for Marshall's. So things are just easier. If you have a lot of kids, it's okay to use paper cups during this time.

You know, just do what makes life easier. And speaking of teacher's gifts, it's okay to buy gift cards for anybody, but teachers especially enjoy gift cards. They have enough things with apples on them, and number one teacher. They don't need- They don't need any more mementos. I guess that's the word. And I encourage people, spend more time ordering online. Just whether it's groceries or whether it's presents, whatever it is, those are things you can do in your pajamas without fighting the crowd and finding a parking place.

I'm sorry to retailers, but it really can simplify your life. And you are like golden at this. I'm pretty sure it's my gift area. It is a gift area for you. Would you think that's a spiritual gift? Oh, absolutely. I think it is. Online shopping. Hospitality. That's right.

It falls under hospitality. That's right. And so as a matter of fact, the other night I was coming home from work. Oh dear. And it hit me. And so I pull in, well, as a matter of fact, a big U-Haul, I mean a literal U-Haul. It wasn't even Amazon or, you know, I think they just need extra people, you know.

And literally U-Haul was out in front of our driveway and I couldn't even get in the one side of the driveway. And I noticed that the guy had a dolly. I mean, you know, he had a cart and he was hauling stuff up to our front porch. And I thought, why did somebody need a dolly? What did we order that was heavy that he would need a cart to get it up to the front porch? And then I got up to the front porch and there were 15 packages. They weren't heavy, but there were 15 of them. And then actually earlier that day I had run home, had a break in the day and I'd run home and gotten three of them off the page.

And so there were probably eight. Now this is one of the heavier days, okay? Yes, it is. It doesn't happen every day. With our kids, spouses, grandkids, we have 16.

That's a lot. In our family. Thank you. But it did hit me. I mean, it was really a funny moment, but it hit me. I thought, I mean, they were all from different places. You would have had to have gone to 18 different stores, the time that that would have taken.

So, good for you that you're saving some time and saving some energy. Yeah. And it does mean that I just need extra presents. Obviously, yes. And so, which is quite interesting since your love language is gifts. Yes. During December, it's- It's the most wonderful time of the year.

It's very cute to see us pull in the driveway and you go, oh, we got some packages from Fort Worth, even though they're not for you. It's true. I just love to see your eyes light up. Another thing we recommend is plan simple meals. You know, there's so much going on. We're gonna all survive if we just have mac and cheese and grilled cheese sandwiches and peanut butter and jelly and tomato soup and grilled cheese and whatever. We're gonna survive through that.

The key is we want to stay calm during this time. And so, trying to minimize stress. The other thing is ask for help. If you're hosting and people ask you for help, take them up on it. If they say, what can I bring? Have your list already planned in your mind, and then you can tell them, and that will make things easier. We found having adult children, excuse me, it's been really wonderful because they will each take a certain thing to make for a big holiday meal, or they'll bring cinnamon rolls when they come to stay with us, or do something.

You could always order from a deli or Whole Foods or someplace like that, but make things simple. It's not worth the stress. I just want to go back to something. Remember, we mentioned getting all the events of the calendar on the calendar at the beginning. The recital we had yesterday and the Prince's event we have today, yes. All of this, as important as getting it down initially, go over it frequently. Once a week or so, get together, check it out, because they always, there's moving parts.

Things shift around or something's added. Just again, make sure you're always on the same page and that we have enough planning to get things done. Yes, and if you're a party person, you can still have parties and you can enjoy them, but we learned over the years a few tips that made it much easier. In the past, at Christmas, we usually had four major parties at our house within a week to two weeks time. So they were one after another. I did that on purpose because we had a system and it worked really easy. The first thing we did is we had the same menu for every party.

That way we knew what we had to buy, or if we catered it, we could just call the same place again, do the same order. It made it simple. And then we had a system. We did. We were good. After the party, Brent would start clearing all the dishes and starting to get them loaded in the dishwasher. I would pull off the tablecloth and the cloth napkins, which sometimes I do give in and use paper, but I'd go put them in the dish.

I would go put them in the washing machine. I'd come back. I'd help with dishes. You would start vacuuming. So we could have everything vacuumed, put the stuff in the dryer. When we went to bed, got up the next morning, we put the tablecloth napkins on the table. We unloaded the dishwasher and we just put them in the same place they were before, put the same silverware on.

And it was simple. We could go to work and everything was ready for that night's party, except for maybe a quick clean of the bathroom. Or even if it was a few days away, it was still ready. It was ready. Or, you know, something else we did. The last minute food prep, that's what it was. But it was party, clean, repeat, party, clean, repeat. And it made it easy for us to do that because we had a system.

And gifts, you know, wow, what a thing. You know, it's the beautiful thing about this season is thinking about others, thinking about giving them something that kind of brightens their day a little bit. But this can be really hard, you know, to expect that we're gonna read the tea leaves and know exactly what everybody wants and what children and grandchildren want. Especially when they live in different cities and you're not with them as much. It's just, don't put that stress on yourself, you know. It is okay to ask them for a few items, a few things that they would like. And the surprise is which one of those you picked.

But you know it's gonna hit the target. We don't have a lot of energy, money, whatever, to do this with. And so make sure that we hit the target. So it's okay to ask for lists. Our kids do a Pinterest board, which is awesome. Or they just send us links. It works great.

Yeah, having two grown daughters now that can send us links of stuff, you know, whatever. Yes. And we have an 11-year-old granddaughter that made a presentation for us that was pretty phenomenal. Amazing. A three-fold cardboard presentation cutting out things that she wanted. Looked like a science fair project. Yes, it did.

Not quite as big, but it did. But it's helpful to know that. Yeah. And they know, I mean, we have to let them know, okay, we're not going to be getting all 25 of those items. Yes, yes. But we know what would hit the target for them. Yeah. And it also helps because if you can't get that particular thing, you can get them a gift card to that store or you can get something similar at that store that they can return it.

And it just makes it so much easier. Gift giving is supposed to be joyful and not stressful. And so those things help. They just make it easier for you. But also, as you said, it hits the target. So one of the things I learned many years ago is it's better if it's not perfect. We put so much stress on ourselves to make everything perfect.

And we end up just stressed out and things are going to happen the way they happen. So as we said years ago when we remodeled our home with four kids between the ages of 2 and 12, however, it turns out it's just perfect. And so letting yourself, let it be what it is. That means you should probably stay away from people that are on Instagram. Yes. Because we have to remember the influencers probably videoed their Christmas in July. Right. And so of course there's going to be perfect.

They're going to have people around them to have everything set up. This is what they do professionally. Yes. And their kids probably hate it. But that's another story. Yes. Keeps us in business. Yes. Stop trying for the magic.

Coming up with this everything perfect, everything amazing experience, the incredible nativity calendar with unique gifts in every single daily box. Looks great on Pinterest but probably won't be any more exciting than a cheap one with chocolates. Yes. And so stop trying so hard to create it. Yeah. Don't put so don't effort so much into this. Give opportunities for experiences.

It really is the experiences. It's not really the things even though they're a gesture that there's something meaningful about that. We're not just saying that Merry Christmas.

And I thought about you. You know a gift is nice.

It is nice. But let the magic come from the organic experiences of opportunities for human interaction. Things that are life giving for everybody. So again don't try to manufacture it. Yes. Let it happen. Well I say instead of trying to make magic I think we need to cultivate awe instead.

We did a whole podcast on awe. But awe is really seeing things with new eyes. All the things around us. It's looking for beauty in the birds that we have land in the backyard. And there's nothing more beautiful than having snow and having a couple of cardinals land in the snow. Looking for those little things. It's looking at Christmas lights.

It's just enjoying the tiny things that bring us joy. It's looking at our Christmas tree decorated. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. So it's celebrating beauty.

Kids know awe. We have to learn from kids because they know awe better than anybody. So last year we went on a trip the first week of December. And before we went this young man that has done our yard work was starting a Christmas light. I almost said Christmas card.

Christmas light display. Putting Christmas lights on people's houses. And so he asked if we were interested and we wanted to help him out. And so we said yes. Go ahead. And he said what do you want. We said well we'd like white lights with maybe a little color sprinkled in.

So we left on our trip and we came back and we came in very late. It was an international flight. We came in very late and pulled in the driveway and went oh my gosh. Oh no. It was I can't even describe it. It was I can't even describe it. There was some white lights.

A few white lights. It was every other color except pink. And I pointed out it was green. It's purple. It's multicolored. Some flashed. Some didn't.

It was like oh. And I'm like how are we going to tell him. And what do the neighbors think. Do they think we're senile now. I mean what. Oh this does not look like us. And then the grandkids came over.

And they were in absolute awe. It was magic for them. They walked around. It was like oh. And one of them said this looks like Ramah which is a huge light display here. So it was so magical for them. And it was so beautiful. And they were so much in awe.

We said go ahead and do our lights again this year. And he did it pretty much the same way. We like it now. But now we love it because we know the joy that it brings to the kids. Just watching our kids little kids grandkids walk up to the Christmas tree and just go from ornament to ornament and look around and stuff and just the sparkle in their eyes is contagious. It is. Let that be contagious.

Recognize the simplicity of that is what makes the difference. It really does. And I know that getting ready for Christmas can be a lot of work. But we just encourage don't just do it to get it done. Just OK we've got to get it all done. Kind of set the tone. We try to put the fireplace on and have a Christmas movie in the background or something.

And light a Christmas candle. So that we have a little bit of an experience with it. Now this would not be my natural. You're really good at this kind of thing. I've learned from you in this way. And you know in previous generations probably the wife has been the one to kind of do most of this if she stayed at home. Now most couples are both working but it kind of ends up landing on the wife still you know.

So I would just say to us guys help. Help out. Now I don't when I say that I'm not expecting. I don't think you expect for me to be as creative as you are. I mean you're you're gifted at this. OK whoever's most gifted at this in the couple take off. But I mean you have something in all of our rooms.

I would not have thought about that. And I enjoy it. I love it. But particularly when we're doing I try to help and particularly we do the family room with the tree. Well you do pretty much all the tree. The lights going up the staircase and all that kind of stuff. We try to again have something in the background have something to where we it's kind of a thing.

It's an event. Yeah it's kind of an event for us. And I just even though that would not be what I would naturally do. I look forward to that. I look forward to those moments and those are memories now that we have. And so so just pay a little attention to that can be helpful. Yes. Another thing is find ways to give.

Look at how can you help. You know there's angel tree. There might be a church community outreach that you can be a part of or surprising somebody that you know is in need with something. Keep your eyes open for ways to help. There are ways everywhere. If you keep your eyes open and listen for the nudges of the Holy Spirit that you should you could do this to help somebody because sometimes the small things we do mean much more to people than what we realize. So it's doing some of those things.

You know we do something in our church each year called Advent Conspiracy and the idea is to cut back on a portion of your spending and give that money to a special church project an outreach project of some kind. And so it's just taking the time to think about those that are in need and sacrificing something to help those that are in need. And then there's celebrating the little things we talked about that some and all. But one of the things our kids started doing at a very young age is if we'd be driving in the car which having a lot in sports we were all the time. If they saw Christmas lights somebody would go Christmas light alert Christmas light alert. So everybody would look and then it shortened to CLA like CLA CLA. Those are fun things to do that are just a part of day to day life but it's celebrating those little things.

And think about we're kind of imprinting memories into our family extended family. So what's special to you? We found here in Tulsa there's a botanical garden that does this amazing Christmas light display and walk through all of the grounds and it's pretty magical. And so so we just try to do that every year and just something that everybody looks forward to and it's always pretty freezing cold. But they have hot chocolate and you can make s'mores over the fire. A lot of a lot of stuff kids in their little wagons and stuff and bundle them all up. And so we think about Christmas.

We're starting to think about that. That's the picture that comes to our mind. And so what are those things for you and your family? Your couples for your marriage. Go on a Christmas date. You know it's it's I've you know we're big on date night and without going into all that detail. I think it's significant when I talk to couples and they're thinking about their schedule for their date nights.

Many of them go well you know probably gonna have to. December is just too busy we'll probably skip December. I go no no no. Create something that is may not be every single week you know over Christmas and New Year's but but something that commemorates Christmas as a couple. And so just so you know I got our book just a few days. Thank you. I'm glad to hear that.

But going to someplace special for dinner maybe even dressing up if you want to or going and looking at or or some kind of Christmas things without the kids where it's just the two of you. This is without kids. Yes. Christmas date. Date. No children. But most of the time when we go to look at lights or we do things it's with the kids.

So doing stuff for you as a couple because as we say you as a couple are going to be together long after they are grown and have their own families. And then the last thing which sounds so much like me is play hooky. I remember and I don't know if you remember this but years ago we were we finished work at noon because we're doing an all afternoon continuing ed and we were driving there and we were like you know we could get these hours online if we really wanted to. I know we've already paid for it and everything but let's just play hooky and not go. And so we had the most special afternoon. We could have a longer lunch. We were just relaxed and it was just fun during the holiday season to have that special time just randomly.

Now don't miss kids productions or important things. But we had such a great time together by working around doing something a little different or a little easier. So peace and simple fun is the best Christmas memory that we can ever make. Seek peace and pursue it scripture says. So it's how do we make things more peaceful and more enjoyable over the holidays. So as we go into the Christmas season here hopefully maybe an idea or two of this you'd be able to grab a hold of and begin to implement into your life. And we just wish you a Merry Christmas and we trust God's blessing in your life in every possible way.

So go in peace. Blessings as you go. The Life and Love Nuggets podcast is a 501c3 nonprofit and is supported by gifts from people like you. To donate go to lifeandlovenuggets.com/donate. This podcast is produced by Clayton Creative in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The content should not be considered or used for counseling but for educational purposes only.