For many of us, the idea of being with family over the festive season will polarise us. It will either fill us with joy or dread. I wonder why these feelings live in extremes. We all know that each family has its own complicated history, but what is it about this holiday season that seems especially tough for so many?
For the last several years (when possible) I have taken to the skies, departing my usual home and used my annual leave as an opportunity to explore the world. Spending time in many different countries over this period I have experienced many different cultural adaptations. But, regardless of where I am there is an unspoken pressure to be with family, to check in and call them to celebrate even if from a faraway land. What is that? For a non-religious, distant family we seem unable to move beyond the social expectation. It’s nice sometimes but if we break it down it’s a little odd. I am all for celebrating, but wouldn't it be easier to celebrate things that happen in our own lives, or times when we are together in the same timezone? Isn’t forcing it, because others are celebrating a little redundant.
Some of my most memorable festive days, as an adult, have been when spent in a pool or up a mountain and in the company of one other, no special dinner, no gifts, no tradition - just space and freedom. I understand that for many of the family-oriented amongst you, this seems very odd and that I might be missing out on some of the joys in family gatherings, but travelling is what I want to do. I look forward to and want to enjoy the break at the end of what always seems to be an intense year. I normally need to recharge, and I cannot do this in a forced family get-together celebrating a holiday I don’t really buy into.
Once a year our progress gets undone by returning to a former version of ourselves in a home where all the growing pains still reside. It's the cruellest of all the sucess metrics.
I, like many, would need to fly several thousand miles, potentially cook dinner, while being jet-lagged and likely being questioned for a lack of presence in the preceding 12 months, all while getting hints about children and long-term plans, in a tone that makes us feel like children. All parents make us regress, and more than usual during the holidays. (Think any Christmas movie, there is a lot of stress followed by a moment that with the perfectly timed music makes it all seem worthwhile, well in real life there is no movie score, just dishes and too many glasses of bubbles.) If you too, live away from family, I understand the visits come with additional layers, a deeper expectation to find and cherish moments together. But, travelling back to the home town that you likely fought to get away from once a year is not something that will necessarily bring joy. Going backwards in any sense is uncomfortable and at times of the year filled with pressure. So why do so many of us surrender to the social norms and do it over and over again.
So much change without any change at all
I am going to generalise here… If you are aged somewhere between 20 and 40 right now going home for the holidays seems to be as in the title, the expectation. However, in these decades young adults leaving home to make something of themselves in a bigger city is an ever more pushed agenda. So, I wonder why don't families adapt, maybe going to their children's homes for the holidays? Think about it, you have been prompted to get out of the small town you are from for years but the family that urged you never seem to take their own advice. If only they visited you, avoiding the strange and perpetual stress of returning over and over to a place that you were encouraged to move beyond. Surely we can see this as counterintuitive. When you work in fast food restaurant at 16 you don’t only eat burgers from there the rest of your life, you evolve, you move past it. This is what many of us have done and then once a year our progress gets undone by returning to a former version of ourselves in a home where all the growing pains still reside. It’s the cruellest of all the success metrics. For some, it might be grounding, but for most, getting out of that home town in the first place was likely filled with struggle and an unrecognisable version of self. It can be confusing, unsettling and maybe even painful.
A Christmas without children
If you are like me, an auntie but not a mother then the appeal to buy things for children and watch them celebrate isn’t the sum of your existence, nor is cooking for hordes of people who you likely see once or twice a year. You might be picturing Ebenezer Scrooge right now, but think of it this way - isn’t how we celebrate up to the person who is celebrating? If we dissect Christmas, it’s supposedly Jesus’ birthday, a guy who died a really long time ago. We don’t know this guy; some of us don’t identify with the religion he symbolises, and we wouldn’t celebrate any other stranger's birthday, so why do we celebrate his? Maybe this is too logical a way to look at a joyful holiday, but ask yourself if it wasn't for the children around you or any affinity to Jesus and his religious symbology, would you celebrate someone’s birthday if they were not in attendance? It is a little odd. (My mountain doesn’t seem so silly now, does it?) It is nice to celebrate, but celebrating is for significant things that happen in an individual's life, or in the lives of loved ones, it doesn't have to be the spirit of an idea or some commercialised yearly gift-giving. Christmas without children can be a choice to celebrate on your own terms. It might not look like anyone else’s, but if your ok with it than that is all that really matters. What if you could look forward to it every year instead of dreading it?
Wouldn't you love to hear children talk more about what they saw and what they did, rather than what they got.
What is it with Christmas traditions?
In all households across the world, there will be markers and activities that honour the past generation while teaching the younger generations the habits of the past. It might be something simple like putting the tree up on the 12th of December, they seem small but they remember a way of doing things. It's as if the people we once shared this time with are still with us. I wonder if the teaching should be a little more explicit, we can honour the past while looking to the future, shouldn’t we be teaching our children why there is a tree not the date of significance? Or instead of buying things on Black Friday (as the new tradition in western worlds) shouldn’t we be looking to show our children how this is wasteful and not sustainable even though things are cheaper on these days. Maybe this time of year can be about more than a wish list getting answered it could be about change, gratitude and progress.
When un-peeling the behaviours of Christmas I find nothing other than the quality time that is really that good for us. Spending, comparing, competing, forcing, pretending - non of these words are positive. The day itself may include - family, togetherness, celebration, peace, prayer etc. But what does it take for us to get there? Have you ever wondered if you could have the latter without the former? By maybe doing less. I am not underestimating how challenging it is to have children who expect things and nag you for them for months, as their friends are getting something similar, but what if we focused on the social, not the commercial opportunities. Wouldn’t you love to hear children talk more about who they saw and what they did, rather than what they got.
Finding a festive compromise
Next time you are having the yearly conversation about plans for Christmas if you like the family part but not the regressing into a former version of yourself, maybe suggest that your folks come to you, or you take a trip to somewhere new together. It might avoid some of the tension you will inadvertently pack in your suitcase. If you are anything like me, going back to a place that is filled with disappointment once a year is not the idea of a restful and recharging break. Seeing the people from there in a neutral setting is far easier to look forward to.
If Christmas is about family and religion for you then I am sure I could learn a thing or two about the importance that I cannot see within my current world view, I am very open to broadening my views. If joyful togetherness is achieved once a year or more, then you are very lucky, find a way to cultivate it and cherish it. And I’ll be totally honest, it does cross my mind once a year that I might be missing out on something, but that is part of my expectation creeping in. My point of view might change but for now, I’ll stick with my plane tickets and new adventures, knowing that one day someone might prove me wrong.
Ask yourself, what is an ideal Christmas?
Whatever it takes for you to get to your ‘ideal’ Christmas day, ask yourself if the cost and effort are worth it, or even spent in the right areas. Looking back did you ever appreciate your parents for cooking for 2 days beforehand as a child. I think not. But you did enjoy being shown how to ride a bike, making biscuits, watching movies on the sofa. These are the traditions we should be concentrating on, not the ‘perfect place settings.’ Make up some new traditions that suit your family and the lessons you want to teach, relive or hold onto. Set some more sustainable goals, things that focus on the occasion and the company, not the budget and the aesthetics. If it really is about togetherness then why not cook together, make memories together and give rather than compete.
Christmas shouldn't be heavy, expensive and stressful, it disturbs me every year that mental health issues skyrocket at this time of year. I hope that this year we remember it should be fun, joyous and a time to come together to make plans for the year ahead. However you do Christmas this year, take a moment to look to the future, what do you need in your life and what stress can you let go of, it’s not as important as we think it is. It can’t be - it’s just a day, don’t let it define your year.
