A lot of people in our area woke up with great anticipation yesterday morning. A local Christian radio station began playing Christmas music. Every year they jumpstart the season with carols and holiday songs, drawing attention to Jesus’ momentous birth.
Actually, 93.3 FM Cincinnati is not the only entity to begin the celebration in November. Have you seen the first Christmas commercial yet? The first store decorations? The eggnog in the grocery dairy section?
Even as Thanksgiving barely comes into view we welcome this season of well-loved customs, heightened joy, and delightful anticipation. But many of us will also experience exhaustion and frustration. We overextend ourselves in order to provide…what? A Norman Rockwell Christmas presented by Martha Stewart? (I’ve certainly been guilty of striving for that.)
Author and friend, Jody Collins, has a better idea.
In her book, Living the Season Well, she suggests: simplify and savor.
Simplify the to-do list; savor the wonder.
And then she offers creative, common sense ideas for doing just that.
Her book is not a prescription, as in, “Here’s what you need to do in order to celebrate Christmas in a meaningful way.” Instead, Jody presents a buffet of possibilities and recommends we start small, start now with those ideas that stir our interest and seem doable.
For example, call a family meeting to discuss setting limits this year. You might decide to:
- Hang fewer lights–maybe even no lights–on the front of the house.
- Purchase a pre-cut Christmas tree nearby instead of at the U-Cut lot miles out-of-town.
- Brainstorm ways the children can help, such as stuffing and stamping the Christmas cards.
Such changes will make more room for “Finding the Heart of Christmas” (the title of Jody’s introduction).
Possibilities include:
- Adjust our views (and the views of our children) about giving and receiving presents. After all, she reminds us, “it’s not the presents but his presence that matters (p. 109).”
- Turn off the screens—phones, tablets, televisions, and computers–for an hour each day in December. Savor the quiet; cuddle up with a good Christmas book to enjoy as a family. Jody lists worthy titles to choose from.
- Mark the weeks before Christmas with an Advent wreath. Jody gives basic instructions, but also includes a list of resources, especially helpful if this custom is not part of your tradition.
Another of Jody’s recommendations: Slow down the celebration. Instead of the huge climax of December 25, followed by an equally huge let-down the next day, ease through the descent by observing Twelvetide—from December 25 to January 5. Jody offers delightful ideas for “savoring the moments” as the Christmas season wanes.
In just over one hundred pages, Jody takes us from Thanksgiving to Epiphany, showing us how to “tune our hearts to look for Jesus throughout the Christmas season, as we intentionally hold a space for him to come” (pp. 29-30).
Her suggestions lead the way to a Christmas of more joy and less busyness, more delight and less stress.
Sounds awfully good to me.
(Living the Season Well is available at www.amazon.com and www.barnesandnoble.com. Check out Jody’s blog, too, at www.jodyleecollins.com for more of her faith/life discoveries. You won’t be disappointed!)
Art & photo credits: http://www.pexels.com; http://www.flickr.com; http://www.amazon.com; http://www.flickr.com; http://www.geograph.org.uk.
From the Inside Out 