Burdened Or Blessed This Christmas?

We put a lot of stress on ourselves to create the perfect Christmas and make special memories that no one will ever forget. The holiday season feels magical, with sights, smells, and sounds that fill us with wonder and delight. 

But you don’t have to have the perfect Christmas for it to be a blessing. In fact, being overwhelmed and stressed can make the holidays feel burdensome. Nobody wants that. 

If you talk to people with a few Christmases under their belts and raised kids from infanthood to adulthood, they say you shouldn’t jampack your holidays full of everything; give them room to breathe and to be surprised. Putting all your effort into making the holidays perfect and memorable is unnecessary. Do less to enjoy it more. 

Spare yourself unneeded stress by asking yourself these powerful questions to manage how you spend your time and energy during the holidays.

How important is it to buy gifts for Christmas? 

A special feeling comes with seeing a beautifully decorated Christmas tree with heaps of presents underneath spilling out onto the floor. Everyone is so excited when it’s time to open the presents, ripping off bows and tearing through paper. But how many of the gifts do people usually really only care about the rest of the year? Maybe one or two? It isn’t the number of gifts that’s important; the thoughtfulness behind them matters most.

What will the kids remember most about Christmas? 

Kids will remember the spirit of Christmas and what you did as a family more than the gifts. They will remember traditions or special trips like a ski trip instead of staying home. Gifts are important, but so are events and beautiful experiences. 

What are the top 3 most important things to focus on? 

1. Quality AND quantity time. Be fully present! If Christmas is about anything, it’s not about the stuff you get but the time you spend with the people you love! Doing something special with each child or family member during the season means so much to them. 

2. Traditions. What’s something fun you can do every year? Traditions create lasting memories that will warm the soul for years to come, long into adulthood when our loved ones are no longer with us. 

3. Community. The holidays aren’t a time for us to only focus on ourselves and family. Christmas is a time to remember that we’re blessed to be a blessing – that it’s really more about giving than receiving. Making an extra effort to care for people in the community, choosing a name from one of the many angel trees we see this time of year and buying them a gift, or volunteering as a family in your faith community to make Christmas special for less fortunate families, will make Christmas extra special for you and your family – one that the kids will never forget. 

With so much to do and the pressure to make it perfect, Christmas can feel overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be. Don’t make it complicated; keep it simple. Take a page from the books of others who’ve gone before to learn the true meaning of Christmas.

May you receive the gifts that matter most this holiday season so you can truly be blessed instead of burdened this Christmas.