Our BetterMost Community > The Holiday Forum

The Holiday Blues

<< < (4/8) > >>

Jeff Wrangler:
Lights and candles, lots of lights and candles! Defy the darkness! Very ancient and certainly not specifically Christian. After the music, the lights are what I love most about the season.

When I was a small boy, my grandparents had one of those garish aluminum Christmas trees (which are nostalgically fashionable again--go figure  :-\ ) that was illuminated by a color wheel--you couldn't put lights on those trees, I guess to avoid electrocuting yourself. I was appalled by the very idea of a Christmas tree without lights. It seemed to me that the lights were the very essence of a Christmas tree. A few years later, because my mother had health issues, we had to buy an artificial tree; thank goodness, by that time they had invented the green kind that you could put lights on,

Whaddya mean, "the pretense of Santa's existence"?  ;)

My SAD usually starts to lift by late February. By that time, we have a noticeably longer period of daylight each day. That helps a lot.

serious crayons:

--- Quote from: Jeff Wrangler on November 06, 2007, 02:29:12 pm ---Whaddya mean, "the pretense of Santa's existence"?  ;)
--- End quote ---

 :-X :-X :-X



 :laugh:

notBastet:

--- Quote from: moremojo on November 06, 2007, 12:45:26 pm ---Scott, if the religious implications of the day give you pause, bear in mind (and I know you already know this) that December 25th is just a convention, and one the Church very self-consciously started to overlay pagan Saturnalia with the new state religion. No one knows when Jesus was actually born, though the Gospels would suggest a date in the spring to be far more likely than one in the winter.

Of course, I understand that even though the date may be inaccurate, the sentiment is still to celebrate the birth of Jesus. And from a Christian viewpoint, this should be a festive occasion (though Easter, logically, would suggest even more festive recognition). So I can only imagine (as a non-Christian) the pressure a Christian might feel to FEEL festive, even if, for whatever reason, they don't.

Of course, Christmas has become a de facto season of secular consumption here in the West (or at least in the U.S.), and there is pressure to conform to the social expectations that have arisen with the holiday--spending and giving, all in a mad rush to keep up with the Joneses, or to not let your kid down so that they own the same toy/game their peers do, or to not look bad in your family members' eyes. I frankly think a lot of this behavior is completely unnecessary and actually a little crazy, and the giving of gifts actually has come to represent less of what is in one's heart than in meeting arbitrary cultural demands. In other words, a lot of hypocrisy has come to play in the holiday.

My solution--just stop. Don't do it. Don't participate. Give a loved one a gift when they least expect it--then they will know it truly comes from your heart, and not just social conformity. What I value about the holidays is having time off from work and spending time with family--this is the true gift, and one invaluably more meaningful than the latest gadget or bauble.

--- End quote ---

yes, and what an odd thing indeed, it has become...

Kelda:
Do you know, I love the holidays and I love my family - but they also drive me batty - mostly my sister actually- and the close confines get the hairs on my back up.

This year we are having it at her house - a much smaller house than my aunts and with much less people - its going to be harder to 'get away' from personalities if I need to.

We'll see how it goes!

But I do think i get a little boit of SAD too.

Scott6373:
There's also an interesting dynamic that happens.  People try to cheer you up, and to josh you into "the holiday spirit".  What they don't realize is that doing that make us feel worse, like how we are feeling is silly, and we should just snap out of it.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page