On Christmas

Tomorrow is my 34^th Christmas.  I have had Christmases full of joy, and some tinged by sadness.  One year involved cutting down our own snow-covered Christmas tree with thermoses of hot chocolate holding off the crisp winter air.  Another saw a small, tired tree with a single ornament on it.  I’ve celebrated with family, and I’ve endured alone.  Christmas is many things to many people, and it changes for each of us every year.

These 34 years have taught me something.  It may not be your conclusion (few self-realized epiphanies translate one-to-one), but I believe there is a core of truth for all of us in it.  Christmas benefits from simplicity, and so do we.

Those of us in America see Christmas’s growth.  It’s not unheard of now for Christmas merchandise to go on display before Halloween, and nearly 22% of Americans go into debt every Christmas.  Similar statistics appear in other countries, but the largest excesses exist here in the United States.  The gifts, the decorations, the holiday themed treats, the novelty ugly sweaters—these things add up. 

What we often fail to see, though, is the point.  As the expression goes, we miss the forest for the trees.  We get so wrapped up (pun intended) in getting the perfect gift, we forget that the point is to express our love for one another.  We worry over whether our outfit for the neighbor’s Christmas party will be a hit and lose sight of finding gratitude for the relationships in our lives.  Christmas should be a time of peace and love, yet it often turns into anxiety and acrimony.

This phenomenon is by no means limited to Christmas.  Organizational psychologist Adam Grant speaks on an explosion in perfectionism starting in the 1990s guiding us to fret over the trees at the expense of the forest.  The Washington Post published an article yesterday titled “Fun is dead.”  One of the quoted sources in the article states, “There are expectations of what I want people to believe that my life is like rather than what my life is actually like.”  Christmas is just another casualty in this ongoing spiral that increasingly defines modern life. 

The good news is that it doesn’t have to be this way.  Men and women have grappled with this fight between forest and trees for millennia, from the writings of Socrates to modern wellness studies.  The environment has changed, true, but the solution’s foundation remains the same: simplicity.  Simple does not mean lesser or worse, it means the preservation of precious resources like our time and attention for what really matters.  One could argue that is the essence of wisdom—using hard-earned experience to look at our complex lives and honing it to the essentials. 

Bringing it back to Christmas, simplicity is, well, simple.  The namesake of the holiday has a few lessons for us we’d be wise to heed.  Focus on what Christ taught: gratitude, charity, and love towards all.  For Christians, this holiday carries special significance due to our beliefs.  The beautiful part of Christ’s teachings, however, is their universal nature.  One does not need to be a believer in Christ to know his teachings have merit. 

In fact, one does not even need to be religious to recognize these truths.  Multiple studies have shown the benefits of gratitude, charity, and love on one’s own well-being.  Whether you rely on cutting edge behavioral science studies or the exhortations of the Apostle Paul to “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ”, the sentiment is the same.  When we show gratitude for what we have, give of ourselves charitably to others, and find love for those around us, we are all made better.

Christmas, then, can be simplified into this wondrous trifecta.  Even a so-called “War on Christmas” is no threat because these virtues cannot be defeated by an external force.  Even if every company in the world stopped Christmas-themed marketing and every person you passed on the street refused to acknowledge the day, you can carry gratitude, charity, and love in your heart wherever you go.  Your ability to feel and express the Christmas spirit is an individual choice, and you determine if it is a gift you choose to open and give.

This Christmas, remember to see the forest through the trees.  Set aside the concerns of the world and focus on that which elevates.  Through your thoughts and actions, bring us all a little closer to peace on earth and good will toward men.