Blog

Creative Celebrating

Sing with me… “Jingle bells, jingle bells! COVID smells, 2020 was a rotten egg. Oh, what fun it was to hide, all year, every day, EY!”

Someone needs to get on creating a holiday jingle for 2020…

This year will go down in the history books. Nothing about it was “normal.” Nothing felt simple or average. Communication changed drastically. Our social lives became limited. We were faced with harsh truths about the state of our society and challenged ourselves every day on how to better take care of ourselves and the people we love. We ultimately had to redefine our values and gravitate toward living intentionally in order to make peace with the external chaos of the world.

And now, the holidays are here. For most people, holidays bring a sense of celebration. And you might be thinking,“What is there to celebrate, Natalie?” My answer for you…quite a lot. I can already see the look on your face. Those widened eyeballs and tilted head. Hear me out.

We can celebrate the people that showed up for us emotionally and physically when we struggled throughout this year. The technology that afforded us to continue to connect and communicate with our friends, family, and co-workers. We can celebrate the ingenuity of our scientists who have somehow created a vaccine in record time as well as the healthcare workers who have proven their dedication to their field despite increasing levels of burnout. We can celebrate the lessons 2020 has taught us, such as not taking our social lives or physical touch for granted, the importance certain hobbies have in our lives, the fragility of our health, and the need for kindness in our society.

See, there’s some good right there.

Take a moment to ask yourself your definition of the word “celebrate.” I mean it. What does that word signify for you? To me, when I choose to “celebrate”, I am choosing to acknowledge and honor someone’s or something’s importance. I think too often we associate celebration with grandiosity, lavishness, and festivities. This year will not allow for that. Instead, it is challenging us to define celebrating in a simplistic, undemanding, and fundamental manner. An approach that we as a society have unfortunately foregone, due to the nature and pressures of societal norms and consumerism.

I think we can all agree that mindfulness has become one of the most popular concepts in the past years. I believe that the practice of mindfulness exists most authentically and vibrantly when we hold space for simplicity and minimalism in our lives. So, why not take advantage of this year and lean into mindfulness during the holidays? Look at this year as an opportunity to engage in mindful celebrating, an act of observing or honoring the people, places, and things that create meaning in your life with a heightened state of awareness. This heightened state of awareness has been made possible due to the minimalist measures we have been forced to accept this year.

So how do you do that? How do you celebrate mindfully?

Well, start with identifying how you’re feeling, how your family is feeling, how your loved ones are feeling. From there acknowledge the people, or opportunities, you have lost. Become aware of your loss. Take a look at that loss and challenge yourself to cultivate ways in which you can honor it. Maybe you cannot see your entire family this Christmas, but what you can do is write personalized Christmas cards detailing your love and gratitude for them in your life. Maybe you can’t eat Christmas dinner with your family. Well, ask for the recipe of your much-loved dish and honor the memory you have of it by making it yourself at home. Lastly, create a list of things you’re grateful for this year and craft actions rooted in thankfulness (a.k.a acknowledgment or celebration) to coincide with each item on the list. If you’re grateful for being able to stock up on food to feed your family this year, maybe choose to drop off nonperishable foods at your local food pantry. If you’re grateful for your pet(s), maybe choose to volunteer or donate some money to a local animal humane society.

All this to say, use the simplicity of this year to cultivate mindfulness around what and who you are choosing to celebrate this year. Get creative with celebrating. Choose the opportunity to make new memories rather than marinating in memories of the past. And it’s okay if you feel the need to “bah-humbug.” But remember, even Scrooge found some joy in the end.