Three gifts I’m giving myself for Christmas
While suffering a stroke has led to various pitfalls in my life, I can honestly say that it’s led to this feeling of gratitude. Gratitude for living and the strength to try my best each and every day.
The feeling of desperate helplessness, the cold feeling that no understands what I’m going thru, they still get to me now and again. I would be lying if I said they didn’t.
So, this week before Christmas, when everything is going at breakneck speed, here’s how I’m keeping track… of myself and of my feelings.
Here are my three little tips for letting gratitude shine.
Take your time
As I get ready to leave for the holidays, frantically trying to pack, getting all of the Christmas presents in order, our visas sorted out, driver's license translated, car rented, our accommodations booked…. I sit back and I look at my children.
They are ecstatic to be taking a holiday! 3 weeks! No school! It‘s Christmas!
The only thing on their collective minds is whether they’ve been good enough for Santa’s visit and whether Freddie (the elf on the shelf) is going to catch up with us in New Zealand.
Although we’re going on the same holiday, my children see it much differently than I do.
It is our job as parents to protect them from seeing what is real. But who's to say that there isn't a middle ground?
Instead of seeing all that we have to do (and it's a lot I don't minimize that) I'm trying to overlook my dining room table covered with the remnants of our packing or the fact that my husband is sneakily playing tennis (and not packing).
And I’m practicing my mantra!
It doesn't come easily and it's not my first reaction. However, it’s what's different from holiday seasons past. I am trying to see the middle ground.
Be grateful
In this particular moment, show gratitude for all that it has taken to get to this very point. The hardships. The pain. Take it all in and celebrate. Thank yourself.
Too many times we rush thru the holidays. Thru the pain. Thru uncomfortable parts in our lives. I ask you for a little bit of sensitivity, for yourself. The opportunity to feel the pain and then to move thru it.
At this very moment you have a choice. You can stop. You can throw your hands up in the air and succumb to the stress.
Or go on with the secret knowledge that, although you didn't ask for it, you fully accept it into your life.
Too many times we don't take this important moment to realise that the pain, the stress is only a slice of the whole cake.
Take a child, for instance, they think that the whole cake is joy! They rarely see packing nightmares or the stress of traveling. They only consider that they are going to a place where it’s summer and Santa Claus had better visit!
For me, I’m trying to accept the hardships just as a slice of cake, but with the realisation that I am going to forget (or try to forget) all of the travel delays and forgotten Santa gifts and enjoy.
Look forward
I'm excited for our holiday.
Although it has been one stress after the other (including our plans in Sydney being quashed by the wildfires) and many moments where I threw my hands in the air and said that “I'm not going on this holiday!!”
I’m trying my best to see the whole cake.
I'm excited to end this year with my family, to take stock of all the good things that surround us. And to take a moment to feel triumph.
This year was hard for us but we've made it.
So with all of this being said, I’m trying to take time, be grateful and look forward.
Because, we all know that life happens dangerously fast. And it is precious.
I am going to wish in the new year with joyful expectation, surrounded by my peeps, with loads of good food and champagne, of course.
To read my motivational mantras and the three steps I practice every single day, click here!