Every year it seems Christmas comes a little earlier.  Have you ever noticed that?  Its called Christmas Creep and it’s a real thing.  Way before Halloween even, the isles of our favorite stores fill up with all the essentials we need to create the perfect Christmas.  Depending on the store you are in, you can purchase the ideal Christmas tree, with all the trimmings, gifts, cards, confections, clothing, you name it and it’s out there somewhere to be found. In fact, if you’ve been paying attention, you’ve already heard a Christmas carol or two and seen a Christmas commercial on TV.

What happened to Thanksgiving, you ask?  I’ve wondered the same thing for years.  It used to make me angry about how commercialized Christmas had become.  It seems like the stores start it earlier and earlier every year.  And for some reason, the longer the Christmas season has become, the more stress that seems to come with it.  

Today, I want to offer just a few simple life hacks to help eliminate some of the stress over the holidays. 

You see, the reason we are all so stressed out is that we overextend ourselves, we overspend, and we overindulge throughout the holiday season.  My objective in this blog and the corresponding podcast of Reviving Your Soul (Now Longing for More) is to help you reduce overdoing in those three areas. 

The first step in overcoming these three problems is to take stock in what you really want your preparations and your Christmas to look like — to truly visualize what it is you want….and don’t want for your holidays.  Too often we fall into the trap of doing because we think others expect us to or because its what we’ve always done. So my hope is to encourage you to Enrich Your Christmas and eliminate the stress that comes with Christmas Creep. 

My first life hack today is to encourage you to plan your time.  I’ve developed a tool to help with just that. My Enrich Your Christmas Blueprint helps you to sit down, decide what you want to accomplish, develop lists to help you accomplish those things, and then schedule the things you want and need to do on a calendar to ensure you get them done.  My best tip to keep you from overextending yourself is to organize your “to-do list” in the order of priorities.  

The reality is that with all the extra things to do during the holidays, you will run out of time if you do all your regular duties too.  You will need to eliminate some things or double up.  There are suggestions for this is in the blueprint and corresponding video I’ve created to help get organized. 

The next area we typically over-do is in our spending. 

Let’s be honest here, Satan would love nothing more than to have us believe that spending is the best way to show someone how much we love them.  Although we know it’s not true, we fall into this trap every year, don’t we?  

So, what if, instead of stressing out over the perfect gift, we made something or purchased something for that special person that you could do together?  Essentially giving your presence instead of presents?  

I think of the families where the parent or parents are working two and three jobs to meet monthly expenses and then are going into debt to buy the gift everyone wants that year.  What if we stopped the madness and instead of falling into that trap we scaled our spending down to what is realistic in the current budget and spend the time we would have worked to buy the present with our family instead?  Yes, they will initially be disappointed they didn’t get that magic gift they saw on tv or that all their friends have, but think how priceless it would be to take the time to explain to them how finances work and save them years of stress of overspending with their own families for years in the future. Truly, the gift of financial integrity and boundaries would serve them so much better and so much longer.  It could be the legacy that could change the course for generations to come.   

Speaking of boundaries, that leads me to my last life hack.  Overindulging in food and drink is the best way to ruin a perfectly beautiful holiday.  

My third life hack is to consciously eat, drink and be healthy! 

Truly, we can eat all the things we love without completely going off the tracks over the holidays.  The problem is, most people veer off a day or two and then completely give up all their healthy habits which send them into a spiral that lands them feeling miserable and sick by the time the new year rolls around.  

My advice is to enjoy your favorite foods without guilt.  I go into more detail in my podcast and in the Enrich Your Christmas Blueprint, but the bottom line is the shame we heap on ourselves for enjoying life creates more problems than the actual thing we are indulging in. 

The key is to remember that making healthy decisions will also help you make better decisions in other areas of life and will prevent you from making many of the other “over doings” we can be guilty of. 

So the bottom line is: There really is a cure for Christmas or Holiday Stress!  It doesn’t come in a magic pill, but with a little planning, preparing, and conscious decision making, you CAN have a much richer Christmas experience that will last through the season and into the new year. 

You’ve heard the saying that Jesus is the Reason for the Season.  It’s such a simple saying, but it’s true.   He is THE cure for Christmas stress. Truly, if you seek him first and step away from all the commercialization of the season and simply focus on the true meaning of Christmas and celebrate in love, you have found the true cure for holiday stress. 

If you take the time for his guidance, wisdom, yeah, even presence, he will fill you with the courage to have the necessary conversations and help you let go of the need to show your loved ones how much you care through spending money on presents. 

There are lots more ideas on how to have a richer, more meaningful Christmas by following these guidelines. I hope you are able to incorporate some into your routine.

God bless and happy stress free holidays!