Need less holiday stress?
Below are 4 more strategies to be Free from Holiday Stress.
Holiday stress (just like chronic stress) comes from actions that are disconnected from the heart.
Strategy No 5
TALK LESS – This is a two-fold strategy and an act of restraint. Stress happens because there is a lot of noise, internal and external.
It takes A LOT of energy to talk. With more time engaged in social gatherings, purposefully talk less after the event.
Refrain from offering your commentary on the event to your partner and/or friends. Block time off the day after an event to have quiet time. Even 30 minutes is helpful.
Secondly, refrain from gossip. If gossip is around you, remain silent, change the conversation, speak your truth (do no harm here), or remove yourself from the environment.
An effective way to deal with gossip is to not lend any energy to it. Silence is golden.
Strategy No 6
PRACTICE OR ESTABLISH A MEANINGFUL RITUAL – Do you have a favorite tradition or ritual around the holidays?
Practicing rituals that warm your heart (not rote ones that don’t mean anything) and connect you to self, spirit and others create positive emotions. Specifically, feelings of warm-heartedness and love.
The best antidote for stress? Love.
Strategy No 7
DON’T PLACE MEANING WHERE MEANING DOESN’T BELONG – Mindfulness, the practice of paying attention to the moment with compassion, teaches us that suffering happens when we act with hope of an outcome.
By not attaching your happiness to hope of a gift, relationship, delicious dinner, or a gathering with no fighting, you release yourself from the expectations of an outcome.
Instead of striving to make everything perfect, be present and pay attention to the moment itself. BE with what is, even if it doesn’t unfold as you wanted or hoped.
Strategy No 8
OPEN YOUR HEART – This may sound anti-climactic or a downer, especially when the common cultural message is to put on a happy face during the holidays…but sorrow is the doorway to an open heart.
Heart wide open is a broken heart, a vulnerable heart, a feeling heart, a heart open to the suffering of yourself + all living beings.
There are lots of gift giving initiatives to those ‘less fortunate’ during the holidays, but none of this is very meaningful if you cannot embrace the unfortunate situations of your own life.
If you experience pain, anger, grief, or disappointment during the holidays, breathe in your feelings and bring awareness that people everywhere feel just like you in that moment.
Breathe out and offer a kind word of:
‘May I be free of suffering.
May I be safe.
May I be peaceful.
May all beings be free of suffering.
May all beings be safe.
May all beings be peaceful.’
When you open your heart to experience your own emotions, you open opportunity to connect with vulnerability and love to yourself and others.
The world longs for your open heart. It’s a beautiful gift.
May you be peaceful during the holiday season.
Warmly,
Angela
Copyright Angela Savitri –
Capri Health 2013
PS – Want freedom from chronic stress strategies and mindfulness lessons in your inbox? Click here to receive my 2x/month e-newsletter.
