The Christmas season is hard. Let’s agree to show up as our whole, authentic selves this month. Let’s be messy gifts.
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Show Notes:
Maybe this is your favorite season of the whole year. Have you been waiting for the Thanksgiving dishes to be done so you could joyfully decorate for Christmas? That’s fantastic. Seeing you love it makes me smile!
For others, this season is exhausting. Girl, I see you, too! Let’s agree to drop the pretense and bring our authentic selves wherever this season takes us, eh?
Life is just easier that way.
TOPICS:
- December in a boot. Boo.
- Limited quiet time
- Sometimes the Christmas season is hard
- Jobs are hard
- Sometimes being lucky is hard (WHAT?)
- Loving our bodies is hard
- Loneliness is hard
- YOU ARE ENOUGH
- Season of slowing
- Season of rush
- It doesn’t have to be perfect
- Messy wrapping
- Just show up
- We need YOU
- Today we celebrate
Transcript
Hey, welcome.
Thank you for joining us here.
My name is Sally Bulavko. Oh, and I am your host here on Finding Finish Lines and the creator of findingfinishlines.com, the blog. I’m so happy you’re here because, my friends, it is December. The Christmas season is upon us. It has begun.
For some of us, this is our favorite time of the year. For some of us, we’ve been thinking about making those Christmas cookies since July. Planning the outfit for the Christmas party. For some of us, it truly is the most wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, wonderful time of the year.
But for some of us, it is hard, super hard H A R D hard. Crazy hard. And you know what? That’s where I am this year. I’m coming into December, I’m coming into the full swing Christmas season with my right foot being all kinds of messed up. So I’m booted in one of those crazy heavy boots where every step feels like it takes an act of Congress. I’m like lumbering, laboring around. I’m struggling to get up the stairs down the stairs. I can’t carry up the Christmas decorations from the basement. And I recognize that this is not the end of the world. This is not the hardest problem to have. I get it. And it feels hard to me because I am extremely limited right now in the ways in which I can move my body.
For me, that’s how I release the tension; when I am out running, or riding my bike, or following the line of the bottom of the pool. That is where I evaluate my feelings and determine what’s valid. That’s where I can process my thoughts. That’s my quiet time. And right now I am so limited on what I can do! And I’m finding myself feeling just like a jumbled mess.
It’s making me a little bit reflective.
It occurred to me that this Christmas season feels hard, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s feeling like it’s hard.
For some of us, this is the season of incredible joy. Everything is right. The world is beautiful, our family’s here together, we have plenty and we’re just diving in. We’re just relishing it, just bathing in the beauty of the Christmas season. For others, it is hard. And because I don’t feel like the hard stories are around us, they don’t show up on TV. They’re not on the radio. I want to take a second, and I just want to recognize that if this season is hard for you, that I see you.
Maybe you work in retail and you spend eight plus hours a day on your feet, dealing with people who are not extending the grace to you that they would like for themselves this month. You know, when you’re expected to know that somebody’s expired coupon should still work. Or if something was placed in the wrong area and the pricing sign is wrong, yes, of course. You’re supposed to know that. You’re supposed to know every square inch of the retail store where you are working. And girl, I have been there. I have spent many Christmas seasons selling panties and lotion and, at one point, hardware.
(Don’t ask. I don’t know why!)
So I get it. And at the end of that long shift when you come home and everyone is expecting you to just keep pouring out, “Make us dinner. Take us to the party. I have a project. Do I have a party coming up? I need a new outfit.”
I know, I know. I see you.
Or maybe you’re spending Christmas working in ministry. And I have been there, too. And people are new. People are coming into your church and you want them to know the love of Jesus. And you just want to be a bright spot in their day.
Sometimes after several hours of hearing the stories of what people are going through, it just feels so heavy. It just feels so heavy. And you want to be an inviting face and you just wanna love on their kids and on them. It’s hard. I know the nap that you wanna have after a Sunday and I see that you can’t.
I see you.
Do you have a demanding corporate job where it’s just go, go, go, go all the time, but what you really want to do is just relax at home with a Christmas movie? I get it, I get it.
Maybe it’s really not about the work. Maybe it’s just about the fact that you’re just not sure where the presents were gonna come from this year or even deeper, where the meal is gonna come from this year.
I see you.
Or, and I know this can sound strange to somebody who hasn’t been in this position, what if this year everything is just working for you and you have plenty. For the first time in your life, you have everything you could want. And you’re trying to figure out how to balance the Christmas experience that you want to give your kids this year without hurting your parents feelings if they were not able to provide that. You’re trying to straddle the guilt, trying to make it all work.
Sometimes we feel like, “Do I have enough? Do I have too much? Am I giving enough? And my cheerful enough? Do I look okay?”
You’re invited to the party that you really wanted an invitation to, you go into your closet and you think, “All right, I’m taking this on. What am I wearing?” Outfit after outfit falls back down to the floor and, soon, you are saying those nasty things to yourself in the mirror.
Girl, I know this experience. I would be very surprised if you try to tell me that you have never felt that way. And if so, tell me all your secrets! Honestly, please put them in the comments. I need your secrets because I know that’s how I feel.
Have you ever thought, “Well, you know what? I’m just not gonna go.” I’m just not even gonna go! Girl dropped that drop that. Because I got to tell you something:
You are enough.
Maybe you’re super lonely this season. Maybe everything on TV is showing you that you should be surrounded by friends and family. You look all the way around, a full spin, and you don’t see anyone.
I see you. I see you.
Whatever you’re carrying, whatever you’re holding together as tightly or as loosely as you can, whatever you’re fighting to smile through in December, you are enough.
You’re enough. You’re not the only one. You are not a mistake. You are not all alone and unseen, and inconsequential.
You are a deliberate creation and you are enough. I need you to hear me.
Do you know, in the winter, our bodies naturally want to slow down. That’s the scoop. That’s why it gets dark so early. You are a human being. You’re not a machine. And there are cycles to our lives. There are cycles to our months to our years to our entire life. And this is the point in the cycle where naturally we are meant to slow down, get more rest, go to bed early, be reflective.
Our society tells us that this month we’re supposed to be going as fast as we possibly can. I bet your calendar is filled to the brim. I bet you’re exhausted. Why do we do this to ourselves? We’re running ourselves ragged in service to what? Christmas? Because I am positive there’s nothing in the Christmas story that tells us we need to run until we collapse. Like Omarosa says, “Jesus ain’t say that!” This is not the expectation for you. It’s just not. It doesn’t have to be perfect friends.
So my sister blessed me last night by sending me a an article that she saw in the Today show online, and it actually said that when you give a gift that is wrapped messily -is that a word? I’m making it a word- If you give… if you cannot wrap, and you give a gift that looks ah, a hot mess from the outside, to a friend, they actually enjoy the gift more.
Let me say that again. If your present is a wrapped like a mess, your friends actually enjoy it more. The study says that it takes some expectation away from the actual gift, like what is contained inside, and they are better able to recognize the thought behind it. That is so freeing, especially for me as a completely disastrous wrapper. I’m just gonna tell you, my husband wraps our gifts. He is a Marine. He is, ah, high and tight, kind of locked-in-in-the-corners kind of guy, and I am a hot disaster when it comes to presents. So if you’re going to get a present for me, it’s coming in a bag and it’s coming with love. I’m just telling you, just know it.
But let’s think about that: the messy gift is appreciated more, friends. What does that teach us?
What about our messy house? Maybe our friends can still enjoy being in it. Maybe you’re not gonna get all of the instagram love that you might have wanted. But maybe that matters less than the actual love, then the warmth inside your actual house.
What if you’re feeling messy, right? Come on. I’m feeling messy. What if you’re feeling messy? What if your friends are able to see the mess and appreciate more? What is inside the gift that is you, guys.
You don’t have to show up super big in every space that you show up. Sometimes it’s just your presence because you are enough.
Let that messy wrapping paper fall off, let it fall away.
If you are plastering on a fake smile to get through your day if you are trying to show up like you’re a Christmas super-fan when you’re not, if you’re trying to fake it, guys, your friends know it! They don’t expect it. When I say, “friends,” I mean friends. I mean family. I mean, the people who matter the people who matter because also in that story, and I’m gonna post the link below about the study.
Also in it, it said that if you give a messy present to somewhat to an acquaintance and actually devalues the gift, it devalues the gift. Makes them think that you didn’t spend enough time on it. And you guess what? If my messy appearance, if my real life me showing up, whole me, actual feelings from the inside showing on the outside, devalues me. You are an acquaintance. You are not a close friend. You are not somebody who has space in my inner circle.
And you know what? Be gone. Just be gone.
Because when you’re tired, you don’t need that. You don’t need that.
The people who matter the people who deserve all of you in July or in December, they’re the people that want your messy gift to show up. Or, if the space that you’re in your life right now requires them to show up for you, allow them in, friends.
All I’m saying today is that when you look around and it feels like you’re the only one that’s a mess, the feeling is a lie, My friends, It’s a lie.
The Hallmark movie plot we watch is because we know it’s not real. We want to take just a little bit of time, an escape, our reality and jump on into small town, flannel shirt wearing man learning to love Christmas again or whatever it is.
But don’t get confused. Don’t start thinking that that’s what it’s actually supposed to be, that everyone has enough. And that life pauses for this month. That some of us aren’t grieving. That some of us aren’t trying to figure out why we’re here. What is my purpose?
You don’t need to pretend, friends. You don’t need to fight through it. You can just be real, because let me tell you: this universe needs you. Whatever it was you were put here for, you might not know yet. But we need you. We need real you. We need all of you.
This might all sound crazy to you. You could be, like I said, loving the Christmas season. If your middle name’s dasher. If you’ve got the apron on and you are singing Christmas carols and just doing it up real big because this is where you find joy, then I want you to do it. You might just say, “Wow. I just listen to Sally blab for entirely too long in my day.”
And if that’s the case, I’m sorry. I really am. I should have given you a warning.
This is not a sports podcast. Or, um, you know, today it’s not about celebrating…
I take that back. Today is about celebrating.
Yep. Today is about celebrating that starting today, we’re going to be brave enough to do this Christmas thing in the real way. Whatever that realness is for you. Today, we’re stepping into our power in the month of December. That’s it. Whatever happened in the first half, we’re letting it go. What happens from here on out, we’re going to deliberately consider and show up the way that we want.
If that means that you’re going to turn something down because you just don’t have the power to get there, turn it down. Turn it down with grace and move on. Forgive yourself and move on.
If that means that someone who makes you feel uncomfortable in your own space has their invitation to your home rescinded, rescind it! You matter. You don’t need to invite people in to your private space who make you feel uncomfortable.
Now, that’s not to say if they’re just not maybe your favorite person, come on… we can get along with people. We can get along. We could be kind. But, if you feel unsafe, if you feel threatened, they don’t get to come in. They don’t get to come in just because you’re told that they’re supposed to come in. You get to pick.
If there’s a family tradition that just doesn’t serve you anymore, let it go. You don’t need to apologize all day. Just let it go.
“I’m sorry, but this year we’re not gonna be doing that. This year we’re going to start a new tradition, one that seems healthier and it feels good to me.” And can we make that tradition, can we start it with, “I’m enough.”
This Christmas season, let’s celebrate that we’re here on purpose and that were enough. Whatever we’re feeling, whatever real life things were holding, they’re real. They don’t disappear 1/12 of the year. They’re here and we’re holding it together. And for that we should be celebrated.
OOOOOH! I feel better. I had to get some of that off my chest.
Tomorrow, we’re in for a real treat.
Meredith Atwood, also known a Swim, Bike, Mom, has stopped by to chat a little bit about her new book called, The Year of No Nonsense and It is awesome! I can’t wait for you guys to hear from her and hear about that book and the journey that she is on and that I encourage you to go on to. It is worth it, so please join us tomorrow.
If you want more Finding Finish Lines, you can pop by the blog at FindingFinishLines.com.
If you have a second, do you know what messy gift I would appreciate so much? It’s a quick review. If you’re listening on Apple podcast, you can review there or Spotify, or wherever you listen. If you could leave a quick review of this podcast if you find it valuable, I would appreciate that so much that’s it for today.
Friends until next time, carry on Women of Valor.
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