In my professional and personal life I have heard many people complain about how the family gatherings at the holiday are horrible. While the idea is not totally my own, I think that many people with control issues work themselves into a "frenzy" that ends up creating the horrible experience. My thoughts today are about understanding the frenzy happens and what do we do to perhaps avoid if not stop it.
Essentially, people dwell on negative thoughts or fears for weeks and even months before Christmas. You might call this dwelling . . . dreading. Dreading leads to catastrophic thinking and anxiety and maybe panic attacks if not headaches and stomachaches.
They had better not do it . . . if they do it . . . I'll . . .
Many families have jerks and ___________s ( fill in your favorite bad name) and they come to holiday gatherings and do the following:
- They make scenes.
- They threaten.
- They yell.
- They scare little children.
- They insult people.
- They ruthlessly criticize other family members without any sensitivity to the needs and feelings of others.
Ironically they see themselves as victims and take no responsibility for their behavior. They will never ever get it and they will mock any well-meaning advice.
Other members of these families will dwell on that behavior and they will repeat over and over to themselves
"They had not better _____________ again . . .
if they do __________ again this Christmas, I will __________.
When people continue to dwell again on this type of thought, they get themselves stoked and wound up.
They may walk on egg shells believing that they are going to keep that sociopath family member with anger problems from blowing up this Christmas like he has done the previous 15 Christmas.
My family members are just going to act stupid again.
Many people are irritated and insulted by behavior of family members at Christmas. Family members can get drunk and get in fights. They can argue over the silliest things when together each and every year. If these people were not family members, the people would be ditched or the relationship would be ended. But as they say in the English language: Blood is thicker than water. You are expected to tolerate and embrace your family regardless of how hurtful they are.
Why can't my family just get along at Christmas?
Some people dwell on what they would like to see at Christmas. They would like to see Uncle Bill and Uncle Harry stop arguing about something that happened in 1991. They want Aunt Bess to be quiet about how two of Aunt Linda's children were jailed and how one of Uncle Bobby's children got pregnant out of wedlock. They would like the drama to end.
The reality is that when family members get together they often pick up arguments where they left off at last Christmas. Mariana Kaplan in her book When Holidays are Hell (still available for purchase online) noted that family members do go into a type of hypnotic trance when back together and maybe revert as if they are children again. The drama never ends.
We are not going to get our family members to get along. We can try to be peace makers or we can act like parents, but when we stick our noses into those arguments it is like we get "egg on our face." It can feel very hopeless because in reality we only keep the drama going.
The Wound Up Rubber Band Effect: SNAP!
While there are other potential negative thoughts that people dwell on, whatever the thoughts, people get themselves wound up like a rubber band. They get tight and on edge. Uncle Bobby can be so on edge and angry inside that when he walks into the holiday gathering, it takes very little for him to snap. Uncle Harry has to make one little remark or smirk or action that was on Uncle Bobby's list of items and Uncle Bobby can become undone in an instant. You may have been one of Uncle Harry's victims last year, but you could wind up being the one who ruined Christmas this year if you are the one who first becomes undone.
A lot of people may get drunk at Christmas to numb the pain and relax. However, alcohol also can impair judgment and create mood instability. A happy drunk can become an angry drunk in a nano-second.
Stopping the tension--dwell on something different
Unreasonable expectations are at the root of holiday tension. What makes the tension worse is how much people dwell on those expectations.
As I have put in an earlier post, Wayne Dyer put a syllogism in Your Erroneous Zones:
My feelings come from my thoughts
I can control my thoughts.
Therefore, I can control my feelings.
By committing to think differently, and making effort to think differently, we can change our feelings.
Some of these alternative thoughts are
- No family is perfect.
- No holiday celebration is going to be perfect.
- There will be good and bad parts of each Christmas.
- I am not responsible for the behaviors of my family members.
- I am not responsible for making my family members better.
It can be a process of grief and loss that we are unlikely going to have a perfect holiday celebration. It can be a moment of painful enlightenment that the Grandmother that we had looked up to all those years and tried to take her impossible advice was really a controlling narcissist.
However, if you had believed that you failed in making your family gatherings perfect, I hope that you can buy into the idea that it is okay to drop the pursuit of perfection. Many have had to do it to feel better.
I think that many of us what a sense of enlightened liberation from the pain that we have been enslaved to. We do it by changing what we believe and dropping those unhealthy personal rules. We then hopefully choose new rules and policies to go by.
May you begin to feel less tension as there are 18 days until Christmas Day. May the next days bring you a greater sense of freedom and relief because you are embracing reality.
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