Love Connection
By Annie Ory

It's hard to believe but here we are. Love them or hate them. The Holy Days are coming. We celebrate Thanksgiving, a uniquely American Holiday that binds us as a culture by emulating harvest festivals the world over. The religious and culturally specific Holy Days follow in December and remind us of our own spiritual and cultural history. Finally, there is the celebration of the New Year. This is the day many of us habitually look at our lives over the past year, celebrate what we've accomplished, mourn what we've lost, regret what we've missed and plan how our lives will change in the year to come. The holidays carry a heavy emotional burden for all of us. Along with joy and celebration we are called upon to reflect on the state of our relationships and to reconnect with family and friends in ways that can be laden with pressure, guilt and disappointment.

If, once again, you will attend celebrations alone, divorced, widowed or never married, you may feel heavy hearted watching friends and family celebrate with their loved ones. Even happily single, or happily married people can feel some stress around this time of year, trying to do everything right.

One sure way to have a terrible time during the holidays is to have an expectation of what they 'should' be like or how you 'should' feel. Instead, I invite you take a moment and reflect on what the holidays mean for you. Reach for the reason you connect with people at this time. Gather your strong feelings of love and faith and use them to plan a course for the next 60 days that will honor your beliefs and your life, as they are.

I knew a married couple whose holidays were always awful. He loved Christmas and bought lavish gifts, decorated with glee and waited for the day with expectant joy. She felt pressured and neglected while his attention went to her gifts and not to her. Invariably, each year, she would pick a fight around the 20th, tear down the tree, open all the gifts as if she were unpacking from a trip and declare Christmas ‘Over!’ He was devastated. For many reasons, this couple later divorced. What’s clear when witnessing the disconnect is that they forgot one another and didn’t plan as a family how to celebrate, which parts were most important and whose job each task would be.

As a family or an individual, I invite you do this now. Create the holiday that works for you and honors who you are and what you believe. If you are single, be sure to plan lots of time with other people and honor your need for community. If you are part of a family, don’t neglect time alone to worship and rest between flurries of activity. If you are recovering from a loss, be patient and gentle with yourself. Ask for the support you need. No matter who you are. Remember, the joy is within you. May the Peace and Joy of the Holy Season touch all of you.

Send Questions to Annie to annie@MappingLove.com . Presidio Sentinel, November/ Newspaper

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