Too many times, women feel that they need to do it all. This martyr syndrome pops up, and nothing can stop them from making sure everyone else’s needs are being met. What about your needs? Is your time not as valuable as theirs?
Have you ever asked yourself, ‘Why?’ ‘Why do I have to do it all?’ There are plenty of good people around that offer to help, and you respond with, ‘That’s ok, I got it!’
Here are two of the tips from my Guide on how to Reduce Holiday Overwhelm:
- LET GO OF THE NEED TO BE PERFECT
“Perfect” does not exist. The sooner you accept that fact, the happier you’ll be. Striving for perfection will only leave you frustrated, inadequate, and unhappy. Here are a few ideas to help you get past the idea that the holidays need you to appear perfect.
How much fun would your kids have if they got involved in decorating, baking and wrapping gifts? Not only will they have a blast doing it, but you’ll create beautiful and fun memories (for both them and you) that you’ll cherish forever. And as an added bonus, your kids will have a sense of pride in letting your guests know that they decorated the house, baked cookies and wrapped the gifts!
Understand your need to have a perfectly clean home throughout the holidays. If this is truly important, consider hiring a cleaning company to help out – consider it a gift of time for you!
2. PLAN AHEAD
Planning ahead is one of the best ways to avoid becoming overwhelmed during the holidays. Make a list of situations that caused you to stress last year:
- Which of the many responsibilities for your child’s holiday play only you can do while delegating some of the others?
- How will visiting a certain family member cause tension?
- How many holiday events can you reasonably attend?
- Did you offer to host too many holiday cocktail parties or dinners?
Once you have identified a few of the more stressful moments of the holidays, you can plan how to approach them, possibly using some of the strategies in my guide to getting through them with less overwhelm. Some easy things that you can plan ahead for include:
- What is a realistic budget for gifts, dinners, outings, etc., that you can stick with?
- Sending out holiday cards at the beginning or middle of December – and remember to schedule time for writing out your cards, so it’s done with time to spare
- Make a shopping list for everyone (including host/hostess gifts) and buy a few gifts off it each week
- What are there holiday dishes that can be planned out early along with the grocery shopping?
- Consider writing a “script” for dealing with difficult relatives, etc.
Get the guide here!
People aren’t perfect. So why are we expecting our holidays to be perfect? Recognize the blessings that are in front of you – and keep a journal. Who knows what you’ll remember after getting through all that rummed fruit!
So this holiday season, accept the help from those around you so you can actually enjoy the celebration.
Step Up. Stride Forward.
Claudia