A Different Kind of Holiday

We live our lives in cycles. The diurnal rituals of night and day deeply carved in our circadian circuits. The palpable rhythm of the seven-day weeks we grown up with (I used to really believe that a Monday was different from a Thursday but the pandemic has slowly eroded most of these usual distinctions). The familiar passage of the seasons and the associated holidays. It’s easy to think that we know what’s coming.

It’s partially true. Or maybe we could say there’s enough truth in our foreknowledge to get us in trouble. One of my current prediction is that we will go through several months of cold weather while the days keep growing slowly longer. Then, in three months, some reliable warmth will return and small green shoots will begin to poke up through the frozen ground. I also imagine, and here’s where it gets dangerous, that I will begin planting seeds in small pots indoors in preparation for the summer’s garden. With this image in my mind, I can already sense how delightful it will be to see the tender green bits of life erupt through the moist soil on the shelf where I keep them. I’ll have lots and lots this year and may even need to buy another grow-light.

I have a pretty strong confidence in my general prediction of the weather pattern and my forecast of unlikely green appearances in late March. Chances are good that I will start seeds indoors at the same time, but maybe not. A thousand things could happen between now and then that would turn those personal predictions into pure fantasies. It’s true these imaginings of my future doings bring me pleasure, but just the other week as I was working through a difficult situation, my future thoughts were equally disturbing and brought me anxiety and discomfort.

So much of what we experience in any moment is about the futures we are continually creating in our minds. We all live an infinite number of futures—right in this moment of the present. Some of them bring us great suffering and some might bring us great pleasure and…none of them will never arrive. Even if you’re ‘right’ it will be different than you imagine it. Or our future fantasies may be pleasant enough but bring us great disappointment when what actually arrives is different from the ideal we imagined. If I had been hoping to get new grow light for my spring seedlings and all I get are some warm argyle sox, even though it’s a lovely pair, I might be very unhappy.

Our minds are such troublesome places. Just writing this, trying to make some sense of it all, I’m becoming irritated. It’s all too complicated. Can’t we just enjoy what’s here? Why all this explaining and posturing? Why all this hope and disappointment?

Can’t we just enjoy what’s here? Obviously not. I mean, we can, but it’s much trickier than we imagine. Without intention and patience and some appreciation for the unexpected we will just be carried away by our thoughts of how it was and how it should be.

Why all this explaining and posturing? The explaining never fully explains things, but I have found it so helpful in pointing directions of travel. We human beings are so much more similar than we usually imagine. Words, tips and stories from others can reassure us of what we know and help us feel less alone. (I do, however, take slight offense and embarrassment in above the self-accusation of ‘posturing’, though I suppose that to do or say anything involves some element of self-consciousness.)

Why all this hope and disappointment? What is the survival value of creatures whose inner lives are an emotional roller-coaster? Why so easily aroused to joy and discouragement by mere thoughts and images that run through our heads? It’s quite a mystery to me, but it does seem to be part of being human.

What I really want to get to this morning, and I think I finally have, is that the regions of joy and suffering that we humans traverse are part of our connection to each other. Whatever you’re feeling, it’s never just you. It’s never just personal.

I know a lot of people who will be spending the holidays separated from people they love dearly. This physical and sometimes emotional distance is a part of every holiday season, but it is especially pronounced this year with the Covid restrictions still in place. The annual ritual of travel and sharing food and arguing with relatives and rekindling ancient animosities and primal connections—it’s all being disrupted this year.

My encouragement for us all over the rest of this holiday season is to say ‘yes’ to as much of our inner life as we can. If the Christmas spirit is about warmth and welcoming, we get to practice it this year within ourselves, wherever we are. Whatever arises, can we meet it with compassion and curiosity–welcoming it in out of the cold of judgment and disapproval?

Though the circumstances and location of your holiday may be different than in past years, the fullness of life courses through your veins flows undiminished. The very place you find yourself in is the pulsing center of a vast web of life. Take as many moments as you can to stop and remember the beating heart of life that so faithfully sustains you and from which you can never be separated.