As the winter holiday season kicks off, many of us are focused on gift giving. It can be a lot of work. I know I’ve spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out the perfect presents for friends and family.
This time of year, I think many of us get so focused on giving to others that we forget to nourish ourselves. I’ve had several patients come in for adjustments because they’re feeling particularly tense, trying to get everything done in order to have a perfect holiday with their families. They’re putting a lot pressure on themselves!
But maybe a perfect holiday doesn’t have to mean checking every box and putting all our ducks in a row. It doesn’t have to mean a certain number of presents and cooking the turkey just so. To me, it’s much more about embracing the spirit of love and kindness and really feeling it within ourselves.
One way we can do that is by remembering that loving and caring for ourselves is just as important as doing the same for our friends and families.
I think a lot about the teaching to “love thy neighbor as thyself.” It’s a great piece of wisdom to keep in mind. But lately I’ve been mindful of the fact that if we don’t do a good job loving ourselves, we can’t extend that same love to our neighbors very well either. We need to keep putting love into our own bucket, in order to be free to share it with others. There’s always more than enough love to go around, if we include ourselves in it.
So make a practice of checking in with yourself every day and asking what you can do to give yourself some love. It can be tangible, like taking a warm bath or drinking a cup of healing Magic Mineral Broth. Or it can simply be making an effort to embrace yourself as you are in this moment, with forgiveness and unconditional acceptance.
I think you’ll find that the more you do so, the more the holiday spirit will flow.