Surviving the Holidays:
Three tips to a stress-free Christmas
It is December already and
the stores have long been
crammed with crazy. The
marketing ploy that depicts
Christmas as a time for giving and
joy is as old as Madison Avenue
and most of us know this month
isn’t all happiness and cheer. The
holidays for some can be a very
stressful time,
ripping them
from their
normal lives
and into a
frenzy of
spending,
eating and
partying
mania. For
others it is so
fun that they get carried away,
indulgences piling atop them until
they no longer feel themselves,
calories and guilt dragging them
into a state of depression. Here are
the three F’s that cause the most
stress for people during around the
holiday season and how to deal
with them without dropping too
many “F bombs”.
F for Financial Stress - Happiness
is not related to the thinness of
your wallet
The average in-store money
spent by Canadians on gifts in
2015 was $1,164 CAD, with 28%
of the buyers admitting to
overspending. Overspending
comes from complex places in
your brain.
We justify this
spending as an
attempt to
increase our
happiness or
to ease our
guilt at the
end of the
year. The real
cost at stake is
your emotional wellbeing. You
will only become more stressed
and depressed as the balance of
your bank account steadily
decreases which in turn will ruin
your Christmas holiday. So how
do you stay on track?
Planning ahead with budgets
and lists that includes things like
how much will be spent on
presents, meals and decorations