Having a Blue Christmas?

There’s a dirty little secret about the holidays:   The very time of year we Americans are supposed to be the happiest is when we’re most depressed.

Can this outcome be avoided?   And what can each of us do to help those afflicted with the holiday blues?

Some will answer, “Don’t eat so much sugar and start exercising!”.

And there’s some truth in that advice.   Bulging waistlines and a pattern of lethargy don’t help anyone feel great about themselves.

But I think the problem, and the antidote, is deeper.

We have a problem with inflated expectations during Christmas and practice a lot of magical thinking.

Higher expectations lead to a greater letdown when they don’t happen.

We expect folks to treat each other better at this time of year.   We expect feuding family members to suddenly stop arguing and be kind instead.

We expect shopping for presents and singing Christmas songs will somehow transcend the unhappy realities of our lives.

And when the magic doesn’t work, we end up feeling worse than we otherwise would have felt had we expected life to be ordinary and people to be the same.

Magic, in many ways, is the cruelest master of all.  It only makes us more miserable.

And magic is the opposite of true faith.

So the first step to avoiding the build-up and crash is to surface unspoken expectations about Christmas, and honestly ask ourselves, “Am I being realistic?”

We have to give up the magic, in other words.

It’s letting go of our self-comforting delusions and coming to terms with the realities we don’t like.

There are things in our lives which hurt us over and over again.

Things we can’t stop.  Things we can’t change.

What if, instead of practicing magic, we brought all these sorrowful realities to the Person whose birthday we are celebrating?

We bleed in His kind presence, and He points to His cross and takes our sufferings upon Himself.

He ministers His compassion to us as only a fellow suffer can.

The Messiah born on Christmas seldom removes pain, but He specializes in transforming it and redeeming it if we’ll allow Him to do so.

And we only allow Him when we come to the end of ourselves, admit we’ll never fix our lives, and find in Him the love that broken humans all around us can never give us.

In other words, it’s time to hand over control and give up on the magical thinking that says, “This time it will be different”.

Magic doesn’t work.   It lets us down.   And it’s not worthy of our trust.   Only Christ is.

And speaking of that Person, He shows us a way out of self-absorption and self-pity and self-sickness.

And that path involves taking us out of ourselves and immersing us into who He is and what He’s doing.

The phrase, “beside myself with joy” captures the essence of the matter.

It’s when we step outside of ourselves, forget ourselves, and are absorbed in giving happiness to God and others that our joy is the greatest.

On Christmas day, try something different:   look at the face of the giver instead of the face of the recipient whenever a gift is opened.

Can you guess who is feeling more joy in that moment?

And does the giver’s joy not explain a side of God so many people don’t get:   the kick He gets out being generous to the least deserving and the least capable!

Generosity is God’s fun.

He’s got too much goodness for just Himself so He liberally shares it and literally wants everyone to join the party.  Then He invites us to have fun with Him!

There are lonely children who need a hug–why not give them one?

There are discouraged people who need to be told they’re still loved–why not tell them?

There are unemployed families that have no money for gifts–why not give them some?

There are soup kitchens and homeless shelters full of people who need a meal–why not serve them a meal?

There are lonely elderly people who have no families to spend Christmas with–why not include them at your table?

So strike a blow against Christmas depression in others and inoculate yourself against it at the same time.

Do something radical:  Try giving others joy instead of trying to suck happiness out of everything and everyone else during the holidays!