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As much as the holiday season can be full of fun and cheer, it can also produce lots of stress and high emotions. Now if you don’t celebrate the specific holiday known as Christmas then feel free to ignore this article, or, take one of your favorite holiday seasons and apply what is about to be shared.

Let’s take a look at the best Christmas gift ever that a person could ever give on Christmas or any holiday season to avoid depression help in Calgary.

When a person comes in the office and shares, they don’t really like Christmas, I find it’s not always about the actual event. Sometimes it’s about the high emotions, stress and challenges that come with the expectations of the day. Some expectations may be about being with family members you’re not exactly looking forward to hanging out with, not giving or getting a gift someone wanted, or feeling disappointment with the lack of enthusiasm your partner had when they thought you’d really like the nose trimmer you got for them (thanks for noticing). Maybe it’s about having an actual day off and wanting to enjoy the day, however, all these expectations get in the way of having a day off, like having to clean up, prepare food, drive to grandmother’s house over the river and through the woods etc…

For some, the above activities might already make you feel exhausted with the thoughts and outcome being “wow, I can’t wait for this Christmas to be over.” However, it doesn’t have to be this way.

So, what do we do about this? New Life Counselling would like to suggest rather than doing and expecting the same negative outcome every year, we need to break things up a bit and work towards having a shift in our attitude towards ourselves and others using some depression counselling Calgary techniques.

1. Depression Counselling Calgary Tip #1: Anticipate the lead up to Christmas

Learn to actually enjoy the anticipation of Christmas. If you know you’re probably going to have a crappy Christmas day, then at least separate and enjoy the build-up to Christmas. In other words, have fun before Christmas. You see, Christmas, really is just another day that unfortunately has been so hyped up and over commercialized it can create a negative outcome of potential selfish behavior. Often, when I do couples counselling, I sometimes ask couples if they are having a self-centered me, me, me single mindset, or a giving other centered relational mindset (more on that in just a moment).  

2. Depression Counselling Calgary Tip #2: Have Christmas metaphorically be an intentional workday.

If we start the day of Christmas as a workday, we can significantly shift our attitude towards our personal desires and our attitudes towards others. In other words, I would hope even at an average bad day at work you would not be shouting bah humbug to every single employee. Rather, you might complain a bit to a co-worker and then get on with your day looking forward to when it’s time for everyone to go home….er, I mean time for you to stop working and go home…Then you can enjoy the rest of evening chilling out as you would normally do after a difficult day of work. Utilizing Christmas as a workday allows us to be other centered, rather than self-centered, taking our focus away from ourselves and onto others.

Ok, as mentioned at the beginning of this article, it was mentioned that we were going to look at the best Christmas gift ever that a person could ever give on Christmas or any holiday season to avoid depression help in Calgary. So here it is…(Little drummer boy drum roll please)

3. Depression Counselling Calgary Tip #3: Give the best gift possible…Give the Gift of You.

Ok, you might be going what? I thought you said we need to be other centered and not selfish on Christmas day. And yes, that is exactly what I’m talking about. Being other centered sometimes means we give the gift of ourselves to those we love, and sometimes even those we don’t love. Giving yourself, added with the intentional workday attitude, we can give the gift of ourselves and be completely focused on being other centered to those on Christmas day…special shout out to Reverend Myers for the idea of “The Gift of Me.”

                      Ok, one more bonus gift to you…

4. Depression Counselling Calgary Tip #4: Find a healthy space to take a break or timeout.

At many of my past jobs I noticed all the smokers would tend to take smoke breaks and so when people asked where I was going, I just said I’m taking a quick 2-minute air break. Yes, I got a few sideways views, however, the point was that I observed the smokers were sometimes more chilled and having more fun at work and so that’s when I learned that taking time out of a busy day, especially on Christmas days (filled with sugar plums, fairy’s, stress, tension and felling completely overwhelmed) can really support your attitude, calm you down and support your self-regulation. So, this anticipated Christmas, as you work on Christmas day, and give the gift of you; Make sure you create space to have some healthy air/smoke breaks to recharge your batteries and have the best holiday season ever.

If you, or a loved one are struggling with this Christmas season, or any other seasons that can trigger sadness and negative memories, you are not alone as Christmas can be a very difficult time for many. If so, it may be time to consider calling Lindsey or Jeremiah at 403-690-8617 and ask for a complementary 15-minute consultation.