Christmas During a Pandemic.

It’s Christmas season and over eight months since COVID-19 erupted. That’s a long time to be hypervigilant, constantly on guard for hidden dangers in every-day activities. Christmas will look different this year as we navigate staying safe while finding ways to celebrate.

Christmas staff parties, concerts, school pageants, craft fairs, and many social events will likely be significantly altered this year. Large family gatherings and winter get-aways will be reconsidered, reconfigured, or scrapped all together. As the long, cold months settle around us, our usual distractions aren’t available. Spring, and the hope of a vaccine, seems a long way away.

Loss is everywhere; the loss of freedom of movement, loss of work as we knew it, loss of connection to a larger network, and loss of feeling safe. Uncertainty has replaced security. With all the losses and inconveniences, it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that we still have much to be grateful for. It’s always easier to express gratitude when things are going really well. It takes effort to find gratitude when facing adversity.

Gratitude is an emotion that usually occurs spontaneously. This positive feeling of wellbeing may well up when we feel the sun on our face, sip a good cup of coffee, or gaze at the face of someone we love. Gratitude comes from appreciating that, despite life’s many challenges and difficulties, there is much to be thankful for. Although gratitude is an emotion we are all capable of experiencing, it is also a personality trait. Some people just naturally focus their attention on what is going right in their lives, not on what is going wrong.

Although gratitude is a spontaneous emotion and personality trait, it’s possible for all of us to increase our awareness of what we have to be grateful for. We can purposefully cultivate an attitude of gratitude. Cultivating gratitude doesn’t mean pretending everything is wonderful when it isn’t. Deceiving yourself isn’t helpful to you or those around you. Gratitude is simply the ability to acknowledge both the good and the bad, while choosing to consciously focus on the good. Gratitude is the ability to appreciate the small joys in life, such as a good book, a visit with a friend, clean sheets, and new socks.

Although Christmas may be scaled back this year, our gratitude doesn’t have to be. This Christmas, you can give the gift of gratitude to yourself and to those around you. If you look back over your life, you might recall people who through small gestures, made a big difference in your life. Perhaps an old teacher saw the good in you when everyone else seemed focused on the bad. Perhaps a grandparent, aunt, or uncle took time to listen to you when no one else seemed to care. Perhaps an old friend had your back when you were going through a painful breakup.

We all have people who were there for us at pivotal times in our lives. Sometimes the right word at the right time changes the course of our lives. There may be people in our lives today who mean a lot, but rarely get told how important they are to us. This Christmas, as we are reminded daily of all we have lost, sharing the gift of gratitude could be the greatest gift of all.

The more gratitude we feel, the more energized we become. As we look back in our past to find gratitude, and look at what we have today, we realize we are truly blessed. Anyone can be grateful for a blessed life, but true gratitude is the ability to be grateful for the small gifts in life, even when one has received a huge blow, or series of big blows.

This Christmas is a time to remember we live in a great country, we have food on the table, a roof over our head, and all our basic needs are met. It’s time to think of those who may not be as blessed. A call, a note in the mailbox, or a small gift on the door step for someone particularly isolated this year, could help someone else feel gratitude.

Sometimes the best gift we can give another person is the gift of our time, the willingness to listen, and the ability to let the person know that he or she matters.

Jenny DeReis, MC, Psych