By Jennifer Elizabeth Masters
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Courtesy Mark SissonFeeling Post Holiday Blues? |
Holidays can be a wonderful time of togetherness, love and acceptance. We rush around shopping, preparing and cooking. We bake and cook furiously, putting all our love and energy into our creations. Guests arrive in a rush of excitement. We share with open hearts and enjoy the fact that everyone loved what we created. We begin the clean up of dishes and move furniture back to its original place. Guests and family members leave. Afterwards, many people feel post holiday depression or a drop in their energy. Looking at holidays from a different perspective can help. Here are 7 ways to bust out of your post holiday blues.
1. Expectations
Maintaining a high state of energy all the time is not possible. We can't be floating at the top of the mountain all of the time. Even Masters have to trudge down the slope to be able to climb the next higher mountain. In everything there is an ebb and flow. The pendulum must swing both ways.
To think we could exist in a state of high without coming down at all is likened to an addict that wants to feel "high" all the time. Our body needs to slow down and rebuild after the excitement and high of a holiday. It isn't bad, or wrong, it just is.
2. Enjoy The Beauty of Contrast
When we can be present with each moment, we enjoy it for what it is. Enjoy the preparations. Enjoy the guests and then enjoy the peace and quiet and rest. It is all just an experience. Each one is different from the next.
If our relationships were perfect all the time, we would begin to take the perfection for granted. If guests were with us all the time, they would cease to be guests. We would not appreciate the newness of their presence and then their departure. The contrast is lovely.
With conflict, anger and emotional release we see it for what it is. If we are sad all the time, we don't experience the other end of the spectrum, JOY. If we are happy all the time, we forget what it feels like to be sad. The contrast allows us to see the beauty in each moment. Revel in it, rather than long for the other end of the spectrum to return. The more you resist what is, the more you suffer. It is perfectly normal to feel sad when your loved ones leave. Allow yourself to feel it. Then let it go.
3. Be Grateful For The Experience
Each experience teaches us something and has a gift and a lesson. Be grateful for each one. Then be open to receive more. The more grateful we are for each and everything in our lives, the more we open to receive more wonderment, more peace, more satisfaction and more success in all that we do. Even having a successful meditation, or a successful walk with our dog. Each event is an experience. Remember to be grateful for the experience it will open you to receive more.
4. Allow Your Emotions To Move
We are human which means we have a physical, emotional and a spiritual component to everything we do. Feeling is natural. Even crying is good for us, as it allows emotions to move rather than stagnate. Stress hormones are released when we cry, which reduces stress levels. This is healthy.
Venting anger is also needed in a healthy way. Exercise, meditation, chanting, singing are all ways you can channel this energy in a healthy way. Primal screaming is another. If you haven't tried it, watch a 2-year old have a temper tantrum. The stomp their feet, pound their arms and yell. Afterward you would think the event never happened. They have forgotten and fall asleep. Energy has moved out of their body and they feel better.
5. Being Present With What IS
Enjoying each moment as it presents itself is being present. When we only focus on the past and what we didn't do, or accomplish, our mistakes and the people who wrong us, we miss the perfection of the moment. We don't see the gift in the PRESENT. The same holds true for focusing endlessly on the future. If we focus most of our time, energy and attention on the future, we miss what is right in front of us. We are distracted by thoughts of what might never happen.
6. Avoid Distraction
Distraction takes us away from the present moment where everything wonderful happens. We can distract ourselves with phone calls, fixing others, visitors, sex or work. The bottom line is that you have to enjoy being alone with you. If you don't, you don't love yourself. No matter what the distraction is you are still there, but not present in the moment.
Distracting yourself is not a fix. Focus on you. Notice how you feel. If you get depressed after family and friends leave, sit with it. Revel in it. Cry if you have to. Then allow yourself to move on.
7. Get Up And Move!
Put on some dance music and get up and dance. Move some energy through you. Physical activity is one of the quickest ways to move energy through your body.
Kool and The Gang, Celebration
