It’s that time of year. The time when all my more organized friends and my supremely organized sister send out their Christmas cards.
(Insert eye roll from a most ungracious me here.)
I’m feeling so overwhelmed. I’m working on this website. Writing Amazon copy for the book. Prodding other authors who have read the book but not yet provided blurbs. Growing my Facebook Gratitude group (which is here if you wish to join us: https://www.facebook.com/groups/3651042128273300/). Doing all the things that will help more folks hear my message of gratitude nerdiness.
I’m also baking for neighbors and wishing I could have my California kids here for the holidays (damn the pandemic!). Working on an agenda for a Cancer Foundation board meeting on Tuesday. Soliciting sponsorships for the Cancer Foundation Sweetheart Auction. Selling raffle tickets online.
If it sounds like I’m complaining, I just might be. Just because I believe so strongly in gratitude doesn’t mean that I have it all together. In fact, sometimes it is the gratitude that is the ONLY thing holding my life together. You should see my desk and my kitchen counters.
And then I go to the mailbox every afternoon and there is another one. Egad! Are the people trying to torture me with their Christmas cards? With those beautiful pictures of their children, photos that were taken back in October, the lovely script they pored over before they took the time to write it, the lovely handpainted cards they created (yep. I got one of those. Talk about feeling inadequate.).
See how screwed up I really am? I’m ticked off at my family and friends who are so thoughtful.
Yesterday I decided it was time to put my money where my mouth was. I read an article in the Santa Fe New Mexican’s Pasatiempo that said people who are grateful sleep better. I’ll have to do some research and write a longer blog post on that. It also said that handwriting a card to someone is a sure way to change your mindset and reinforce your positive feelings.
I know this. I have done the research on what writing down your gratitude does for you, both mentally and physically. But of course, when push comes to shove, I’m sometimes stubborn. I want to stay busy and create additional busy-ness in order to keep from doing what I know will make me feel better. Anyone else out there like me?
So yesterday. I sat down with five Christmas cards. I purposefully handwrote notes to five people I’m grateful for (including that supremely organized sister of mine). I stopped everything else I was doing and made myself think. I spoke aloud my favorite prayer, which is “thank you, thank you, thank you.” I set my timer for twenty minutes and turned off my phone (which is another thing to be grateful for. Try it.) and then I wrote.
I got so into the Christmas note writing that my timer went off and I kept at it. I grabbed a couple more cards and kept writing. It felt amazing.
I mixed up a batch of my famous poppyseed bread, which is my go-to holiday baking gift and then grabbed a couple more cards and kept writing.
Today I’ll stamp everything and perhaps do a few more. And you know what? I slept like a baby last night. It could have been the two glasses of wine I had while wrapping a few presents. It could have been the nice conversation I had with my husband, for whom I am grateful every minute. It could have been that I finished a long list of tasks that I had to get through yesterday.
But listen – it could also have been the nine cards I wrote, all of them reminding folks that they are part of my gratitude posse. They have made my life better this year. They are a gift.
Writing Christmas cards is a gift in and of itself.
Don’t be overwhelmed this year. Write Christmas cards if you feel like it, if you can set a timer and carve out twenty minutes. My suggestion is that you start with one. Start with one person who deserves to hear how grateful you are for them.
See if you don’t sleep better after expressing your gratitude in writing. I think you might.
Happy Holidays everyone. You are a gift for reading this. Thanks for your time and attention.
Bunny Terry is a native New Mexican who grew up on a farm in northeastern New Mexico. Her first writing job was typing stories on index cards on her family’s Underwood, stories that were uncannily like the ones she read over and over in O Ye’ Jigs and Julips, her favorite childhood book. No one thought to save those index cards for posterity, although there is the theory sarcastically circulated by her siblings that they will certainly be worth millions someday. 