I did a search on my blog just now (I have been writing this blog almost daily for five years now) for “the holidays.” It turns out I have written eight pages of stuff about holidays. That’s a lot of writing about a relatively limited part of our lives. There are eleven official federal holidays in the United States. These holidays don’t include religious holidays such as Easter and Passover, and secular holidays such as Halloween and Valentine’s Day. So, for argument’s sake let’s bring the number up to around twenty holidays a year that we celebrate (with the idea of including our personal and family birthdays and anniversaries). Out of 365 days of the year, about twenty or so days are dedicated to holidays in our country. Less than a month, out of the twelve months in any given year are dedicated to holidays. About 6 percent of the year is dedicated to holiday celebrations. Ninety-four percent of any given year is filled with ordinary days.
Why am I turning the holidays into a banal, robotic, emotionless mathematical word problem? I am writing this because it helps with perspective. If you “live” for the holidays and celebrations, and the rest of your life feels like drudgery, or a countdown to your next celebration, you are putting all of your greatest living experiences into about six percent of your life. If you dread the holidays, and you live in angsty anticipation for weeks before any of the particular holidays arrive, you are living in fear of events which only take up about six percent of your life. The other 94% is all yours to do whatever you want to do with it, without the peripheral hoopla.
Perspective is important. Figuring low, at least 90% of our lives are spent in our everyday routines. If you wake up most days in eager anticipation of what the day may bring, whether it be a holiday or not, you will lead a fulfilling life. Don’t worry about the holidays. Don’t load them up with too many expectations. Put the same kind of effort, and thought, and hope into your every single day that you do for the holidays, and you will surprise yourself with a greater percentage of wonderful days. Don’t wait for the holidays to tell your friends and family that you love them and that you are grateful for them. Don’t wait for your birthdays to celebrate yourself. Live every single day of your life as a celebration of the gift of experiencing living a life. Our lives have been gifted to us, for no other reason than because Love and Creativity wanted to feel itself living a life through us and our individual perspectives. Perspective is everything. Keep this 6% perspective in mind this holiday season, and into the new year. If you make loving and cherishing your every single day in the new, upcoming year your major goal, next year’s six percent of holidays will just end up being the cherry on top, of your delicious, multi-faceted, fabulous sundae of a life.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.