We have now experienced three Christmas celebrations, taken a couple long car rides, hosted a few shindigs, and done all of the shopping, eating, drinking and making merry that goes along with our holiday season.
Throughout our travels, the packing and unpacking, the laundry, the grocery lists, the gift exchange spreadsheet, and the gazillion details (that always work themselves out one way or another), I have been overcome by emotions a few times as I tried to put into words what Christmas means to me. Here goes:
With my kids now ages eight and five, our family came out of the holidays this year in a completely different way than we did a few short years ago. We actually started the year off relaxed and energized for the coming weeks and months. Before the back-to-school rush, my husband and I were reminiscing about the early years of our children's lives, and memories started to surface of the first Christmas we were new parents. Lizzie was three months old, and despite living six hours away from our closest family members, we had decided to do a whole bunch of traveling to see everyone.
I was a little behind on my new year’s prep for 2014. A little thing called an ice storm and being displaced over the holiday season will do that every time. (More on that in another post.) I’m not really one for new year's resolutions anyway.
My family recently returned from a two-week vacation to London and Wales. My husband and I keep remarking on what an incredible holiday it was and, for the first time since having kids, we came back from our vacation feeling rested.
I remember when I was pregnant with our first child, and people would talk about how unprepared I was for the love I would feel when the baby was born. That I would experience a surprise at the depth of love we can feel for another human being. And with my second pregnancy, people would remark how hard it is to imagine having more love within us than we already do but once that second baby is born our love simply expands even more.
With Christmas bearing down on us like an express train, I’m looking towards the holiday festivities with excitement and trepidation. As sure as the sky is blue, there will be moments over the next two weeks when I feel like I’m going to lose my mind. And since the lessons I learn on the yoga mat are a continual source of inspiration for my life off the mat, I thought I’d turn to my yoga practice for some tips on getting through the holidays with as much joy and peace I can muster.
Here are three elements of my yoga practice that I intend to put to good use:
Yes, this week is the big week. On Saturday, my life odometer rolls over from the 30s into the 40s. When people hear I’m turning 40, they have one of two reactions: 1) “Ohmygod, you’re turning 40?!?” (said with excitement and enthusiasm) or 2) “Ohmygod, you’re turning 40?!?” (said with pity, commiseration or a hint of "better-you-than-me").
I remember. I remember my grandad with his big smile, warm eyes and hearty laugh. I remember asking him about the war - when I was too young to know the pain it had caused him - and he simply said, “I lost some friends.”
Labour Day weekend is usually one of my favourite weekends of the year. My husband and I had our first date on the Friday of the Labour Day weekend back in 2000, and my eldest child was born on the Saturday of the Labour Day weekend in 2006. And so every year my husband and I usually do something special on the Friday night, and we have a family get-together on the Sunday to celebrate my daughter’s birthday with all of her grandparents, aunts and uncles.
In the first few years of motherhood we need – more than ever – to surround ourselves with the people who lift us up, who give without expectation, who love unconditionally, and who celebrate us. Along with the many physical and emotional changes that occur when we bring a new life (or lives) into this world, we may also reflect on life and ask ourselves some of the "big questions". Some of us feel our identity shift completely, some of us question our parenting ability, and some of us make life choices we never thought we’d make.
