Just a bit of Eggnog and Cheer...

Christmas couldn’t come at a better time than now. If anything, to provide just a bit of reprieve from this hell of a year. There have been at a number of times, where I have honestly thought that this year has been just ‘too much to handle’. It has been stressful, drama ridden, and down-right scary at times.

Every time I turn around, it seems like I speak to someone who is going through something so profoundly difficult. Either I hear the worry of losing the job they once thought secure, they just received a scary diagnosis of cancer in this already scary world of COVID we now live in, or they have a marriage that is nearing its end when true relationships are the one thing holding us all together.

With every one of those conversations, my heart breaks for those I speak with. I know, I am an empath, but the pain is just too real for them and too great to ignore. I can feel their pain and the worry, literally feel it…and unfortunately, they are not alone in it.

The world right now is hurting, weeping rather. We are missing our loved ones and missing our norms, but one thing is certain, this year has opened my eyes to the tremendous need for the most important thing in life, LOVE.

Love can build you up, give you strength, and provide comfort in a world of chaos. Love can heal a broken body, mend a broken mind, and repair a broken heart.

To me, Christmas is love. Love from God to give the world a savior. A reminder of the love from Jesus to eventually give his life. Love from a mother and father to their children of just how precious they are in their eyes, showering them with gifts on Christmas morning. Love to family and friends by taking the time and energy to find just the right gift or even better, to make something precious from the heart.

Christmas is love and love brings cheer. So when you need a bit extra love this year, you can easily feel that cheer when we focus on the following: baking Christmas cookies with joy to hear the ‘oohs and aahs’ of those who have them; feeling the warmth and comfort of the fire glistening below the stockings hanging over the fireplace; a corny Christmas Movie or two; listening to your favorite Christmas album; the Christmas tree shimmering with lights and years of memories from homemade bulbs of fingerprints and Disney princesses; and the unique flavor that encompasses it all, the yearly eggnog and perhaps the spike you have added too.

So grab your favorite slippers and some eggnog, take a breath and try your best to breath in that Christmas Cheer. Don’t forget to try to pay it forward, spreading the Christmas Cheer this year, to help remind you and the world that LOVE will bring us together, and that LOVE will give the ones that feel the most blue that Christmas Cheer to get them through.