Christmas is an inside Job

On this holiest of holidays I reflect on what we are celebrating this day.  Although there is an array of celebrations this month, Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Christmas and more, our modern-day Christmas celebration in the West can be traced back to St. Nicholas the patron saint of school children.

In all our adult hustle and bustle it feels as though the Spirit of this holiday is lost by the “grown up”.

I have gorged on my share of sugary Lifetime/Hallmark movies, steeled ravenous mall crowds and cursed as I untangled a string of lights or two.

Whether you celebrate these December holidays as religious, spiritual or Christmas, it is the child like Joy that comes from within that is the true Spirit of all the festivities.

Many people begrudgingly attend family gatherings, reluctantly spend too much money on gifts for people they don’t like or don’t know and through it all, and have lost that Joy.

I am reminded of a quote by Henry David Thoreau:

“It is easier to sail many thousands of miles through cold and storm and cannibals, in a government ship, with five hundred men and boys to assist one, than it is to explore the private sea, the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean of one’s being alone.”

Spend a moment today “alone” with your thoughts to reflect on those things you have to be grateful for.  Be thee like a child and truly sense the Joy that emanates from within.  Imagine you are sitting on the white sandy beaches of Playa.  Let the waves sing a lullaby to your heart. Jump up and down in the beautiful blue ocean.  Embrace peacefully good will toward men (and women).  The Miracle of Christmas will descend upon you and those you share this day with.

Feliz Navidad