December 3, 2025 • 36 mins
The holidays are supposed to be a joyful time, but 2025 statistics reveal 41% of people experience holiday stress (versus 28% in 2024). Concerns include finances, loneliness, family tensions, grief, and feeling like you can’t keep up with all the merriment or are missing out. “Maybe it’s time to dial back and focus on calm versus frenzy.” says Fearless Fabulous Melanie Young. Having experienced holiday doldrums herself, she provides her self-care tips for Keeping your Cool during the Yule.
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Fearless Fabulous You is broadcast live Wednesdays at 12 Noon ET on W4WN Radio - Women 4 Women Network (www.w4wn.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com).
Fearless Fabulous You Podcast is also available on Talk 4 Media (www.talk4media.com), Talk 4 Podcasting (www.talk4podcasting.com), iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, Audible, and over 100 other podcast outlets.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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(00:20):
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Speaker 3 (00:42):
Hello and welcome to Fearless Fabulous Shoe. I am your host,
Melanie Young, and we are in the last month of
twenty twenty five, December twenty twenty five, so we're now
we just cleared Thanksgiving. I hope everybody had great Thanksgiving
and we are now heading into that interesting time of
(01:05):
the year because it's the happiest time of the year
and the most beautiful child of the year, the jolliest
time of the year, and the magical time of the year,
and everybody's sparkling and shining and glittering, and everybody's feeling gay.
Right then, not really, I was reading about the holidays
because not everybody feels that holly jolly time. In fact,
(01:28):
this is kind of creepy, scary. I just read that
almost forty nine percent of over forty percent of Americans
say they're feeling more stressed in twenty twenty five over
the holiday season than last year twenty twenty four, which
was like maybe high twenty percent, twenty eight percent in
(01:49):
the twenty almost double, so almost double. If Americans are
feeling more stressed this year, that's kind of scary. But
there are reasons for that, and they're fairly and you
may have felt them. I know I have, so I'm
sharing because I care. The key holiday stressor is one
is grief. Forty eight percent of people say grief is
(02:11):
a holiday stressor because maybe you have lost a loved
one or maybe you were like I did in twenty
twenty two. I was caregiving my dying mother over the
holidays and grim. It was a grim, not a fairy tale,
it was a grim reality. My mother died on December
(02:32):
twenty second, twenty twenty two. So my Christmas holiday just sucked.
That's all I'm going to say. I had to pick
out her coffin on Christmas Eve and plan for a
December twenty seventh funeral because we had to clear the holidays,
and so my husband, Dave and I probably had one
of the saddest Christmases ever last year. You know, it
(02:55):
seems like, and I don't want this to be a
DeBie downer because just so you know, I'm going to
talk about how to turn it around, but I'm setting
it up. It seemed like for many, many years, David,
my husband, and I spent a lot of last Christmases
celebrating what's the last Christmas. Maybe you're feeling it, well,
you got to go home to see mom or dad
or grandma could be their last Christmas. God knows. We
(03:19):
spent so many Christmases apart. David would go see his
mom in Florida so she wouldn't be alone. I would
see my mom, who both widows in Tennessee. So David
and I actually never shared a lot of Christmases together
because we were busy spending what could be the last Christmas,
or you know, want to brighten up our mother's Christmases.
So there was a Florida Tennessee thing, and then we'd
(03:42):
like meet afterwards to go celebrate New Year's and our birthdays. Together.
Last Christmas was my mother in law's last Christmas. David
and I were living in New Orleans, and we canceled
plans to do a big trip for New Years. We
stayed local. We drove to Jacksonville to spend what we
(04:04):
thought might be the last Christmas with his mother, Sally.
She fell the next day. It was hospitalized for two weeks,
and it was her last Christmas. She died of September
of this year. We're both glad that we made the
decision to spend our last Christmas. But I said to David,
this year, this is our first Christmas where we're not
having a last Christmas. This is actually the first Christmas
(04:27):
where we are untethered and free to just create our
own Christmas traditions in our new adopted home of New Orleans.
So we should be feeling gay. But you know, last
night started what I call the holiday holiday stress period
because I think about my family. I think about all
the loved ones we've lost over the holidays, many of
(04:49):
whom we lost over the holidays. Literally, I think about
the pressure to go out and spend money. I think
about all that, and then I said self, you don't
have to do it. Anything. You can create your holiday
spirit with the spirit you have and enjoy it the
way you want. You don't have to follow anyone's rule
(05:14):
book on how to enjoy the holidays. And that's what
I want to tell you. How to keep your cool
during the Yule and define your own holiday spirit, your way,
and how to take care of yourself so that you
are cool, calm and collected, because we want you to
(05:36):
have a cool mule. And I'm saying this as I
talk to you, I think of some of my friends.
I have two friends who just lost their beloved dogs,
and I know they're sad. So the first thing I
do around this time of the year is I don't
think inward and stare at my navel and what was
(05:57):
my year like? I stopped doing that. I used to
reflect all the time. What was my year like? Was
it good? Was it bad? What can I do better?
How can I make things better for myself? And the
first thing I did is I tossed all that away
because I'm no longer here to achieve and slay the world.
And whatnot I achieved? It's great. Life is good. I'm
here to just enjoy life and bring joy to my
(06:20):
friends who may be feeling less joy this year. So
the first thing I do is I pick up the
phone and I call a friend. Dave, and I love
to just pick up the phone and call a friend
and have a conversation with someone we haven't talked to
a while, because nothing beats that more than scrolling and
posting and whatnot. We used to send out Christmas cards.
(06:43):
I love doing that, but we are not doing that
now because postage is expensive and I just spent. My
mother would send out cards every year, and we'd have
a tradition of I drive her to the post office
and she pick out her little Christmas stamp and my
job was to put the stamps and help her fill
out the cards. And in the last couple of years,
when she could no longer write because she was crippling,
(07:05):
Arthur writ Is, I helped her do her cards and
post them and it was great. But when she died,
there were hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of Christmas cards,
so many that I had to sell them or throw
them out. And I hate waste. So I have a
little aversion now to buying Christmas cards because I was
swallowing and drowning in them when we were clearly at
her house. So what I do instead is I call
(07:27):
people and say, I want to tell you that I'm
thinking about you and how much I enjoy you or
miss you, or whatever I can say positive. If I
know they're grieving or they're having a different time, I'll
maybe send them a little gift or maybe they'll get
the card with a little personal note. But I keep
it simple, Keep it simple. I also believe that this
(07:50):
is a great time to find your inner child again
and do goofy things. You don't have to do expensive things.
I don't know about you, but I can't afford to
write checks to lots of charities. But I can afford
to post about these charities or maybe spotlight them on
this podcast or shine a light on them so that
(08:11):
maybe people who have more money than me can write
the check. So I do that. I try to spotlight
wonderful giving organizations and carrying organizations that I support spiritually
but I can't support financially. So maybe I share there,
or I look at their online stores and see if
there's any gifts I can give that will give back
to them. Like one of my favorites, and she's been
(08:33):
a guest on the show is Thistle Farms. It's based
out in Nashville. The founder suffered child abuse and sexual
abuse as a child, and now she helps helps women
who are suffering from human trafficking or abuse. She provides
a safe haven for them. It's called Thistle Farms. She
(08:53):
puts she teaches skills to these women, helps rehabilitate them,
and they have a beautiful online shops. One example. There
are many more. Let's say that you love the theater,
you love the opera, you love the ballet, or your
local zoo or a nonprofit. See if they have an
online site or they're spelling selling a special Christmas ornament
(09:16):
or gift package and buy there. Then you're supporting them
in some way. That's really important to stop thinking about
how wrong you feel, feel how right it is, to
think about others that will. That's the best gift you
can give yourself. Well, one of the two is to
(09:37):
give thoughtfully. It doesn't have to be expensive, just something
simple to make someone else feel better. I had a
friend she passed I think last year, Natalie dupri She's
been a guest on I think both all my shows,
and she created something called the pork chop theory. Of cooking.
But this pork chop theory is bigger than cooking. The
(09:58):
concept is you put to one part in a pan,
it cooks okay. If you put two pork chops in
the pan, the fat supports each other and they cook better.
So share the fat. In other words, you're better together
than a part. So connect with people, have people over
for coffee, or meet them for coffee or David and
(10:19):
I love just to have small, intimate dinners. It saves
us on spending money going out. We're blessed with a
lot of wine from our various wine events, so we
have people over for dinner and do home cooked meals.
I who never cooked in my life when I lived
in New York, I'm a champion of home cook meals
and dinner parties now small. We keep it small and simple,
but it's a great way to gather friends you haven't
(10:40):
seen in a while. Everyone will tell you, including me,
practice setting self care is essential this time of the year.
This means uh, trying not to overindulge. Yeah, have a
bite of this in that, but you don't have to
have the whole piece of pie or cake. For some reason,
sugar right now is making me go berserk. I've had
(11:01):
to cut back. It gives me a raging headache. So
I'm eating less but enjoying everything. I never pass on
anything unless I really don't like it. And I never
talk never talk about your weight or how will I
get this weight up? Don't worry about it, just let
it go. If you're healthy, just enjoy the fact you're healthy.
(11:21):
Take more walks, enjoy nature, even if it's cold, bundle
up and enjoy it. Go to the library. If you
don't have a library card, get a library card. It's
the best thing ever. I go to the library, I
pick up books. I curl up and read I've gotten.
When the weather cools down, even here in New Orleans
it's cooler, I drink tea or Tissan's and I curl
(11:42):
up with the book and it just feels so relaxing.
Or I sketch here, I write. I have my diary
in front of me right now, my journal. I'm not
going to hold it up because it's hard. Well a
little bit that I keep a journal and I write.
And I actually rote my guidelines for self care and
keeping your cool during the mule, not only for myself,
(12:02):
for you. So the first was practice self care, take walks,
Stretch when you get up in the morning. Stretch your
body because it's probably tight in the cold and sleeping.
Stop if you're still working, stop, set a timer to
stop at a certain time and let it go. It's
(12:24):
okay to work less. I know some people have to
work harder, maybe they have multiple jobs. Just create a time,
a carve out of time that's your time and you're
not working or scrolling, Just your time and give yourself
a daily treat, a reward or anything. It could be
(12:45):
as simple as slathering yourself with a luxurious mortuarizer that's
probably sitting on the back of your shelf. As I said,
crilling up with the library book or a book and
t if you like to cook, make a recipe. I
just like to take walks, and I love to read
(13:05):
interesting books or articles where I can lose myself and
it I'm a journalist at heart. I love to read
wonderful writing. Maybe listen to an audiobook or a podcast,
whatever it does to feel good. Maybe you just want
to go get a great manny petty or go to
the local store and have a makeover. That's another thing
(13:27):
to do to treat yourself. Just do something every day
to make yourself feel great. If you're not working and
you're retired or choosing not to work, volunteer. A lot
of nonprofits and charities right now have had massive budget
cuts and could use your amazing personality and talents and
(13:50):
knowledge to help them. Whether it's an animal shelter where
you can help them take care of animals. Maybe it's
your local ballet where they need people to help sell
you know this Christmas horn a butt string intermission. Maybe
it's a holiday party or a big fundraiser, or that
(14:13):
you can't write that big check, but maybe you can
help sign people in or be at the membership booth.
There's lots of ways that people can use you as
a wonderful volunteer where you could be a part of
the festivities without having to pay write a check. So
think about that. Another thing we've started do is a
taken nap. My mother in law, my late mother in
(14:34):
law used to take thirteen minute naps thirteen and then
she increased to twenty when she got like up in
her nineties. She died at ninety two. Take the lap
or just lie down with your eyes shut, no sound
or maybe music and just sit and be quiet because
we're always going, going, going. You know, the holidays are
like we got to go, you know, get the house clean,
(14:57):
we got to decorate, We've got to go to parties,
have to buy gifts. David and I stopped giving each
other gifts many many years ago. We share experiences. For me,
that's a gift. I do spend money on travel. It's
my passion. It's our birthdays. December twenty seventh is David's
mine's January first, So I know, if I can give
(15:20):
ourselves something special to bring in a new year for
us age wise, as well as you know annually a
new year, I do it. It doesn't always have to
be extravagant. Last year, we drove to Jacksonville to be
with his family and his mother's last Christmas, and we
ended up driving back to New Orleans and just having
a fun time here. We're doing a little bit more
(15:41):
this year, going on a bucket list trip to Portugal,
because I want to do something different, and that brings
me to do something different. Just do something out of
the ordinary, even if you don't like it, tried it,
but it'll lift your spirits to say I did it.
(16:03):
Nurture your senses. So nurture your body by exercising, stretching,
adding that extra moisturizer if it's dry out, just something,
you know, put oil in your hair.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
You know.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Sometimes when David's not riding his bicycle, I'll put oil
in my hair. I'll put a face mask on all
the things he can't stand watching me do. I do him.
When he's gone, I'll get my red light, jeve out.
I do all that because it feels good and he's
not around, So that's what I do. And when he's back,
I'm blowing. I'm like, Hi, how was your bike ride?
(16:36):
He's like, what have you been doing? I'm like nothing,
just taking care of me. So that's what I do.
If you live alone, lucky you. You can do all
those things whenever you want and there's no one there
to go. What are you doing? Nurture your senses. I
love listening to music. We have a station here that
actually you can listen anywhere called WWOZ. It's a New
(16:58):
Orleans space jazz. I listened to that and I just
get lost in the music. However, the other night we
went to a really fun event called Celebration of the
Oaks and City Park is one of the great things
I love to do and I moves to do with
my mom and dad as the little girls, we'd go
out and see all the holiday lights, whether it was
the hotel mobbies, or the store windows, or the parks
(17:22):
or just people's houses. We would always have a tradition
of driving around look at holiday lights. And I remember
when we moved back in with my mom and she'd
been isolated because of COVID. We wrapped her up and
took her out to go see holiday lights and she
was like a kid again. She was so excited and
it brings out your inner kids. So we did that
(17:43):
the other night at Celebration of the Oaks, which in
New Orleans is this big lit up a fair in
city Park, and we drove around and listened to just
holiday music and it was so much fun. And I
started doing that. The other night. I was feeling a
little strung out and I just listened to holiday music
on our TV. I put it on and just watch
(18:04):
it was great. David's like, what are you doing? And
I'm just enjoying holiday music. During the time of the year.
David looks to watch Goofy Hallmark movie Christmas movies. I
indulge him and let him do it. It's the same theme.
You know. Girl lives in New York, goes back home
to take care of family, say the family business, whatever.
She thinks she's going to go back to New York
or big city to get a big promotion. But meet
(18:26):
the old friend who now is the fireman, policeman, postman,
may or whatever. She comes back, falls in love and
says to give it all, the move the home. That's
the story. I think I live that story myself, but
I could write another story like it. But we watched that,
and I've been watching old movies like Greece. I love
(18:48):
John de Volton, Olivia Newton, John, I have my favorite
holiday movies. You probably do too, Minus Love Actually and
Four Christmases. My twos are my favorites. I also love
Auntie May because I love the song we need a
little Christmas and of course it's a wonderful life. So
watch those holiday movies. Go watch go out, look at
the holiday lights, bumble up and go to the beautiful
(19:12):
hotel lobbies if like, we have them here in New Orleans,
and we're going to do that tonight. Look at the
look at the Holiday Lights. That's free tonight, We're going
to you know, check the local churches and synagogues and
see if they have free holiday concerts. We're doing that tonight.
We're going to Saint Louis Cathedral to see a free
holiday concert. Free. You don't have to spend anything to
(19:32):
find holiday joy, and you don't have to do much
to find your inner joy. You just have to pull
it out and let it rip and go for it.
Don't worry about what other people think. Because one of
the big issues the spear is missing out. You go
on social media and you see all these people all
glammed up and going to big parties, and does seem
like everybody's out at a holiday party and you're missing out?
(19:55):
Well maybe you are. I don't know. Sometimes I feel
like I'm not invited or there's no room for me.
But then I get over it because you can create
your own holiday event and party yourself and stop worrying
about it, you know, get just a matter of picking
up the phone or setting out some texts, say hey,
let's get together for some holiday cheer. However, you don't
(20:16):
have to cram it all in in December. One of
my biggest pet peees living in New York is I'd
have so many We had a lot of friends up
in New York because we've lived there a long time.
But people be like, we have to get together, I
have to see you before the end of the year.
And once I said, so many people said that to me,
I said, why do you have to see me now?
We could have seen each other in June. Why does
(20:38):
it have to be the end of the year where
you see people so often? If I sense it, somebody's
feeling a little holiday pressure or they just can't get together,
I'll see you in the new year. Let's plan something
when it's quieter for all of us. It shouldn't just
be all crammed into December or the last two weeks
of the year, spread out all about joy. You don't
(21:00):
have to do it at the end of the year.
And if you really do fill alone, meet up. Go
to meet up and find something you're interested in. Maybe
you want to learn how to water color. Maybe you
want to learn how to make a wreath, maybe you
want to make gingerbread houses. There is a Facebook group
or a meetup group that will do it. You can
just look it up and you'll find local people, local organizations,
(21:21):
and groups with similar interests, and you can go learn
to do something. I've always wanted to learn refine my
skills at collage artists, so I put that on my
I want to learn about collage and watercolor and try
it myself. I have a friend who makes gingerbread houses.
She asks invited to be able to make a gingerbread
house with her. I've never done that. I think I'm
(21:42):
going to do that. So joy doesn't have to be expensive.
Financial stress, gosh, I have suffered financial stress over the years,
over the holidays, every day you name it to the
one day I made a New Year's goal that I
would not have debt. It's all I wanted was to
(22:04):
be debt free, and I made that goal that I achieved.
It wasn't easy. But if you can find a way
to address the holiday stress by making a budget, putting
money away, not going on social media and looking at
special offers, try to stop yourself from buying and trying
(22:27):
or trying and buying. Make sure you're not signing up
for auto or newles, attend free events. It's okay to
try free products and offers, but watch it you're not
getting roped into an auto renew or a membership. Free
concerts are the best looking at decorations the best. You
(22:48):
don't need to spend a lot of money on gifts.
Really give your time. If you really are really financially strepped,
get a Christmas card and write a note in it
and say, I will give you my time. If you
need help with a project, or you need you need
someone to drive you somewhere are your kids, I will
volunteer and gift you my time. That happened to me recently.
(23:13):
I had some surgery and friends gifted their time to
drive me to and from the hospital because my husband
doesn't drive. I just it was a gift to me.
And if I can do something like that and gift
my time back to you or a friend, I will
do that. If you must buy, if you feel like
you need to buy stuff, and you know, we always
(23:35):
have what we call that it's in the closet, let
me go get it. Holiday gift for people. Gift cards
are great. Everybody can use a gift card, you know,
and local stores have local gift cards. I mean, you know,
it's always nice to support local. Find a couple of
local stores and have some stuff ready, or bake some
breads or cakes and have ready. Some of my favorite
(23:57):
gift cards are you know, basic like credit card gift cards. Target.
If somebody's in the fixing up their home, a home depot,
it could be a Starbucks gift car whatever. If they
you know, if you know somebody loves something, give them
a little bit of gift card. In this it have
to be a lot of money, just a little thought
that counts. Another thing that's nice is I support local museums.
(24:22):
They have great gift shops, or even better, give someone
a membership. Some of the memberships are not that expensive,
and maybe somebody would love to be a member of
the local park or the local museum or something like
that and they hadn't thought about it. That's a great
gift a membership or support by shopping at their online
(24:42):
stores I said before, or go to a local farm
market or a holiday market and pick up just small
things that you can have a Christmas ornament or a
Honka gift, something small. The other the thing I recommend
is wearing bright colors like I'm wearing. Get out of
(25:05):
your black and brown or if you just have to
wear black and brown if you live in New York,
like I did embellish get something sparkly to wear on
your head. They do this in New Orleans all the time.
I take. I have all these vintage pieces of jewelry
that I got from my mother in law and my mother,
and I sometimes put them on my shoes if they're
(25:27):
clip earrings, or on my sweaters with their pins, just
bling it up. It's kind of fun to do. Make
homemade cards. Another thing I like to do is when
I have cards that are sent to me and I
love the cards, but maybe I don't want to keep
the card. If it's a beautiful card, I'll cut the
cart up and keep that front and put it in
a little frame and give it to someone. I have
(25:48):
so many beautiful cards with glitter and bling that are beautiful,
and I'll put a little note on the back of
that front of the card I've already taken off the
other back, and I'll put in a frame for someone.
It's so much fun. I think that's a great thing
to do. Games, believe or not, people love games, whether
it's and you can go to a state sales or
(26:10):
consignment stores or secondhand stores and find perfectly good things.
My husband found a you've had an air frer perfectly
good air fryer and a local goodwill and now he's
air frying to death and it's perfectly fine. You know.
Repurpose gifts are great. You're taking something someone no longer needs,
your wants, and you're giving it to someone else who
could use or to appreciate it. I'm all for that.
(26:33):
If you can't afford to travel, you know there's a
lot of God travel Tuesday good. You know everything points
to travel. Maybe you can't, maybe this isn't the year,
but become a tourist in your own hometown. Again. Local
libraries do more than lend books. They absolutely can check
out crafts. You can check out movies, you can do
(26:53):
go to free lectures, museums the same thing. You can.
Sometimes local tourism offices offer tourist passes at discounts to
people visiting your town. Be a tourist in your own
city and take advantage. Check out what your local groupon
has locally you can get great discounts. There are so
(27:18):
many ways to enjoy where you live and be a
tourist in your own town. I've done it many times
that you can turn a staycation into excuse me, something
amazing I've done it many, many times. Here's something interesting.
Host a gift swap. Maybe maybe like many people I
(27:39):
know are like I have too much stuff or my
mother and parents left me house with too much stuff.
This is a great time to create a gift swap
or I call it a shwag sail. You can say,
bring something that you no longer spark joy for you,
but you'd like to gift and just swap out and
do it with coffee. And people can also bring you
(28:00):
know you know, it could be a covered dish and
have a gift swap. That's a lot of fun. It's
a whole lot of fun. Try not to overconsume alcohol
or food. If you find yourself doing it, don't buy
anything that's tempting. Stay away from it. Try to have
(28:25):
a mocktail or pot of tea ready, something that can
hydrate you that is not alcohol. I mean, I love wine,
but I drink a lot of water and tea to
offset alcohol. And I know when to stop. Know when
your stop is ready, and when it's ready to say
I'm done. Don't feel any pressure to keep going. If
you know a friend who is going through rough time,
(28:47):
please reach out and take that personal lunch at their
long distance Maybe that's the person you send a little
I'm thinking of you card or gift. I have a
few friends like that, and I'm shopping around for special
little ornaments for their treat. They lost their dogs, so
I'm looking for dogs things to make them feel better,
or send them pictures to create a picture collage of
(29:07):
you and your friend together. That's always so much fun.
It's okay to decline invitations. You don't have to say
yes to everything, particularly when the yes involves writing a
check to attend. You know, come to this holiday lunch.
It's one hundred and fifty dollars. Come to this. It's
okay to say I'd love to, but I have other plans,
(29:29):
even if your other plans are curling up and reading
a book or watching a Christmas movie or doing nothing.
If you're not comfortable going, or you feel it's going
to stress you out because you are writing a check
to writing a check to have that joy, then don't
do it. Nobody's holding a gun new your head, saying,
and I hate that phrase. Nobody's forcing you to go
(29:51):
out and do things, and you shouldn't feel like you
have to do them because you're missing out. Do it
because you want to do Say yes to people who
may not be around or available. If they're coming, if
you have friends in town, try to see them. You
don't know when you're gonna see them again. Try to
(30:14):
say yes to things that are going to be fun,
or maybe you haven't seen these people in a long time,
or maybe it's a new experience. I always hated the fact,
and I do have my regrets, and one was that
I would was too busy working to see people or
visit them. You know, they send me invitations to come
(30:34):
visit and I'm like, no, I can't fit it in. Well,
now I have a lot of time and I'd love
to have fit in the invitations. Maybe different, but I
do try to accept invitations to things where I feel
I could meet new people, have a great experience, be
a part of something. I don't have to be the
life of the party, but i'd have to. I'd like
to have the party to have life for me. Create
(30:58):
your own holiday ritual for David and I. This year,
that's kind of a new thing because, as I said
at the beginning of the show, we've been focusing on
spending last Christmases with our mothers for a long time,
so we didn't have a holiday ritual other than waiting
for Christmas to be over to be together a Yet
(31:20):
this year we're actually going to go out for Christmas
Eve lunch. It's just us. We don't have other family.
Now that's the downside of the last Christmas as you
have last family. But we're going to create our own rituals.
We're going to have our little holiday lunch and then
we're going to have Christmas Eve at home. But then
actually on Christmas Day, which is for us a quiet time,
(31:42):
we're actually flying because David's birthday is the twenty seventh,
and I always like to land on the twenty six
where we are so that he is a great birthday.
That's our current holiday ritual, besides just going out and
joining the local beauty that we live in and going
to watch the going to watch all the decorations, which
(32:03):
I just get excited like a kid about. So slow down,
slow down, celebrate, but celebrate at your pace. It's not
a race. It's not about who has the biggest and
brightest holiday. It is giving the biggest and brightest gift.
If that is stressing you out, stops scrolling don't watch
(32:25):
TV shows that are encouraging. You just shop. I don't
know about you, but I'm tempted to buy everything. I
saw something today on CBS Morning and I was like,
I really want that Dentis Baso recharger at forty nine dollars.
But do I really need a Dentis Baso charger at
forty nine dollars? No? Do I really need half the
stuff I bought and have returned over the past week
(32:47):
because of special offers. No. And I've spent a lot
of time returning stuff. So I'm trying to get off
the computer other than to read and do my work
and post and write. I keep a journal, as you
can see. I write everything in it, including all my
notes that I'm talking to about now. I find it
very centering. Maybe you're an illustrator and you want to illustrate.
(33:08):
Find something that stirs your creativity and your thoughts that
you could put on paper and print something. I think
it'll be good to clear your head. As for family,
which is a big stressor, as I said, the top
stressors are finance, greace, feeling lonely. I've touched all those
(33:29):
in family. I have this to say, Family, tensions are tight.
David and I visited different people for Thanksgiving, and we
chose to let families be together because let them work
out their topics and we don't need to be the
extra people there who are not part of the family. However,
(33:52):
as my own family becomes fewer and far between, I've
learned too. My late mother would say friends of the
family choose to hold close. So I've learned that even
though I no longer have parents and siblings I've never had,
and my family is few and far between, and David
has family, but Nope, really it's us. I've learned to
(34:16):
cherish the people that I hold close, including my friends
and who I consider family. And I've cherished that so
I don't have family issues other than I don't have
much family, but I've sold that by creating friends who
are like family for me. So don't let family touch nerves.
(34:37):
Enjoy them while you have them because they won't be
there forever. And then choose your friends who you consider
family and cherish them and hold them close, and hopefully
they'll be with you for a long haul. That's what
I hope. Anyway, I'm going to be taking some downtime
over the holiday to focus on some of my rituals
(34:59):
that I just talk about and do some traveling. So
I want to wish everyone who is following me a fearless,
fabulous holiday. I hope that it is calm and centering,
and that you find the joy you want and you
(35:20):
keep away of the tension stress you don't need, and
you maybe follow some of the tips I've provided, and
if you need to reach out and talk to someone,
do it, and above all, keep your cool during the mule.
It's just a couple of weeks out of an entire year.
(35:42):
And then remember that the holidays mainly come once a year,
but you can make a holiday any day you want.
You don't need to set dates to celebrate. You can
celebrate every day your way, and as always like to say,
make sure that whatever you choose is on your terms
(36:03):
and not on the terms and criteria that other people
set for you. Do it your way, and always choose
fearless and fabulous happy holidays. Thank you,
The topics and opinions expressed on the following show are
solely those of the hosts and their guests, and not
those of W four WN Radio It's employees or affiliates.
We make no recommendations or endorsements for radio show programs, services,
or products mentioned on air or on our web. No liability,
explicit or implied shall be extended to W four WN
Radio It's employees or affiliates. Any questions or comment should
(00:20):
be directed to those show hosts.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Thank you for choosing W four WN Radio.
Speaker 3 (00:42):
Hello and welcome to Fearless Fabulous Shoe. I am your host,
Melanie Young, and we are in the last month of
twenty twenty five, December twenty twenty five, so we're now
we just cleared Thanksgiving. I hope everybody had great Thanksgiving
and we are now heading into that interesting time of
(01:05):
the year because it's the happiest time of the year
and the most beautiful child of the year, the jolliest
time of the year, and the magical time of the year,
and everybody's sparkling and shining and glittering, and everybody's feeling gay.
Right then, not really, I was reading about the holidays
because not everybody feels that holly jolly time. In fact,
(01:28):
this is kind of creepy, scary. I just read that
almost forty nine percent of over forty percent of Americans
say they're feeling more stressed in twenty twenty five over
the holiday season than last year twenty twenty four, which
was like maybe high twenty percent, twenty eight percent in
(01:49):
the twenty almost double, so almost double. If Americans are
feeling more stressed this year, that's kind of scary. But
there are reasons for that, and they're fairly and you
may have felt them. I know I have, so I'm
sharing because I care. The key holiday stressor is one
is grief. Forty eight percent of people say grief is
(02:11):
a holiday stressor because maybe you have lost a loved
one or maybe you were like I did in twenty
twenty two. I was caregiving my dying mother over the
holidays and grim. It was a grim, not a fairy tale,
it was a grim reality. My mother died on December
(02:32):
twenty second, twenty twenty two. So my Christmas holiday just sucked.
That's all I'm going to say. I had to pick
out her coffin on Christmas Eve and plan for a
December twenty seventh funeral because we had to clear the holidays,
and so my husband, Dave and I probably had one
of the saddest Christmases ever last year. You know, it
(02:55):
seems like, and I don't want this to be a
DeBie downer because just so you know, I'm going to
talk about how to turn it around, but I'm setting
it up. It seemed like for many, many years, David,
my husband, and I spent a lot of last Christmases
celebrating what's the last Christmas. Maybe you're feeling it, well,
you got to go home to see mom or dad
or grandma could be their last Christmas. God knows. We
(03:19):
spent so many Christmases apart. David would go see his
mom in Florida so she wouldn't be alone. I would
see my mom, who both widows in Tennessee. So David
and I actually never shared a lot of Christmases together
because we were busy spending what could be the last Christmas,
or you know, want to brighten up our mother's Christmases.
So there was a Florida Tennessee thing, and then we'd
(03:42):
like meet afterwards to go celebrate New Year's and our birthdays. Together.
Last Christmas was my mother in law's last Christmas. David
and I were living in New Orleans, and we canceled
plans to do a big trip for New Years. We
stayed local. We drove to Jacksonville to spend what we
(04:04):
thought might be the last Christmas with his mother, Sally.
She fell the next day. It was hospitalized for two weeks,
and it was her last Christmas. She died of September
of this year. We're both glad that we made the
decision to spend our last Christmas. But I said to David,
this year, this is our first Christmas where we're not
having a last Christmas. This is actually the first Christmas
(04:27):
where we are untethered and free to just create our
own Christmas traditions in our new adopted home of New Orleans.
So we should be feeling gay. But you know, last
night started what I call the holiday holiday stress period
because I think about my family. I think about all
the loved ones we've lost over the holidays, many of
(04:49):
whom we lost over the holidays. Literally, I think about
the pressure to go out and spend money. I think
about all that, and then I said self, you don't
have to do it. Anything. You can create your holiday
spirit with the spirit you have and enjoy it the
way you want. You don't have to follow anyone's rule
(05:14):
book on how to enjoy the holidays. And that's what
I want to tell you. How to keep your cool
during the Yule and define your own holiday spirit, your way,
and how to take care of yourself so that you
are cool, calm and collected, because we want you to
(05:36):
have a cool mule. And I'm saying this as I
talk to you, I think of some of my friends.
I have two friends who just lost their beloved dogs,
and I know they're sad. So the first thing I
do around this time of the year is I don't
think inward and stare at my navel and what was
(05:57):
my year like? I stopped doing that. I used to
reflect all the time. What was my year like? Was
it good? Was it bad? What can I do better?
How can I make things better for myself? And the
first thing I did is I tossed all that away
because I'm no longer here to achieve and slay the world.
And whatnot I achieved? It's great. Life is good. I'm
here to just enjoy life and bring joy to my
(06:20):
friends who may be feeling less joy this year. So
the first thing I do is I pick up the
phone and I call a friend. Dave, and I love
to just pick up the phone and call a friend
and have a conversation with someone we haven't talked to
a while, because nothing beats that more than scrolling and
posting and whatnot. We used to send out Christmas cards.
(06:43):
I love doing that, but we are not doing that
now because postage is expensive and I just spent. My
mother would send out cards every year, and we'd have
a tradition of I drive her to the post office
and she pick out her little Christmas stamp and my
job was to put the stamps and help her fill
out the cards. And in the last couple of years,
when she could no longer write because she was crippling,
(07:05):
Arthur writ Is, I helped her do her cards and
post them and it was great. But when she died,
there were hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of Christmas cards,
so many that I had to sell them or throw
them out. And I hate waste. So I have a
little aversion now to buying Christmas cards because I was
swallowing and drowning in them when we were clearly at
her house. So what I do instead is I call
(07:27):
people and say, I want to tell you that I'm
thinking about you and how much I enjoy you or
miss you, or whatever I can say positive. If I
know they're grieving or they're having a different time, I'll
maybe send them a little gift or maybe they'll get
the card with a little personal note. But I keep
it simple, Keep it simple. I also believe that this
(07:50):
is a great time to find your inner child again
and do goofy things. You don't have to do expensive things.
I don't know about you, but I can't afford to
write checks to lots of charities. But I can afford
to post about these charities or maybe spotlight them on
this podcast or shine a light on them so that
(08:11):
maybe people who have more money than me can write
the check. So I do that. I try to spotlight
wonderful giving organizations and carrying organizations that I support spiritually
but I can't support financially. So maybe I share there,
or I look at their online stores and see if
there's any gifts I can give that will give back
to them. Like one of my favorites, and she's been
(08:33):
a guest on the show is Thistle Farms. It's based
out in Nashville. The founder suffered child abuse and sexual
abuse as a child, and now she helps helps women
who are suffering from human trafficking or abuse. She provides
a safe haven for them. It's called Thistle Farms. She
(08:53):
puts she teaches skills to these women, helps rehabilitate them,
and they have a beautiful online shops. One example. There
are many more. Let's say that you love the theater,
you love the opera, you love the ballet, or your
local zoo or a nonprofit. See if they have an
online site or they're spelling selling a special Christmas ornament
(09:16):
or gift package and buy there. Then you're supporting them
in some way. That's really important to stop thinking about
how wrong you feel, feel how right it is, to
think about others that will. That's the best gift you
can give yourself. Well, one of the two is to
(09:37):
give thoughtfully. It doesn't have to be expensive, just something
simple to make someone else feel better. I had a
friend she passed I think last year, Natalie dupri She's
been a guest on I think both all my shows,
and she created something called the pork chop theory. Of cooking.
But this pork chop theory is bigger than cooking. The
(09:58):
concept is you put to one part in a pan,
it cooks okay. If you put two pork chops in
the pan, the fat supports each other and they cook better.
So share the fat. In other words, you're better together
than a part. So connect with people, have people over
for coffee, or meet them for coffee or David and
(10:19):
I love just to have small, intimate dinners. It saves
us on spending money going out. We're blessed with a
lot of wine from our various wine events, so we
have people over for dinner and do home cooked meals.
I who never cooked in my life when I lived
in New York, I'm a champion of home cook meals
and dinner parties now small. We keep it small and simple,
but it's a great way to gather friends you haven't
(10:40):
seen in a while. Everyone will tell you, including me,
practice setting self care is essential this time of the year.
This means uh, trying not to overindulge. Yeah, have a
bite of this in that, but you don't have to
have the whole piece of pie or cake. For some reason,
sugar right now is making me go berserk. I've had
(11:01):
to cut back. It gives me a raging headache. So
I'm eating less but enjoying everything. I never pass on
anything unless I really don't like it. And I never
talk never talk about your weight or how will I
get this weight up? Don't worry about it, just let
it go. If you're healthy, just enjoy the fact you're healthy.
(11:21):
Take more walks, enjoy nature, even if it's cold, bundle
up and enjoy it. Go to the library. If you
don't have a library card, get a library card. It's
the best thing ever. I go to the library, I
pick up books. I curl up and read I've gotten.
When the weather cools down, even here in New Orleans
it's cooler, I drink tea or Tissan's and I curl
(11:42):
up with the book and it just feels so relaxing.
Or I sketch here, I write. I have my diary
in front of me right now, my journal. I'm not
going to hold it up because it's hard. Well a
little bit that I keep a journal and I write.
And I actually rote my guidelines for self care and
keeping your cool during the mule, not only for myself,
(12:02):
for you. So the first was practice self care, take walks,
Stretch when you get up in the morning. Stretch your
body because it's probably tight in the cold and sleeping.
Stop if you're still working, stop, set a timer to
stop at a certain time and let it go. It's
(12:24):
okay to work less. I know some people have to
work harder, maybe they have multiple jobs. Just create a time,
a carve out of time that's your time and you're
not working or scrolling, Just your time and give yourself
a daily treat, a reward or anything. It could be
(12:45):
as simple as slathering yourself with a luxurious mortuarizer that's
probably sitting on the back of your shelf. As I said,
crilling up with the library book or a book and
t if you like to cook, make a recipe. I
just like to take walks, and I love to read
(13:05):
interesting books or articles where I can lose myself and
it I'm a journalist at heart. I love to read
wonderful writing. Maybe listen to an audiobook or a podcast,
whatever it does to feel good. Maybe you just want
to go get a great manny petty or go to
the local store and have a makeover. That's another thing
(13:27):
to do to treat yourself. Just do something every day
to make yourself feel great. If you're not working and
you're retired or choosing not to work, volunteer. A lot
of nonprofits and charities right now have had massive budget
cuts and could use your amazing personality and talents and
(13:50):
knowledge to help them. Whether it's an animal shelter where
you can help them take care of animals. Maybe it's
your local ballet where they need people to help sell
you know this Christmas horn a butt string intermission. Maybe
it's a holiday party or a big fundraiser, or that
(14:13):
you can't write that big check, but maybe you can
help sign people in or be at the membership booth.
There's lots of ways that people can use you as
a wonderful volunteer where you could be a part of
the festivities without having to pay write a check. So
think about that. Another thing we've started do is a
taken nap. My mother in law, my late mother in
(14:34):
law used to take thirteen minute naps thirteen and then
she increased to twenty when she got like up in
her nineties. She died at ninety two. Take the lap
or just lie down with your eyes shut, no sound
or maybe music and just sit and be quiet because
we're always going, going, going. You know, the holidays are
like we got to go, you know, get the house clean,
(14:57):
we got to decorate, We've got to go to parties,
have to buy gifts. David and I stopped giving each
other gifts many many years ago. We share experiences. For me,
that's a gift. I do spend money on travel. It's
my passion. It's our birthdays. December twenty seventh is David's
mine's January first, So I know, if I can give
(15:20):
ourselves something special to bring in a new year for
us age wise, as well as you know annually a
new year, I do it. It doesn't always have to
be extravagant. Last year, we drove to Jacksonville to be
with his family and his mother's last Christmas, and we
ended up driving back to New Orleans and just having
a fun time here. We're doing a little bit more
(15:41):
this year, going on a bucket list trip to Portugal,
because I want to do something different, and that brings
me to do something different. Just do something out of
the ordinary, even if you don't like it, tried it,
but it'll lift your spirits to say I did it.
(16:03):
Nurture your senses. So nurture your body by exercising, stretching,
adding that extra moisturizer if it's dry out, just something,
you know, put oil in your hair.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
You know.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Sometimes when David's not riding his bicycle, I'll put oil
in my hair. I'll put a face mask on all
the things he can't stand watching me do. I do him.
When he's gone, I'll get my red light, jeve out.
I do all that because it feels good and he's
not around, So that's what I do. And when he's back,
I'm blowing. I'm like, Hi, how was your bike ride?
(16:36):
He's like, what have you been doing? I'm like nothing,
just taking care of me. So that's what I do.
If you live alone, lucky you. You can do all
those things whenever you want and there's no one there
to go. What are you doing? Nurture your senses. I
love listening to music. We have a station here that
actually you can listen anywhere called WWOZ. It's a New
(16:58):
Orleans space jazz. I listened to that and I just
get lost in the music. However, the other night we
went to a really fun event called Celebration of the
Oaks and City Park is one of the great things
I love to do and I moves to do with
my mom and dad as the little girls, we'd go
out and see all the holiday lights, whether it was
the hotel mobbies, or the store windows, or the parks
(17:22):
or just people's houses. We would always have a tradition
of driving around look at holiday lights. And I remember
when we moved back in with my mom and she'd
been isolated because of COVID. We wrapped her up and
took her out to go see holiday lights and she
was like a kid again. She was so excited and
it brings out your inner kids. So we did that
(17:43):
the other night at Celebration of the Oaks, which in
New Orleans is this big lit up a fair in
city Park, and we drove around and listened to just
holiday music and it was so much fun. And I
started doing that. The other night. I was feeling a
little strung out and I just listened to holiday music
on our TV. I put it on and just watch
(18:04):
it was great. David's like, what are you doing? And
I'm just enjoying holiday music. During the time of the year.
David looks to watch Goofy Hallmark movie Christmas movies. I
indulge him and let him do it. It's the same theme.
You know. Girl lives in New York, goes back home
to take care of family, say the family business, whatever.
She thinks she's going to go back to New York
or big city to get a big promotion. But meet
(18:26):
the old friend who now is the fireman, policeman, postman,
may or whatever. She comes back, falls in love and
says to give it all, the move the home. That's
the story. I think I live that story myself, but
I could write another story like it. But we watched that,
and I've been watching old movies like Greece. I love
(18:48):
John de Volton, Olivia Newton, John, I have my favorite
holiday movies. You probably do too, Minus Love Actually and
Four Christmases. My twos are my favorites. I also love
Auntie May because I love the song we need a
little Christmas and of course it's a wonderful life. So
watch those holiday movies. Go watch go out, look at
the holiday lights, bumble up and go to the beautiful
(19:12):
hotel lobbies if like, we have them here in New Orleans,
and we're going to do that tonight. Look at the
look at the Holiday Lights. That's free tonight, We're going
to you know, check the local churches and synagogues and
see if they have free holiday concerts. We're doing that tonight.
We're going to Saint Louis Cathedral to see a free
holiday concert. Free. You don't have to spend anything to
(19:32):
find holiday joy, and you don't have to do much
to find your inner joy. You just have to pull
it out and let it rip and go for it.
Don't worry about what other people think. Because one of
the big issues the spear is missing out. You go
on social media and you see all these people all
glammed up and going to big parties, and does seem
like everybody's out at a holiday party and you're missing out?
(19:55):
Well maybe you are. I don't know. Sometimes I feel
like I'm not invited or there's no room for me.
But then I get over it because you can create
your own holiday event and party yourself and stop worrying
about it, you know, get just a matter of picking
up the phone or setting out some texts, say hey,
let's get together for some holiday cheer. However, you don't
(20:16):
have to cram it all in in December. One of
my biggest pet peees living in New York is I'd
have so many We had a lot of friends up
in New York because we've lived there a long time.
But people be like, we have to get together, I
have to see you before the end of the year.
And once I said, so many people said that to me,
I said, why do you have to see me now?
We could have seen each other in June. Why does
(20:38):
it have to be the end of the year where
you see people so often? If I sense it, somebody's
feeling a little holiday pressure or they just can't get together,
I'll see you in the new year. Let's plan something
when it's quieter for all of us. It shouldn't just
be all crammed into December or the last two weeks
of the year, spread out all about joy. You don't
(21:00):
have to do it at the end of the year.
And if you really do fill alone, meet up. Go
to meet up and find something you're interested in. Maybe
you want to learn how to water color. Maybe you
want to learn how to make a wreath, maybe you
want to make gingerbread houses. There is a Facebook group
or a meetup group that will do it. You can
just look it up and you'll find local people, local organizations,
(21:21):
and groups with similar interests, and you can go learn
to do something. I've always wanted to learn refine my
skills at collage artists, so I put that on my
I want to learn about collage and watercolor and try
it myself. I have a friend who makes gingerbread houses.
She asks invited to be able to make a gingerbread
house with her. I've never done that. I think I'm
(21:42):
going to do that. So joy doesn't have to be expensive.
Financial stress, gosh, I have suffered financial stress over the years,
over the holidays, every day you name it to the
one day I made a New Year's goal that I
would not have debt. It's all I wanted was to
(22:04):
be debt free, and I made that goal that I achieved.
It wasn't easy. But if you can find a way
to address the holiday stress by making a budget, putting
money away, not going on social media and looking at
special offers, try to stop yourself from buying and trying
(22:27):
or trying and buying. Make sure you're not signing up
for auto or newles, attend free events. It's okay to
try free products and offers, but watch it you're not
getting roped into an auto renew or a membership. Free
concerts are the best looking at decorations the best. You
(22:48):
don't need to spend a lot of money on gifts.
Really give your time. If you really are really financially strepped,
get a Christmas card and write a note in it
and say, I will give you my time. If you
need help with a project, or you need you need
someone to drive you somewhere are your kids, I will
volunteer and gift you my time. That happened to me recently.
(23:13):
I had some surgery and friends gifted their time to
drive me to and from the hospital because my husband
doesn't drive. I just it was a gift to me.
And if I can do something like that and gift
my time back to you or a friend, I will
do that. If you must buy, if you feel like
you need to buy stuff, and you know, we always
(23:35):
have what we call that it's in the closet, let
me go get it. Holiday gift for people. Gift cards
are great. Everybody can use a gift card, you know,
and local stores have local gift cards. I mean, you know,
it's always nice to support local. Find a couple of
local stores and have some stuff ready, or bake some
breads or cakes and have ready. Some of my favorite
(23:57):
gift cards are you know, basic like credit card gift cards. Target.
If somebody's in the fixing up their home, a home depot,
it could be a Starbucks gift car whatever. If they
you know, if you know somebody loves something, give them
a little bit of gift card. In this it have
to be a lot of money, just a little thought
that counts. Another thing that's nice is I support local museums.
(24:22):
They have great gift shops, or even better, give someone
a membership. Some of the memberships are not that expensive,
and maybe somebody would love to be a member of
the local park or the local museum or something like
that and they hadn't thought about it. That's a great
gift a membership or support by shopping at their online
(24:42):
stores I said before, or go to a local farm
market or a holiday market and pick up just small
things that you can have a Christmas ornament or a
Honka gift, something small. The other the thing I recommend
is wearing bright colors like I'm wearing. Get out of
(25:05):
your black and brown or if you just have to
wear black and brown if you live in New York,
like I did embellish get something sparkly to wear on
your head. They do this in New Orleans all the time.
I take. I have all these vintage pieces of jewelry
that I got from my mother in law and my mother,
and I sometimes put them on my shoes if they're
(25:27):
clip earrings, or on my sweaters with their pins, just
bling it up. It's kind of fun to do. Make
homemade cards. Another thing I like to do is when
I have cards that are sent to me and I
love the cards, but maybe I don't want to keep
the card. If it's a beautiful card, I'll cut the
cart up and keep that front and put it in
a little frame and give it to someone. I have
(25:48):
so many beautiful cards with glitter and bling that are beautiful,
and I'll put a little note on the back of
that front of the card I've already taken off the
other back, and I'll put in a frame for someone.
It's so much fun. I think that's a great thing
to do. Games, believe or not, people love games, whether
it's and you can go to a state sales or
(26:10):
consignment stores or secondhand stores and find perfectly good things.
My husband found a you've had an air frer perfectly
good air fryer and a local goodwill and now he's
air frying to death and it's perfectly fine. You know.
Repurpose gifts are great. You're taking something someone no longer needs,
your wants, and you're giving it to someone else who
could use or to appreciate it. I'm all for that.
(26:33):
If you can't afford to travel, you know there's a
lot of God travel Tuesday good. You know everything points
to travel. Maybe you can't, maybe this isn't the year,
but become a tourist in your own hometown. Again. Local
libraries do more than lend books. They absolutely can check
out crafts. You can check out movies, you can do
(26:53):
go to free lectures, museums the same thing. You can.
Sometimes local tourism offices offer tourist passes at discounts to
people visiting your town. Be a tourist in your own
city and take advantage. Check out what your local groupon
has locally you can get great discounts. There are so
(27:18):
many ways to enjoy where you live and be a
tourist in your own town. I've done it many times
that you can turn a staycation into excuse me, something
amazing I've done it many, many times. Here's something interesting.
Host a gift swap. Maybe maybe like many people I
(27:39):
know are like I have too much stuff or my
mother and parents left me house with too much stuff.
This is a great time to create a gift swap
or I call it a shwag sail. You can say,
bring something that you no longer spark joy for you,
but you'd like to gift and just swap out and
do it with coffee. And people can also bring you
(28:00):
know you know, it could be a covered dish and
have a gift swap. That's a lot of fun. It's
a whole lot of fun. Try not to overconsume alcohol
or food. If you find yourself doing it, don't buy
anything that's tempting. Stay away from it. Try to have
(28:25):
a mocktail or pot of tea ready, something that can
hydrate you that is not alcohol. I mean, I love wine,
but I drink a lot of water and tea to
offset alcohol. And I know when to stop. Know when
your stop is ready, and when it's ready to say
I'm done. Don't feel any pressure to keep going. If
you know a friend who is going through rough time,
(28:47):
please reach out and take that personal lunch at their
long distance Maybe that's the person you send a little
I'm thinking of you card or gift. I have a
few friends like that, and I'm shopping around for special
little ornaments for their treat. They lost their dogs, so
I'm looking for dogs things to make them feel better,
or send them pictures to create a picture collage of
(29:07):
you and your friend together. That's always so much fun.
It's okay to decline invitations. You don't have to say
yes to everything, particularly when the yes involves writing a
check to attend. You know, come to this holiday lunch.
It's one hundred and fifty dollars. Come to this. It's
okay to say I'd love to, but I have other plans,
(29:29):
even if your other plans are curling up and reading
a book or watching a Christmas movie or doing nothing.
If you're not comfortable going, or you feel it's going
to stress you out because you are writing a check
to writing a check to have that joy, then don't
do it. Nobody's holding a gun new your head, saying,
and I hate that phrase. Nobody's forcing you to go
(29:51):
out and do things, and you shouldn't feel like you
have to do them because you're missing out. Do it
because you want to do Say yes to people who
may not be around or available. If they're coming, if
you have friends in town, try to see them. You
don't know when you're gonna see them again. Try to
(30:14):
say yes to things that are going to be fun,
or maybe you haven't seen these people in a long time,
or maybe it's a new experience. I always hated the fact,
and I do have my regrets, and one was that
I would was too busy working to see people or
visit them. You know, they send me invitations to come
(30:34):
visit and I'm like, no, I can't fit it in. Well,
now I have a lot of time and I'd love
to have fit in the invitations. Maybe different, but I
do try to accept invitations to things where I feel
I could meet new people, have a great experience, be
a part of something. I don't have to be the
life of the party, but i'd have to. I'd like
to have the party to have life for me. Create
(30:58):
your own holiday ritual for David and I. This year,
that's kind of a new thing because, as I said
at the beginning of the show, we've been focusing on
spending last Christmases with our mothers for a long time,
so we didn't have a holiday ritual other than waiting
for Christmas to be over to be together a Yet
(31:20):
this year we're actually going to go out for Christmas
Eve lunch. It's just us. We don't have other family.
Now that's the downside of the last Christmas as you
have last family. But we're going to create our own rituals.
We're going to have our little holiday lunch and then
we're going to have Christmas Eve at home. But then
actually on Christmas Day, which is for us a quiet time,
(31:42):
we're actually flying because David's birthday is the twenty seventh,
and I always like to land on the twenty six
where we are so that he is a great birthday.
That's our current holiday ritual, besides just going out and
joining the local beauty that we live in and going
to watch the going to watch all the decorations, which
(32:03):
I just get excited like a kid about. So slow down,
slow down, celebrate, but celebrate at your pace. It's not
a race. It's not about who has the biggest and
brightest holiday. It is giving the biggest and brightest gift.
If that is stressing you out, stops scrolling don't watch
(32:25):
TV shows that are encouraging. You just shop. I don't
know about you, but I'm tempted to buy everything. I
saw something today on CBS Morning and I was like,
I really want that Dentis Baso recharger at forty nine dollars.
But do I really need a Dentis Baso charger at
forty nine dollars? No? Do I really need half the
stuff I bought and have returned over the past week
(32:47):
because of special offers. No. And I've spent a lot
of time returning stuff. So I'm trying to get off
the computer other than to read and do my work
and post and write. I keep a journal, as you
can see. I write everything in it, including all my
notes that I'm talking to about now. I find it
very centering. Maybe you're an illustrator and you want to illustrate.
(33:08):
Find something that stirs your creativity and your thoughts that
you could put on paper and print something. I think
it'll be good to clear your head. As for family,
which is a big stressor, as I said, the top
stressors are finance, greace, feeling lonely. I've touched all those
(33:29):
in family. I have this to say, Family, tensions are tight.
David and I visited different people for Thanksgiving, and we
chose to let families be together because let them work
out their topics and we don't need to be the
extra people there who are not part of the family. However,
(33:52):
as my own family becomes fewer and far between, I've
learned too. My late mother would say friends of the
family choose to hold close. So I've learned that even
though I no longer have parents and siblings I've never had,
and my family is few and far between, and David
has family, but Nope, really it's us. I've learned to
(34:16):
cherish the people that I hold close, including my friends
and who I consider family. And I've cherished that so
I don't have family issues other than I don't have
much family, but I've sold that by creating friends who
are like family for me. So don't let family touch nerves.
(34:37):
Enjoy them while you have them because they won't be
there forever. And then choose your friends who you consider
family and cherish them and hold them close, and hopefully
they'll be with you for a long haul. That's what
I hope. Anyway, I'm going to be taking some downtime
over the holiday to focus on some of my rituals
(34:59):
that I just talk about and do some traveling. So
I want to wish everyone who is following me a fearless,
fabulous holiday. I hope that it is calm and centering,
and that you find the joy you want and you
(35:20):
keep away of the tension stress you don't need, and
you maybe follow some of the tips I've provided, and
if you need to reach out and talk to someone,
do it, and above all, keep your cool during the mule.
It's just a couple of weeks out of an entire year.
(35:42):
And then remember that the holidays mainly come once a year,
but you can make a holiday any day you want.
You don't need to set dates to celebrate. You can
celebrate every day your way, and as always like to say,
make sure that whatever you choose is on your terms
(36:03):
and not on the terms and criteria that other people
set for you. Do it your way, and always choose
fearless and fabulous happy holidays. Thank you,
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