Imagine this: The turkey is in the oven, the kids are arguing in the next room, and your family is due to arrive any minute. Your mind is racing through a seemingly endless to-do list. Did you remember to pick up that last-minute gift? Is the house clean enough? Will everyone get along this year? Somewhere between coordinating schedules, preparing meals, buying gifts, and trying to keep everyone happy, the excitement of the holiday season has turned into exhaustion. Anxiety. Stress.
Sound familiar?
The holidays are often described as the most wonderful time of the year, and they can also bring a tremendous amount of pressure. Between family traditions, social obligations, and expectations (both our own and others'), it's easy to get caught up in trying to create the “perfect” holiday. The perfect gifts, the perfect meal, the perfect family gathering. Along the way, the pressure to make everything special can overshadow what actually matters to us and our ability to enjoy it.
Let’s take a closer look at a word that typically fuels this pressure: should.
When our “shoulds” become rigid rules, we can start treating preferences and expectations as obligations. Should statements (“I should host the whole family again this year”) often carry an underlying judgement about how we or others ought to behave, implying that there’s a right and a wrong way to do things. When we get caught in these rigid expectations, we can lose sight of our own needs, values, and limitations. It’s also easy to feel as though we’re falling short, even when we’re doing our best.
Consider the difference between “I should attend every holiday party I’m invited to” and “I want to spend time with my family and friends, and I also need time to rest.” The former frames the decision without much choice, as a requirement, while the latter makes room for both connection and personal needs.
Our expectations are shaped by a combination of our upbringing, past experiences, cultural norms, personal values, and the messages we’ve received about what we’re “supposed” to do. Over time, these expectations can become so ingrained or familiar that we stop questioning them. When expectations start to feel like an obligation, the pressure to meet them can leave us feeling overwhelmed, resentful, guilty, or ashamed when we (perhaps inevitably) fall short.
Just because an expectation is longstanding, or coming from someone else, doesn’t necessarily make it an obligation.
Perhaps you’ve typically hosted the holiday gathering, spent a certain amount on gifts, cooked multiple dishes, or said yes to every invitation. That doesn’t automatically mean you have to continue doing so. As our lives, relationships, and circumstances change, we can give ourselves permission to reconsider what we’re willing and able to take on – especially when we’re feeling overwhelmed, stressed, or burnt out.
We can’t always change the expectations others have of us, though we can reconsider which ones we choose to carry.
That said, how do we navigate these holiday pressures without sacrificing our own needs or relationships?
Question those “shoulds”
Start noticing when you’re (as I like to say jokingly) “shoulding” yourself. Pause and ask yourself: am I choosing this because it aligns with what matters to me, or because I’m afraid of disappointing someone? Recognizing the difference can help you make intentional choices.
Communicate your limits with compassion
Boundaries can be effective without being harsh. You can acknowledge the importance of a tradition or someone else’s wishes while still communicating what you’re able and willing to do.
Make space for disappointment
Communicating your boundaries doesn’t mean that everyone is going to be pleased with your decision. The people around you are absolutely allowed to feel disappointed - as much as you’re allowed to choose something that honors your needs. You can acknowledge their feelings, hear them out, AND remain firm in what you’ve decided. We can care about others’ feelings without taking responsibility for preventing their disappointment.
As we enter into the upcoming season, readjusting expectations is about finding ways to honor what’s important to you and recognizing meaningful holidays don’t require that everything goes according to plan (because, let’s be honest, how often does that end up happening anyway?).
This holiday season, consider giving yourself and others permission to do things differently. Not every invitation needs a yes, not every tradition needs to stay exactly the same, and not every holiday moment needs to be “perfect”. Maybe the meal isn’t homemade, you skip a gathering, a longstanding tradition looks a little different this year, or you let yourself take a bubble bath today and wrap the gifts tomorrow.
The holidays don’t have to be perfect to be fulfilling. Sometimes, letting go of what we believe the holidays “should” look like creates more room for the connection, joy, and rest we’re hoping to experience.
Here’s to a warm, nourishing, and good enough holiday season. 🙂
