Holiday Stress:
How to Relax and Enjoy the Season

The people you love but don't always love to be around appear in droves. Sometimes they are even your houseguests!

And even if they stay somewhere else, you still have to share your personal space with them, cook for them, clean for them, shop for them.

On the one hand, you're glad they're here, and happy to do all the work involved, but on the other hand, you're just one person with only 24 hours in your day, and this stuff is tiring.

And when on top of it, the old familiar family dynamics creep into the picture, and you feel one-upped, criticized, unappreciated -- in short, like you're nine years old again -- well, this is the stuff that holiday stress (and homicides) are made of.

You never feel like you have enough of this. (No one does.) Add to that the crappy economy. And here you are, spending it hand over fist.

Yes, you do it every year, and yes, somehow it always works out, but it can still put your teeth on edge to hear that mental "cha-ching" over and over again and see that adding machine churning out numbers in your brain.

The bottom line is more holiday stress.

Even though the internet means less driving around and dealing with crowds of anxious, surly people, it's still tough to figure out what to get, where to get it, and how to get the best price for it.

And no matter how good your list is, don't you always forget someone or something? Face it, you're still going to have to go out in the cold, compete for a parking space, and search for the elusive whatever-it-is. At least once. Oh, joy.

Everybody wants a piece of you. There are the social obligations -- work parties, get-togethers with family and friends. Then there is the house to clean, the tree to decorate, the shopping to do, the presents to wrap, the cookies to bake, the gigantic meal to create.

Meanwhile, still only 24 hours in your day and seven days in your week. It's holiday stress just waiting to happen. Fantasies of cloning oneself tend to proliferate at this time of year.

The more you can anticipate what's going to happen, the better you will be able to deal with it. Set aside time for everything you need to do, and think about how things are likely to go -- what will traffic be like, how long will it take at the store, how will your mom push your buttons this year?

Make lists. Take notes. Each time you write something down, it's one less thing you have to keep thinking about. Get a little 3"x5" notebook to scribble in and keep it in your pocket or purse.

Yup. Always have a Plan B. I can't emphasize this enough. Have a Plan B. Imagine that for some reason you can't pull off Plan A. Come up with an acceptable substitute plan. Or two.

What if you can't get all five kinds of cookies baked? Two will be o.k., right? Buy a couple of extra generic gifts in case you've forgotten someone.

Think about worst case scenarios and how to get through them. Some of them will probably seem ridiculous (grandma's hair catches on fire!) so make sure to giggle about them inside. You can slip the punch of holiday stress if you see it coming.

Get everyone involved. Give everyone a task. You know that cliché saying, "many hands make light work"? Well, it's true. That's how it got to be a cliché! Also, doing things together is part of the holiday bonding experience, remember?

I usually do this in bed, either the night before or first thing in the morning, or in the shower. Mentally go through your day, or even the next few days.

Picture yourself doing the things on your list, executing Plan A. Then picture yourself executing Plan B (and Plan C if you have one). Picture yourself gracefully handling the unexpected and laughing in the face of trouble. Ha ha!

(If that doesn't work, picture yourself wringing someone's neck or setting off a bomb.)

You know that saying, "if you see it, you can be it"? Yeah, I know it's sappy as hell. But it's another cliché that's true!

I'm bad at this. I have learned that I need to take whatever amount of time I think it will take me to do something and multiply it by four. So pad your estimates and give yourself enough time to do things, and then start a little earlier than that.

If, when you are planning, you realize you don't have enough time or energy to do everything on your list, adjust your expectations -- of yourself, and of the event you are trying to create. Make everything an order of magnitude smaller.

Also, adjust your expectations of the people you will be interacting with. Factor in personalities and figure that not everyone will be on their best behavior (they're stressed too), and cut everybody some slack.

The easiest way to do this is very simple. Stop what you are doing and take a deep breath. Exhale slowly. Shake out your hands. Repeat as needed.

But also plan ways to give yourself breaks. Stuff like taking a quick walk around the block, going to the bathroom and splashing water on your face, or running out for more tinsel (or beer).

Whatever you can think of that will allow you to catch your breath, calm down, locate your sense of humor, and refocus.

Ask for help if you need it.

Nothing and nobody is perfect. Things will go awry. Something will be miscalculated, or forgotten, or burned, or said, or broken.

Laugh it off. Let it go. Fuck it. Have fun anyway.

Remember that the worst moments now make for the best stories later on.