It’s a simple
yet a very profound question. . .
What makes your mug your mug. . . ?
What literally gives it
not just meaning
but it’s sip-ability
It’s amazing even when it’s empty
When it’s your mug
It’s filled with much more
than your favorite beverage or drink. . .
It’s filled with once upon a time in memories
and significant just a moments
and they’re so overflowing
that it can’t help but to be shared
with another
. . .What makes your mug
your mug. . . ?
In just a moment
without even a paused ponder
you know
and sharing what you know
of these sip-abilities
is most holy
S I P
O N
NEVER TOO EARLY
W E L L. . . ?
Is it still too early to celebrate Christmas?
(only 40 days away)
Yeah, it’s time for that debate again S O. . .
what say you?
Naomi Ludlow from USA TODAY took a real good look at this and had some interesting facts and fictions. I was actually in COSTCO over the Labor Day weekend and BAM there was just a small aisle of Christmas trees and lights. Now that Halloween marked the end of spooky season and is a full two weeks behind us, there’s a constant debate on when we should start celebrating Christmas. In recent years, we’ve seen the festive period creep in as early as Nov. 1. Sirius/XM Radio already has there stations blaring the Christmas tunes and families put up decorations and some get a head start on buying presents because there are BLACK FRIDAY sales before Black Friday now.
And so the now-annual debate has begun: When is the “proper” time to start decking the halls, decorating the Christmas tree and belting out those merry songs?
Psssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssst:
I never take mine down, we just decorate it for the different seasons/holiday’s as they come and go
Social media starts popping with personal opinions, with some demanding all Christmas cheer cease and desist until Thanksgiving has been observed, while other Santa Claus celebrants proclaim Dec. 1 as the official start of the season.
And then of course there are the uber-eager fans, including the self-proclaimed “Queen of Christmas,” Mariah Carey, who say Nov. 1 is the right time to kick off the holiday season.
Yet even as the start of the holiday remains up for debate, there’s more than just personal traditions and preferences on the line. Regardless of where you may fall on this seasonal battle, there are some very real reasons why some people decide to start the celebrations long before what others may believe appropriate.
Christmas lights before Thanksgiving:There’s a reason behind the ‘act of kindness,’ experts say
Holiday traditions bring comfort to some,
but sadness to others
The past two years have been a time of isolation and new norms that sent many into a frenzy. The same goes for how we’ve celebrated the holidays. Families adjusted by having virtual gatherings, but for many, the joy of the season remained.
For most people, the holidays are a time to step away from normal routines, reconnect with family and close friends, and destress.
“We’re kind of stuck in the day-to-day and putting out fires in our lives, but taking the time to prioritize some celebrations with friends and family really creates positive feelings and helps us enjoy life,” said clinical psychologist Ryan Howes.
Thus a reason for some to want to capitalize on as many holiday events as possible – to give people hope of the better times that are ahead.
“For many people, the holidays are associated with positive emotional arousal,” psychotherapist Owen O’Kane told USA TODAY. The Sunday Times bestselling author continued, “And that could be linked to the fact that many people associate the holiday period with warmth, family, nostalgia and connection.”
Leading up to the holiday season, people look forward to their established family traditions and often set expectations linked to their fond childhood memories. A scientific study showed that when humans set expectations for pleasure, we produce dopamine, which is a chemical messenger that tells the brain how happy we feel.
On the other hand, some people don’t see the holidays as a fond memory. This time can cause stress and be difficult to get through. These people will produce chemicals such as cortisol and adrenaline, according to O’Kane.
Oftentimes, those who dread the holiday season are trying to overcome hardships, whether it’s dealing with issues such as grief, family disputes, and drug and/or alcohol abuse.
We may crave those Christmas memories
As humans, we recall memories through our five senses, with smell being the most prominent.
When we smell freshly baked cookies, it can take us to a time we spent making cookies with Grandma. Seeing twinkly lights helps us remember the time Dad almost fell off the ladder while trying to decorate the house. Touching an old ornament brings back the memory of making it with siblings. This is called sensory activation and is a leading reason why the holidays are highly anticipated.
Retailers play a big part in activating our senses. They understand how our minds work and want us to participate in the process.
“The next time you go to the department store and you look at the amount of effort into how displays are laid out, how lighting is done, how colors are used, how music is used in the background, all of it is used very cleverly to stimulate us,” O’Kane told USA TODAY.
The layout forces the consumer to feel the holiday vibe and urges them to buy gifts. This is just one of the tactics besides holiday deals to get people involved.
Colors also impact how we participate in the season.
“Red stimulates and energizes – even our spending. Waitresses wearing red receive 14 to 26% higher tips than waitresses wearing any other color uniform,” according to a Psychology Today article. “Green is an optimistic color associated with luck and wealth. It’s also been shown to have a positive effect on creativity. A possible explanation for some of the more unusual gifts found under the tree.”
So why not start celebrating now?
Dread, overstimulation and even disappointment keep people from wanting to participate in the holiday season.
A study on the Christmas blues shows that the holidays may increase stress before they start and could increase uneasy feelings afterward. There are a number of reasons this can happen, including finances, grief, loneliness, estrangement, or divorce or pleasing.
All of the expectations we set in the beginning of the season are far more exciting than the actual holiday, Howes told USA TODAY. But sometimes we are faced with disappointment if things didn’t go as planned.
O’Kane suggested we create a balance so we aren’t overwhelmed as the season approaches and aren’t disappointed at the end.
SO WHICH ARE YOU ?
If you follow me at all over social media, you know I’m a big-never-stop-never-let-go-of-celebrating-Christmas. Some would say, I’m a walking/talking/living
Christmas Card
But
with a purpose and a strong reason and a powerful meaning:
TO TAKE THE FEELING
TO HAVE THE KINDNESS
TO ALLOW THE SPECIALNESS OF THIS SEASON
to be a part of our
e v e r y d a y s
(which is why I post a Christmas picture the 25th of each month so that we literally can
PRACTICE MERRY CHRISTMAS
So let the stories be read
let the stories be told
and most of all,
LET THEM BE WRITTEN AND RE-WRITTEN
in each of us as we celebrate in our own ways
and hopefully be the reason and a part of another’s
celebration
AND THEN THERE’S THIS:
Maybe the greatest gift you may be able to give during these upcoming days
is the greatest gift Another can receive:
T O L E R A N C E
TOUCHING ART
| Please Touch the Art |
| This compelling video tells the story of an artist, Andrew Myers, who is so moved by a blind man’s joy at “feeling” three dimensional art that he is inspired to create three dimensional portraits to be experienced by people who are blind or visually impaired. Why is touching artwork so taboo? According to the producers of the film, “Prior to the mid-1800s, tactile interaction was commonplace for visitors experiencing collections of art, but as museums of art evolved, rules forbidding touch became the norm.” In this film, Myers surprises George Wurtzel, a blind artisan working in wood, with a portrait. Wurtzel delights in sharing his portrait with his visually impaired students at Enchanted Hills Camp as he teaches them by example how to work as a blind artisan. Wurtzel’s philosophy that “your life is what you decide it will be” permeates the film. |
It is such a simple simple question with such a profound and almost on answerable reply:
WHAT MAKES YOUR LIFE MEANINGFUL?
Is your life ultimately what you decide you want to make it to be or what OTHERS decide they’d like to make you be?
We are all severely handicapped
We are blind
We are deaf
We are mute
And because of THAT
Know a darkness;
Know a stillness;
Know an utterlessness
that can’t be described only experienced
And sadly, often is
And even more sadly,
Often
NEVER HAS TO BE
And The cure is when we remedy that
first of all and ourselves
we also heal it for others. . .
Test THAT
GO AHEAD
TOUCH
TASTE
SEE
HEAR
SMELL
S E N S E
beyond what
Fingers
Eyes
Noses
Mouths
Ears
can ever achieve and the
Go full on artist
Be artisan enough
To share THAT with OTHERS
So that you become the
a r t
And not just simply the artist….
Dealing in DEATH
Kind of makes you wonder, huh. . .
D E A T H
Billy Collins has long been one of my favorite contemporary poets and he ponders
D E A T H
this way in his poem entitled,
M Y N U M B E R
Is Death miles away from this house,
reaching for a window in Cinncinati
or breathing down the neck of a lost hiker
in British Columbia?
Is he too busy making arrangements,
tampering with air brakes,
scattering cancer cells like seeds,
loosening the wooden beams of roller coasters
to bother with my hidden cottage
that visitors find so hard to find?
Or is he stepping from a black car
parked at the dark end of the lane,
shaking open the familiar cloak,
its hood raised like the head of a crow,
and removing the scythe from the trunk?
Did you have any trouble with the directions?
I will ask, as I start talking my way out of this.
I remember at a very young age welcoming d e a t h; walking with it; talking to it; trying to understand what it all meant. I don’t know if I’ve ever come to heads or tails of that but I know doing some 26 funerals a month for the past 10 years has brought me closer to it than I’ve ever had in my entire life. The Buddhist tell us that attachment is the form of all suffering and detachment helps us not suffer as much. I, like Many, am a poor Buddhist. . .
I remember as a five or six year old kid, sitting in the backseat one Friday night as we were making our way to my grandparents, which was more of a weekly event than not. . .I told my parents matter of factly that I hope I would die before them because I would be too sad if they died first; there was a palpable silence I can remember and that nervous look between parents that wasn’t all that secret before they both, in machine gun like fashion began sputtering off all kinds of reasons why that’s “not the way it’s suppose to be.”
There was the death of my grandfather when I was six and then the death of my other grandfather right before my 14th birthday that I believed I was directly responsible and then aunts, uncles, great grandmother and grandmothers and friends in high-school. . .
In a strange way I have learned to not just open the door to death but actually unhinge it. And by just unhinging it, it’s let it come and go in places in my life like a undamable flood waters that seep in spots you didn’t even know exists and before it drys all of the way it leaves an unmistakable odor that never quiet evaporates or gets tamed. . .
I’ve long ago filled out my own DNRCC and written letters to be read ‘at that appropriate time. . .I’ve taped parts of my own Celebration of Life so I can have the “LAST WORD” and intend to attend it if I get a glimpse or a longer than usual ‘heads-up’ that it’s looming before me in my most immediate future;
I’ve even gone further as to actually imagine trying to envision what it would be like to not only lose my parents today, this year, but also losing my sister and brothers to the SHADOW that knows no Light. . .
And yes, I’ve dared hugging the Porcupine-full-barbed-quails-exposed and plunging deep, what it would be like to have Erin, my wife die or any one of my four daughters, my son, my five granddaughters or my
grandson. . .
O U C H
That seems to go little bit further than what we would call
mindfulness. . .
It’s way less than mindlessness, too. . .
Try it go ahead and finish these two sentences:
BEFORE I DIE I WOULD LIKE TO_________________________________
THIS IS WHAT IT WOULD FEEL LIKE IF ONE OF MY LOVED ONE DIED______________
Write out your own Obituary. . .
G O T H E R E
TASTE IT
SNIFF IT
HEAR IT
SEE IT
TOUCH IT
Recall the Laughters. . .all of them
It certainly doesn’t matter if a Tree gets hit by lightning and no longer can bear fruit or sprout leaves compared to if my wife or my children, grandchildren or even my dog Molly died; and it’s even much different then if somebody that is the same age as my wife or my child or my parents die. . .this mindfulness, this acceptance of death; this detachment, is it somehow making me live better; making me love deeper; making me feel and experience more freshly and more deeply?
I’m not sure, but I do know that it’s not any L E S S. And by taking this door and unhinging it, it allows these thoughts, these feelings to sort of come and go without stopping them or judging them or disallowing them. And it is in that very act that it disarms them; Renders them less potent; Makes them, DARE I SAY, more
n e i g h b o r l y. . . ?
It seems, these things are the very seeds once planted we don’t fully ever get to see the plants but know that they grow just the same, and that we are not just tenders of those plants, but also harvesters. It’s growing season always and in ALL PLACES because it never is not THAT season among the Seasons. . .
So exactly what is the Takeaway?
Simply that it is not the same for each person or any person in your way of dealing with anything good and bad; Life or Death is not exactly a RIGHT or WRONG WAY so much as YOUR WAY and most likely it’ll be different than Another’s WAY or Experience. . .
SO EACTLY WHAT IS THE TAKEAWAY?
Teach me your way; let me learn of it and don’t judge me too harshly if I don’t follow it to every detail but take from it lessons that I need to learn at the very moment that I need to learn even again, and let that be enough for the both of us. . .
After all what makes us Caring Catalysts. . .
What makes us Anything
What makes us Everything
is not the fear we are nothing. . .
It’s the Fear that we
WE CEASE TO BE
CARING CATALYSTS
ANYTHING
EVERYTHING
ANYONE’S
EVERYONE’S. . .
Excuse me now. . .
it’s time to do a little dying
and place my head on the pillow;
close my eyes and be asleep
before the next song on my playlist comes up. . .
And even as I die in this way,
A G A I N
(as we each do every night with even a not-so-good-sleep)
I am confident that I will RESURRECT
either to a new day
or to the One that is never ending. . .
For there indeed is a TIME
tick-ticking away. . .
a time for both
and yes. . .
indeed a time for all