Christmas is just around the corner.  The holidays are approaching and we all make plans to enjoy the festive season.  Christmas is a time for family reunions, for fun and relaxation as we catch up with each other and look forward to settling into the warmth and familiarity of the people we love. But for some of us, when family relationships aren’t necessarily healthy or positive, Christmas can be a time of angst.  Going home for Christmas can be anxiety inducing.

  For example, we worry about:

• the unresolved conflict that hovers as the elephant in the room; 

• finding ourselves in childhood patterns that we don’t want to revisit.

• experiencing the subtle but painful put downs that might come our way. 

• and so on…

Most of us don’t want to experience such things and worry about how to manage them in the moment.

But being in the moment is hard to manage.  While we might want to avoid the conflict, or ignore the barb, we can find ourselves triggered emotionally and fall back on the survival behaviours that we learned when we were children.  For example, we might

• react defensively and say unhelpful things in response;

• argue back;

• withdraw from the interaction;

• be lost for words and just freeze; or

• comply just to ‘keep the peace’.

If any of these reactions ring true for you, then I imagine you might feel dissatisfied with your own reaction and wish you could behave differently in the moment.  That is how it has been for me.

If you’d like to be different in these stressful moments, here are some simple things to remember.  In the moment:

1. Recognise the old patterns when they emerge;

2. Pause;

3. Take slow, deep breaths to steady your emotional reaction;

4. Choose to respond differently, take back control.

It is only when you are back in control that you can begin to behave differently. At this point, you are better able to connect with yourself and ask,

a.     What am I feeling?

b.     What am I needing?

c.     What request of myself do I have to care for myself?

 Remember, you can’t change other people.  You can only change yourself.   

Recognise, Pause, Breathe, Choose

 If you’d like to learn more about connecting compassionately with yourself and the people you love, then visit our courses page on our website, Coaching to Clarity, https://www.coaching2clarity.com/ .