Merry Christmas

The season of Christmas brings tangents; parties, food, shopping, family, movies, music, even those favorite Christmas T.V. shows. I think we all get caught up in the hype, I know I do.

There is this quote by Dallas Willard that keeps messing with me: "Familiarity breeds unfamiliarity."

I've done Christmas 25 times and I can probably remember 21-22 of them. Every year the same sort of thing takes place.

Routine.

I love the routine of Christmas; I always have and I hope I always will. I love all the things that come along with Christmas.

But this quote, this quote keeps me thinking.

In thinking, I question my subconscious. Within my familiarity, I wonder how unfamiliar I am with Christmas. I wonder if I'm really celebrating Christmas, or just the tangents that come along with Christmas. I wonder what occupies my mind the most. This messes with me.

The reason we have Christmas tangents is because of one event. We are celebrating the birth of the One who came to redeem and restore the brokenness of the world. We are celebrating Emmanuel (God with us). We are celebrating the waiting and the arrival of the One who was promised throughout the Old Testament of the Bible. This event is the root, the cause, the foundation of all the tangents and routines that accompany Christmas.

What occupies my mind the most?

The tangents: All the stuff that comes with Christmas is on my mind far more than the meaning of Christmas itself.

I don't like this.

It bothers me.

It makes me cringe thinking I'm just another person caught in the net of a commercialized Christmas holiday.

So

May we celebrate this one event. May we recognize our possible unfamiliarity and attempt to bring back the consciousness of the real purpose behind this holiday. May we all remember and reflect upon the point of singularity when it comes to Christmas: the Savior's birth.

"Let me tell you about the time I..."

I'm starting to change the way I talk to people.

Through my life, I feel I have had some pretty wild success stories as well as some interesting stories of failure. In fact, I've been pretty eager to share these stories with people. I've always thought my stories could help people cope with their own situations.

Have you ever had someone share a struggle with you?

...something painful?

...something hard?

...something unjust?

For some reason, I've always felt that this is an important time to share my stories.

"Maybe if they knew my story, then they wouldn't realize how bad theirs really is.

Maybe the success of my story of struggle will help them succeed in theirs."

Recently I've been sharing some of my struggles.

Recently I've been running into a lot of other people's stories.

Quite honestly, I'm learning something.

I'm learning not to attempt to heal someone else's struggles with my stories.

"Maybe my token of advice isn't as helpful as I thought.

Maybe they don't want to hear my story.

Maybe our perspectives and cognitive clockwork aren't as compatible as I thought.

Maybe they don't want to hear how I've been there before."

What I'm learning is that maybe its far more effective to enter into someone's suffering with them, than it is to give them a token of advice or a story.

Encouragement

Motivation

Inspiration

I'm starting to think that the comfort of a loving friend will go much farther than a personal story or a token of advice.

Instead of being so quick to make their story about me, now I'm going to try and make my story about them.