816. 3 Ways To Take The Stress Out Of The Holidays

What would happen if you had honest conversations to design, a few days or however long you're going to spend together in a way that serves everybody without judgment.

Welcome to the Earn your happy podcast. I'm Lori Harder, founder of Light Pink, best selling author, three time fitness world champion, and I'm a crazy, multi passionate entrepreneur. My journey has taken me everywhere, from being a broke waitress, barista, retails associate and personal trainer with massive anxiety and no belief in myself, to later becoming a multimillionaire in love with my life. In 2007, my husband and I lost everything. We found ourselves hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt at rock bottom. We had no ideas and I had no education to fall back on. This is when I found personal development and learned everything I could about business.

Not.

Not by choice, but because I realized no one was coming to save me. The conversations on this podcast are gonna let you know that you're not alone and that we all feel like we don't know what we're doing. We're gonna give you the tools to help you face your fears, take action, start your business, and grow those massive dreams that are keeping you up at night. It's time to create a life that you can't hide from and put so much on the line that your higher self is forced to come out. You're gon waiting for someone to approve of you and you're going to anoint yourself. Because I'm obsessed about building businesses that give women a platform, I want to feature you. So if you text the word podcast to 310-496-8363, you can get your questions answered on our Q and A segment along with a shout out. And if you rate, review and subscribe to this podcast, we're choosing someone every month to get coached and featured on our show. It just might be you. So let's get started.

And we're back with another episode of he said, she Said.

I just realized it might sound kind of echoey in here.

It might.

Oh well, guys, we're on the road still. We are road warriors. If you've been following along, we are in between homes. We sold our Scottsdale home. Gosh, almost three weeks ago. I think we closed on it, moved out, and we can't close on our new one till December 28th. So it's like five or six weeks of just floating around, bouncing back and forth between Arizona, California, Arizona, California. Based on where our meetings are and all the things that we have to get done, it's kind of been fun.

It has been fun. Today is the first day though, that I'm like, oh, it'd be nice to see. Start to feel a little bit rooted, I think mostly because you know me, I'm a little bit like when my food gets off or my sleep gets off a little bit off track, I can start to feel like, I don't know, a little bit like a psycho.

You're not a psycho at all, honey. I meant that. All right, guys, so this is a really good lead in actually to the holidays because the holidays can make us feel kind of crazy. The holidays can bust us out of our routine. The holidays can feel like everything's up in the air and they're supposed to be the greatest time of the year. Like I am the biggest Christmash holiday season nut on the planet. I'm sure there's someone nuttier than me, but I'm pretty close.

Wonderful time it is.

Sing it, babe.

It is the time when we watch Christmas movies every night for a month straight.

Do you like it or hate it?

No, I really like it. I really liked it over the years, I think the first year that we did it, which I feel like wasn't that long ago, like we really started to Christmas out TV wise. TV wise was like four or five years ago.

Yep.

I used to hate watching movies, period.

So you couldn't even sit still through them in the past?

No.

So that's not what the episode's about today. Unless you want it to be. But really we thought it'd be handy if we shared a few tips on how to avoid holiday overwhelm because we, and especially Lori, has really mastered this and she had to master it and maybe even had a unique perspective on how to master it. Because she didn't do holidays growing up because of her religion that she was raised in as a kid. So when she stepped into my life and saw the sheer amount of chaos and traditions and stress, the things that we were doing during this quote, most wonderful time of the year, just because we've always done them that way. She's like, this is nuts.

This is the most horrible time of the year.

So let's step back. Then when you walked in and saw how we did Christmas or holidays, what was your first reaction?

Well, it was really interesting because from somebody who, number one, my love language is not gifts. And then number two, being able to kind of like see how much stress getting these gifts, whether it was monetary or whether it was just like no time to get them, not knowing. And then on the other side, seeing once gifts are exchanged how little they're used, how much they just sit there, how much waste there was that for me, it was like, oh, my gosh, this is like, one of the most stressful things ever. And I have to tell you that sitting through the first Christmas, now, this is gonna sound kind of bratty, but not at the same time. Cause I know that you've experienced something like this where you open a bunch of gifts that you don't like or you'll never use, or you already have, and you have to act excited about it. And I think the sheer emotion of pretending to be excited for a long period of time over things that you kind of feel bad about or, you know, were wasted or you're never going to use, or the thought of having to go and return these things for an entire day or two after already being stressed out is, do you want to stand in line? Can you even exchange these things? It just was a moment of, there's gotta be a better way. It wasn't like, oh, this is terrible. These people are doing it from a bad place. Of course I know they're doing it from a good place, but I thought, what if we actually asked everybody if they're enjoying their holiday experience? And, you know, your mom was stressed out. She was spending too much money.

Always trying to get the perfect gift.

Always trying to find the perfect gift.

Obviously, from the place of love.

From such a place of love.

Unneeded stress.

Yes. And then we were in the same boat, right? We're so busy. And then on top of a busier time, you're trying to fit everything in for your business so that get that week off, or you don't have to stress around this time, Even though that's exactly what this time is, if you're not doing it in a way that actually works for you. So you're taking an already busy time and you're like, okay, now go be thoughtful. Think of the best gifts that you can get for everyone, wrap them beautifully, and then go travel, and then eat bad food, drink too much, and then put yourself in a terrible mood so that everything is just, like, massive frustration.

Foreign.

Hey.

Okay, I gotta give a shout out.

To one of my favorite humans and.

Podcasters, Kathy Heller, and I freaking love her podcast that I know you're gonna love. It's called don't keep your day job. Does that name get any better? Top podcaster, entrepreneur, business coach, author, and my friend Kathy Heller sits down with successful creative entrepreneurs to learn what it takes to make a living doing what.

You want to love.

I've admired everything Kathy does from the start of her journey because she takes so much care and has so much intention with everything she does. Her wisdom and tips are unmatched and I myself have learned so much from her podcast that I've been able to apply growth strategies or light pink and earn your happy. You'll hear from incredible minds like actor Matthew McConaughey, hello entrepreneur Seth Godin, Shark Tank's Barbara Corcoran. I was also a special guest which was so incredible. Plus everyday people who are quitting their.

Jobs as they build their own businesses.

If you're tired of building someone else's dream, if you want to quit your job and get paid to work your passion, this is the show for you. Visit Kathy Heller.com Laurie and you'll get my episodes on don't keep your day job plus a free workshop on how to find your dream path from Kathy so you can take action and start living life on your terms. Guys, go check it out. Now let's get back to the episode.

Do you remember the stress of having 20, 30, 40 gifts to wrap and all of a sudden it's like the night before you're like, I've got no choice but to stay up. And I know a lot of people feel that. I know a lot of people do that. You know what's curious? I'm going to ask my mom this year. I wonder if she enjoys the holidays more now that we only exchange one gift each as opposed to back when she had all the gifts to try and get to try and make sure each person got the same amount and all. I'll be interested to ask what she likes better.

Yeah. So then we had the conversation like, what would it look like if we really enjoyed the holidays? What if we took this money and allocated it to an experience and we thought, you know, you go and you sit around at your A lot of people. This is funny because a lot of my friends don't do this anymore. A lot of my friends said they don't go home for a week anymore because it was just too much for them to even handle between confrontation, their nervous system, the stress of it all. So unfortunately, a lot of my friends don't even go home anymore. Not unfortunate for them, but most people still do. But there is actually a lot of mine don't, which is interesting. So there is a better way though. So could you potentially say, what would we be doing if we all enjoyed our time? Like one day maybe you go ice skating. One day you all go for a walk. One day you all go skiing or snowboarding. What would it look like if you took that money and put it into something that you actually enjoyed? Maybe you want a warm place, Go to Cabo, go to Hawaii. Maybe you want to go to Florida. You know, we have friends that go to Disney every single year for the holidays so that it's something to. You're putting more memories around the experience.

And so we've literally exchanged, no pun intended, the idea of lots and lots of gifts and money spent, time and money spent on gifts to exchanging that time and money to renting an epic Christmas cabin every single year. One that is always on a snowboard ski hill somewhere. And that has changed our life forever. Was this the sixth year we'll be doing that?

And now we look forward to it so much.

We can stay active. We can be outside. We don't sit around just grazing and drinking all day. And it's really changed the dynamic because it gave everybody something to look forward to instead of one person that has to host it. And it feels like a season of work.

Yeah. It's funny because Jackie, my sister in law, who's not a sister in law right now, but they're just not married, but essentially they've been together how long, babe?

Oh, God, nine years.

So with your brother, they've been together nine years. Her and I are super active. We don't like to sit still at all. So. And I'm sure there's people listening who feel the same way. So can you imagine, put us at a family's house and be like, okay, sit here now. Don't do anything in your routine. Feel guilty about exercising in the morning because you should be eating the breakfast and doing the things, which, by the way, I don't eat breakfast. So then it's even weirder because I'm like, I intermittent fast.

So you're so far out of your.

Routine that you don't even feel like yourself. So then you're crabby. So it's like, what does this look like? If we all took care of ourselves and we all had fun together. So those were the conversations we started to have. Like, okay, I want to stay in routine. This is when I'm best. This is when I'm happiest. This is when I can love you most. This is when I. This is when I have the most fun. So what do we need to do for everybody to feel good about spending a week together? And that's really where those conversations had to come in, that we're open and honest and really taking care of Ourselves. So it's in the morning, we all go and do our thing. We do our morning routine, whatever that looks like. You can read, meditate, go work out. We don't plan anything until usually around like 12 or 1 o'. Clock.

Go hit the hill.

You can hit the hill, whatever that looks like. So, you know, what does that look like? Even if you are going home and maybe you're not necessarily doing big experiences this year, but could you take the step in saying, hey, I really want to make this year enjoyable for myself, you, the whole family. And I think the way to do that is if we all feel good about the routine or what we're doing. What would that look like? For me, it would be to make sure I'm getting my workouts in my walks and knowing that we don't plan any festivities or anything like that until maybe 1 o' clock or 3 o' clock in the afternoon so we can all get our work done or whatever we need to get done.

Yeah, whatever works for them. So if the first takeaway was what would happen if you exchanged the time and the money for experience over gifts? Right? And you don't have to eliminate gifts. That's not the message here. We buy one gift, we throw them in a pile and people kind of blindly choose it. So we buy a gift that would fit kind of everybody there and we.

Put a price range on it, we put a lower price range so everybody feels good. One gift for each person that shows up. That's it. We only buy one.

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And then who knows who gets it? So the first one is what would happen if we exchanged the time and the money that we spend on getting gifts and wrapping gifts and buying gifts for an experience. The second thing is what would happen if you had honest conversations to design a few days or however long you're gonna spend together in a way that serves everybody without judgment. And I know that's painful. Like you're like, oh, I'm gonna be the black sheep. Oh. I'm gonna be the only one that doesn't wanna do the tradition. And I know it's not comfortable, but extreme comfort and joy comes from having that very uncomfortable conversation. Right. You're one great, respectful, well thought out conversation away from the whole family having a really good time instead of stress during the holidays.

Yeah. And that doesn't mean that you're not gonna feel guilty about this after you implement or integrate it. Sometimes you have the conversations and then you go and you do your routine and you do your workout and you're feeling guilty the whole time. We've had years like that. Like, oh, gosh, are we leaving them alone right now? I feel bad. And that's just how it looks when you are starting to put together a boundary. That's just how it looks when you're starting to break an old tradition and implement a new one. And we have to push these things, you know, sometimes like sitting down. And we like to do that. We've done that tradition a lot of years where we write on either a Christmas ornament, like a nice thing about each person, so you put the name on the Christmas ornament or a coffee mug, and then you go around and you hand your coffee mug to the right and each person at the table puts like, a nice word or a.

Nice word, a word that describes you.

On that ornament or on that coffee mug and permanent marker. And now this sounds so great, and it is great, but getting people to actually sit down and do it is a whole thing. So, meaning, if you want a new.

Tradition, it is going to take work.

And it's not going to feel like the right time, and it's going to feel forced in the beginning. But if you want something new, if you want something good, if you want something different, it is going to take work and it's going to feel awkward and people are probably going to hem and hawk. I mean, honestly, we've had moments where, Chris, you hem in ha. Because you've been like, I just feel like watching a movie right now. And it's like, well, we're never gonna do this if we don't. If we don't go and sit. Because you know what? Going and expressing emotion and making a special moment isn't comfortable in the beginning.

But it's worth it in the long run.

Everybody's so happy that we've done it. You know what? Looking back, I'm so happy that we've done that with your dad. In fact, I found some of the mugs that we've done with your dad. And it was as we moved and it was so special.

Yeah, that would be. The third thing is how can you create at least one new tradition around connecting? I think we picture, yay. It's the holidays, all the families are getting together, everyone's connecting, but they're actually not. It's just kind of chaos and stress, and some people are present, some people are. What does it look like to create a tradition where it is force placed? I say that in a funny way, creating a container of intentional connecting, because I can tell you those are some of the best conversations, the best memories, the best everything that's come out of us. You know, taking one evening every year to do that.

Yeah. I hope this helps you guys. I would really love if you listen to this, if there's something that you're thinking of doing, we would love to hear it. You can tag us on Instagram and tell us maybe what a new tradition is, or just DM us, because we love to know what you're taking away from the podcast.

Love it. Thanks for listening, guys. Love and appreciate you always. And happy holidays.

Happy holidays.