I woke up yesterday, and felt like I was falling. All I could think was that I needed to prepare those bedrooms by this date, and plan meals for those days, and I probably need to go food shopping because we have run out of juice, and I must find time to wrap the gifts, and I should do that load of washing before this happens, and I really need to clean out the chickens, and we are nearly out of cat litter and Goose needs her feeder changed, and, and, and … So much to do! Plus, of course all the ‘normal’ jobs like housework and meals and animal care. Too much to think about.

Do you ever feel like that? Like there is just too much? Like you need to pause things for a day so you can catch up? My guess is that at this time of year, many people feel like this. So I invite you to pause (yes, I know you don’t have time, but pause anyway).

Just stop. Breathe. Look.

Because I don’t think we feel this way because we have been caught up with consumerism, or because we are trying to keep up with the media’s image of Christmas, or any of those other negative comments that sometimes come washing down on use when we’re feeling overwhelmed. I think we feel like this because we love people, and we want to show them that we love them, and at Christmas we have a lot of contact with a lot of people all at once–who all need to be loved–and we cannot quite keep up.

But if we pause, and think, this is a good thing. We feel overwhelmed because we love so many people that we don’t want to disappoint anyone. This is good. We have people who we love. The opposite would be worse. (I once heard–not sure where–that Christmas acts as a magnifier, and if we have lots of people who we love, we feel very happy at Christmas, and if we have no one, we feel very lonely. This has some truth, but loving a lot of people also brings a lot of work!)

Therefore, my message today is simple. We need to pause, and realise that today is a gift that we may never have been given, so it’s a shame to squander it on worry. Today is overwhelming because we love people, and this is good. So we need to take a breath, and write our lists, and put our heads down and plough through the jobs–because that is what people like us do. But instead of feeling as if we are falling, we will try to feel as if we are flying, carried along on the winds of time (which travels very fast in the week before Christmas) because we are preparing to scatter love. Which is hard work, but worth it. So offer a prayer of thanks, and promise yourself a Bailey’s later, and know that you are not alone as you fly…

Hoping your day goes well. Take care.
Love, Anne x