My two sisters and I just had our annual Thanksgiving menu-planning call. I don’t know why we do this. We have the same menu every year, and that’s how everyone likes it.
In my family, you don’t bring unsanctioned dishes, nor do you deviate, even slightly, from recipes. If you do, you will hear about it. A relative was once accused of “getting cute with the brussels sprouts” when he left out the bacon.
But on this year’s call, I did propose something new: I told my sisters that I won’t be deep cleaning before I host Thanksgiving and Christmas. Anything beyond a quick bathroom swipe is on my “to-don’t” list.
If you’re like me, you probably have a lengthy holiday to-do list. But it can be helpful to make a to-don’t list, too. You can catalog the stressful things you want to avoid, said Niro Feliciano, a psychotherapist and author of “All Is Calmish: How to Feel Less Frantic and More Festive During the Holidays.”
Experts shared some pointers on how to make your own list.
Clarify what’s important to you — and what isn’t.
Let go of thinking about what you “should” do for the holidays, and ask yourself what you actually want to do, said Christine Platt, author of “Less Is Liberation: Finding Freedom From a Life of Overwhelm.”
Feliciano suggested asking yourself a few questions: What part of the holiday is most meaningful to me? What may have worked in the past that doesn’t feel right anymore? What are some things that I could drop to make my life easier?
Instead of going out for New Year’s Eve, Platt and her daughter will likely be in bed relaxing “in our pajamas, eating snacks,” she said. “We’ll just ease into the New Year doing something soft and easy.”
Have a conversation with loved ones.
Sometimes, we uphold holiday traditions because we assume they’re important to other people, said KC Davis, a therapist and author of “How to Keep House While Drowning.”
“But a lot of us don’t even stop to think, ‘Does anyone in my family even want 13 side dishes?’” said Davis, whose holiday to-don’t list includes placing an “Elf on the Shelf.” So get everyone together on the phone or a group text and ask, she added.
If it turns out that something on your to-don’t list is important to other people, Davis said, you might lessen your load in another area.
If, for instance, Christmas dinner is the big homemade meal at your house, said Lynelle Schneeberg, an assistant professor of psychiatry at the Yale School of Medicine, you can order in pizza on Christmas Eve.
Assemble your list of ‘nopes.’
After you make your to-don’t list, jot down what you have to do to achieve each goal. Maybe it’s releasing the idea that every dish has to be made from scratch, or that you have to decorate each room in your home, said Dr. Schneeberg, whose holiday to-don’t list includes staying indoors for too long.
If you don’t want to spend your entire holiday in the kitchen, Davis said, devise and announce a new plan early — like the adults cook dinner and the kids clean up. (And paper plates are fine, she added.)
One easy item for your list: Don’t attempt a “perfect” holiday, Feliciano said. You can’t solve decades’ worth of family issues in a few days, she said; so lower your expectations, and focus on what you can control such as seating people who don’t get along far apart.
And try to have a sense of humor about what she calls “holiday fails.” Every year, for instance, Feliciano and her husband decorate the outside of their house with big letters that spell J-O-Y.
But one year, she said, the letter “J” kept falling off. So they gave up on trying to rehang it; instead, it just read OY.
“We all laugh about the year of OY,” she said.
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Let’s keep the conversation going. Follow Well on Instagram, or write to us at [email protected]. And check out last week’s newsletter about the best foods and drinks for constipation.
Jancee Dunn, who writes the weekly Well newsletter for The Times, has covered health and science for more than 20 years.
The post This Holiday Season, Make a ‘To-Don’t’ List appeared first on New York Times.
