Best Christmas Ever

I’ve really been enjoying my daily videos from Dynamic Catholic as part of the “Best Christmas Ever” series. (You can sign up to receive the daily videos for free at DynamicCatholic.com) I was getting caught up on my videos this morning, and Matthew Kelly asked a question that made me look at the holiday season in a whole new way.

He asked “What is your favorite Christmas memory?” Just the question itself released a floodgate of Christmas memories over the years in my mind. It was hard to pick just one. As I was strolling down memory lane, he followed up the question with the following statement – “Your favorite Christmas memory more than likely does not have ANYTHING to do with all that your parents stressed over and worried about during the Christmas season.”

Wow.

I couldn’t believe how true that was. As I began to take a look at each of those memories a little closer, I was sure that none of them were anything that ever caused my parents any stress.

Making Christmas dinner with Nanny at her house on Christmas Day.

Spending Christmas Eve with our family after mass.

Practicing Christmas carols at school. (And yes – since I went to school in Parisville, we sang them in Polish.)

Playing outside in the snow during Christmas break and smelling the smoke from my grandparents wood stove.

Sure…..there were special gifts that I had received over the years, and I appreciate all that my parents did to make our holidays special. When it comes down to it, though – those aren’t the things that you carry with you as you go on though life.

As the video continued, Kelly listed out things that we obsess and stress over during the holiday season. They were all things that create anxiety in our lives and steal our joy during Christmas, but when thinking of all of those memories……it completely put things in perspective.

As I continue through this Christmas season, I am consciously making an effort to create more of those memories – and stress less about the small stuff. Not only will it make this Christmas season that much more special, I’ll have so many more special memories to look back on.