I Struggle at “Christmas Time”

~ Posted: 30 December 2015 ~
 
Well... those who have known me for long enough will know that for me... Christmas is a ‘hard time’... the build-up to it brings so many mixed up emotions, and in the aftermath of Christmas, I find myself in the utterly still... dead... silent space of nothingness... other than the special memories of spending a truly blessed day with family and friends, but even they seem so distant already now. 
 
For years I suffered greatly around this time of the year... struggling inner child feelings... Mother used to get us all excited and make us dream big about the wonders and magic of Christmas... then inevitably and eventually very predictably, totally burst our bubbles and destroy every ounce of happiness we may have mustered for Christmas!  So on a subconscious level, Christmas always makes me dread... long story!  Then the depression in the “empty aftermath” afterwards! 
 
I think my boss has a memory like an elephant as she has watched me over the years... so literally the day before Christmas she sent me a huge job... I started working on it and more jobs that came in the day after and finished yesterday... more this morning too... so there was no time for the depression to set in... I felt needed, appreciated and had a responsibility that helped me through this dead silence and isolation and desperate struggle with dissociation and the need to curl up on my bed and just sleep the days away...
 
All the excitement... all the hustle and bustle... all the people... all the joy... GONE overnight... then just the dead silence and isolation... the part I dislike most about Christmas... because I wish that every day with family and friends could be as beautiful... as if we are equally as important to each other, loved and needed even on non-Christmas days.  To me, it’s all seems to be a big farce!  A one-day illusion of how things should actually be “every day” in life...
 
Feelings: unreal... untrue... momentary... fleeting... I’d rather not know a time like Christmas... as if this one day in the life of a human being should be any different to every other day
 
I am deliberately not discussing “religious” ideals in this conversation, because this is not what this letter is about... I’ve had enough of “this religious group attacking that religious group, etc.”... my therapist's relentless attacks on me re: her religion verses mine and how I am doomed to burn in hell for not following "her way", has left me totally cold to defining things through religious discussions... I have learned that it is better for me to define life through the heart of me... the seat of my own soul... and not through what others tell me is right and wrong and what should be or shouldn't be through their own ideals, learning’s and perceptions.  We are all so different, and my relationship with my God is highly personalised and therefore should not interfere with or judge yours.

I would like my blog to be not about this church or that church, or this people and that people, but rather about “the human spirit within us as human beings”... and things as they should be in this world because of "our humanity".  I would like to know that anyone, anywhere can read my blog and feel connected to the “human struggle” and the “strength and potential for recognising and knowing what is good, beautiful and true for all, which lies within each one of us..."

 
Right now:
I desperately need “time” to write my paper on Logotherapy Dream Interpretation to include my new findings on this amazing subject (nothing to do with fortune telling).  I pray that over the next few days I have the silence and space I actually do now need to get that done... I marked my last “late” student portfolio yesterday... so today feels hopeful to get my paper started... please pray for me that I get it done well...

Happy New Year!
Wishing all my friends and family a blessed New Year to come... only hours away!   I used to dread New Year’s too, but over the last few years since I started my incredible Logotherapy journey, I have started to have real “HOPE” in each New Year which gives me another chance to make my dreams come true... my book for instance... God willing I will find time to get that finished too this New Year. 
 
If you celebrate your New Year at a different time to the rest of the world, then I pray your year is going wonderfully well so far and will continue to be really good for you.
 
~ Pana