Let’s Figure this thing out together… The Human Emotional Experience. We did a little experiment that was not perfect with a virtual platform. Bare with us on the audio difficulty, but we still got great content to help us all figure out how to manage the holiday’s which of course have a strong tendency to be” “hard.”
Let’s figure out together what the cures are… Through a Therapist’s Eyes.
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Episode #256 Transcription
Chris Gazdik: [00:00:00] Hello, this is Through a Therapist’s Eyes on December the 21st. We are currently in an adventure. If you’re trying to find us on YouTube Live, Neil, I don’t even know if they got us on YouTube Live. This is kind of adventurous because we’re doing something new with a, a a platform that allows us to sort of Skype in.
So John is with us. John, can you hear me? And can you see me?
John-Nelson Pope: I can. Can you hear me? Can you see me, Tommy? Okay. Yeah. We’re on the winter solstice.
Chris Gazdik: You said Victoria’s eight year old client informed us of that. So what do you think Victoria? Can you hear us and see us?
Victoria Pendergrass: I can do all those things.
Chris Gazdik: I got to do it just once.
Victoria Pendergrass: Y’all he’s clapping his hands and it is in my headphones. It is so loud. It sounds like he’s in my eardrum.
Chris Gazdik: I’m so sorry, but we gotta [00:01:00] have fun in the holidays, right? That’s right. We the holidays. So we are talking about the, why are the holidays hard, and, and really the cures, because we see this all the time, right?
We talk about, oh, the holidays are so hard. People can really easily agree to that. They can easily say like, yeah, that’s the case. And then it’s like, Well, wait a minute. What, what really do people mean by that? And I don’t think that people have a good understanding. So I just sat down, brainstormed, and thought of a whole list of things.
And I’d be curious to think John and Victoria, I’m gonna put you on the spot. Like, just a list is all we want to start out with. I had the advantage of thinking about this in advance. I went, I’m gonna forewarn you. I went all the way through the alphabet. Oh my goodness, you can’t look at the list.
John hasn’t seen the list yet. So Anyway, so this is through therapist eyes, like I said on december the 21st we have the where you get insights directly in your car and your home and through a Panel of therapists and it’s not to delivery of
therapy services in any way victoria likes to remind me we have the book through [00:02:00] therapist eyes Number two coming out sometime in 2024.
That’s going to be cool on marriage We have the subscribe and click button help us out with youtube specifically. We’re trying to get a thousand subscribers So we need those subscribers. We need a five star stars Five star rating. John’s got his hand up. Five stars. Ha ha. Yeah. So contact at throughwiththerapisteyes.
com. Look, we’re in endeavoring to figure this out together. Not just the human experience today, but also, what, the internet. Yes. It’s kind of fun, John. I was thinking of a podcast that we like that does routinely log in like this. It’s like totally behind the scenes on the
John-Nelson Pope: YouTube. Yeah. Exactly. I really do.
Yeah. I’m I’m going to I’m recording it right for this week. So, as I drive down to Florida, I can listen to to the recording. Oh,
Chris Gazdik: good. Good. There you go. It’s it’s I’ve gotten used to listening to [00:03:00] ourselves doing the trains at the transcriptions that we do on online last week. Yeah, you know, like, yeah, Victoria walks into the office and she’s like, oh my god, Jordan.
Last but not least a mention to our sponsor. Our sponsor is First Horizon Bank. We’re very grateful in the latter part of 2023. Do you have them aboard sponsoring the show, helping us out? We will be having them go into the new year in 2024, and we just appreciate them coming alongside of us with the passion that they have for people that we share with them.
They in banking needs us in mental health and substance abuse concern. Yeah, they have over 400. First Horizon Bank. We appreciate you. Check them
John-Nelson Pope: out. They have over 400 locations. Go ahead, John. They have over 400 locations spread throughout. So, I, I think you’re very accessible. You’re, and they’re all a hometown bank.
And yet they.
Chris Gazdik: Where are they centered? Did we learn [00:04:00] where their headquarters are?
Victoria Pendergrass: It was is it Memphis? No. Memphis, Tennessee. Right.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. First Verizon bank. Check them out guys. So let’s get to what we’re talking about today. But three questions I say really are the Harlow days hard for you and do you know how to overcome the challenges?
I mean, those are just basic questions that obviously in the way that this show was framed, you know, for you to really think about. And then It was interesting for me to think about, guys. Have the holidays always been hard for you? And part of what we’ll get into talking about, that I had an interesting thought, that kids likely are going to answer that question, no.
And so the curiosity that I have is what happens to us adults, where we all kind of know universally, yeah, they really are. So I thought we’d spend a little bit of time, you know, getting to that. I’m gonna do a reveal. John can decide to do a reveal, and Victoria can decide to do a reveal, [00:05:00] if you want to.
If you don’t, that’s fine too. But, for me, I wanted to
John-Nelson Pope: He must have angered the gods.
Chris Gazdik: It makes the holidays. Cracking up on YouTube, sorry, you know.
John-Nelson Pope: Hey, check, check your audio, Chris. Your, your
Chris Gazdik: audio’s kinda weird. We, we can hear you, but it’s, I think your ear pods are disconnected.
Ear pods are disconnected. What are you, what are you doing? Did you, did
John-Nelson Pope: you touch your phone or did it make its own sound? Do they need to be recharged?
I’ll tell you what makes the holidays hard for me. I’ll tell you what makes the holidays hard for me. Technical difficulties, so.
Chris Gazdik: Should I just log out and log back in for Try It Out Loud? You can try it to see if your ear buds, cause I think your ear pods just disconnected.[00:06:00]
Is that better? Yeah. Better. It went off again. It came back up. There we go. Back to my personal reveal after technical difficulties. Oh, amateurs, John. These freaking
John-Nelson Pope: amateurs. Definitely. That’s why I’m wired. Can’t mess that up.
Chris Gazdik: No, for me, one of the things that I’ve always felt the strain and stress for, and I think everyone’s experience is different, but I wanted to kind of reveal that in a way that. You know, all the way back to when Christopher was a little Christopher, and the reality was I had experienced a divorce. I’ve kind of talked about that before.
So, you know, I had the experience as a young child, you know, 10, 11 years old, of like, okay, what’s going to happen here? [00:07:00] Dad’s house, I’m going to mom’s house, when do I get to dad’s, when do I get to mom’s, it was just like, wow, you know, that, that angst that they had about their kids in the holidays just kind of poured out onto me.
And then, you know, goodness bless it, I got married, and then, you know, you experience, you know, triple decker, you know, dad’s house, and then mom’s house, and then the in laws, and it’s just like, you know, dang. So it’s like. You know, having to be in multiple places to please multiple people just kind of drove me crazy.
And then, like, you know, travel, you know, and the grandkids came into the picture. So, it, it, it, there’s a lot of reasons why I’ve kind of carried the main vice during the holidays of really being careful of meeting your own expectations rather than the expectations of everyone else. So, I, I, you know, it comes from personal experience in that regard.
But also the, the, the experiences just personally over the. You know, [00:08:00] experience that. So I don’t know if you guys want to mention anything about, you know, what makes the holidays hard for you or not, but I wanted to kind of throw that out there just as a just as a little bit of an example. Do you guys have opening thoughts about what makes the holidays hard besides?
Technical difficulties with computers.
Victoria Pendergrass: I think for me I agree with what you said with even though my parents haven’t gone through a divorce once the whole getting married part and like, then splitting your time between 2 families and then when you add, like, grandkids into that, and then, or like, great grandkids, how.
Difficult that is to, like, drive around North and South Carolina for me, like, on holidays. And then also, I think it’s grief and loss and death like that. I mean, I
know that’s probably so obvious, but like those things [00:09:00] coming into play when you realize that those people aren’t around for the holidays anymore.
Chris Gazdik: Right. Gotcha. Absolutely. I think a lot of people share that in common, john, what are your opening salvos for? Well, this is
John-Nelson Pope: interesting because Victoria said about losing loved ones. That is sort of a snapshot. Of the, of the past of seeing your loved ones as they decline and get older, and then they pass, and and so there’s a little bit of sadness there, but my sense of it was, is that when I was, I had a very happy childhood.
When I, but we moved when I was 10 years old down to Florida and we went from Southeastern Kentucky and it’s, and it’s a very poor area, Southeastern Kentucky, but all my relatives were there. And Christmas was so special. They would have, and it always seemed like it snowed and it always seemed like, and of course it didn’t, but [00:10:00] it just was that memory of all the relatives coming in.
My grandfather was a country doctor and he had his huge old house and he would have of a gathering of all the families of all his children. He had seven children. And so the house was full of like 50 grandchildren and spouses and, you know, and great grandchildren. It was just a wonderful time. Moved to Florida and I was so homesick and I could count the days literally beginning in September.
For Christmas to come down and then I noticed that as I was getting closer and closer to Christmas, this was by the time I was 12, 13 years old. And looking forward to going and driving up to Kentucky is that I had this sense of ennui. It was a sense of sadness because I knew that once I got up there, then that would, that [00:11:00] joyful time would be ending and we would start the new year.
And so that was kind of a sad time for us. And so I didn’t mean to go off on that, but it was just such a magnificent time with family and the pies and the, and the turkey and the ham and the, the duck and the goose. I mean, I’m, I’m adding things there, the duck and the goose and the oysters. So it was just absolutely fantastic.
And then go back to Florida and it’s 80 degrees. And it wasn’t Christmas anymore. Obviously it was over, but,
Chris Gazdik: It was definitely weird. Yeah. I felt weird being my first Christmas in Florida, actually, you know, was, was odd. It was like, it’s so warm
and all the lights are on and stuff. I mean, I just think there’s some difference in it that people experience.
And so real quick before we get to our list and, and I guess I wanted to say off the front end and I got this. My mind got to like my audio and stuff like You know it is curious to [00:12:00] me along the lines of what we just shared for our own experiences And thanks guys because that was unprompted And genuine in the moment like, you know, I think it’s fair to say that kids will say pretty universally No, the holidays are great.
Love them. Can’t wait for them pretty all the time but adults And I think that’s, like, almost universal. First of all, do you, y’all agree with me? And what are your supposition as to why that might be the case? It just, doing the show prep, that made me curious.
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, I mean, kids are resilient, first of all.
So, like, when things happen, they bounce back a lot quicker and a lot more effectively than adults do. Do you feel like,
John-Nelson Pope: I’m sorry. No, go ahead. Do you feel like when they start hitting adolescence, that’s when there’s the, the hormones, the mood changes. And so you get the ennui. I mean, and I said, I use that term again, [00:13:00] but that sense of just you’re happy, but you’re also sad.
There’s a sense of emptiness and loneliness that might happen to an adolescent. And as they get older and then when one is in college and young adulthood, there may be problems with a sense of
Chris Gazdik: isolation. It’s interesting, John. I think, you know, you might be onto something and I want to get onto thinking about our list because I think we could really ponder this for a while.
But what I hear you saying is there are really developmental milestones, different experiences. And, you know, as you grow from a little kiddo with all of the magic. Going to a young adult, the magic is kind of gone. And then as an adult, it’s kind of like, well, okay, what are we supposed to do here? So it’s, it definitely changes as you go along with what your brain development,
John-Nelson Pope: what sounds like that, that childhood where you’re like in middle childhood or late childhood, there’s still even that [00:14:00] expectancy of Santa Claus.
And then you don’t have that anymore. The magic,
Chris Gazdik: people are really, really sad, which we talked about a couple of weeks ago, you know, when we, when we talked about the Santa Claus and how to deal with that issue and it just, you know, it does come back to my mind that that becomes so super. Let me put both you guys on the spot.
We deal with this all the time and I wanted to say this on the front And I forgot about it again The this is a little bit of a morbid show it what you might think what makes the holidays hard but it You know It’s something that we need to deal with because it’s something that a lot of a lot of
John-Nelson Pope: people you mean Santa got run over by a reindeer
Chris Gazdik: You gotta sing it now
John-Nelson Pope: Santa I I can’t sing it
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, I guess so. And you know, so we want to talk about the cures that we want to talk about like how to have an uplifting kind of beat here, but we also have to be realistic about what really people struggle with. So that being said, John and Victoria, like, [00:15:00] what are the things that you deal with in your office?
What do you think specifically sort of makes things? John, I’m curious to go to you because you haven’t seen the list I played with. I’m actually going to read the list and I actually just want to go through and figure out, like, what do we tell people, right?
John-Nelson Pope: Well, I, I, you’re asking me what, what some of the negative things that are going on with people for, for Christmas.
Right.
Chris Gazdik: What is the true reality and what makes it
John-Nelson Pope: hard? I think, There is with some, there’s a, a sense especially with people that are divorced or separated with their, from their partners, they’re separated from their partners, they’re separated from their children, they get very despondent sometimes, and I’ve had clients that engaged in a lot of drinking.
And all that does is just kind of jack up the the cycle of depression and so I, I get that I mostly deal with adults, not so many like young people, but [00:16:00] most of it would be that, that sense of, of, of real loss that they’ve had and that they had something and that there was an idealization of how things were for them.
When they were together as a family.
What do you think? Absolutely.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. John Victoria, what is, what would you be like your top five list? If you guys come up with something I didn’t have, I’m going to be shocked.
Victoria Pendergrass: I would say when it comes to kids or like young teenagers, mainly it’s. When their parents are divorced or like I said earlier, grief, loss, death, those types of things.
I think sometimes just the expectations that come with the holidays can be kind of hard for people to manage and then people spiral. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: And you [00:17:00] know, it’s funny. One of my early claim to fame moments, I actually got like a TV spot interview, right? And it was talking about the holiday blues. And you know, I don’t know if you ever done news stuff, but I’ve been on the news and it’s like, you know, they come in.
Interview you got this camera and they have this conversation. It’s like this 20 minute production and then you get like a couple of clips. And so, you know, I watched it on the news and I’m like, Oh wow, they cut out so much, but that’s fine because the one thing that they got was really, really important.
How do you manage the holiday blues? And Victoria, you just kind of touched on it as well as where I touched on it, where. You know, you get caught into a spiral downward trend when you really try to meet the expectations of others instead of meeting your own expectations. And I think that’s a huge piece of what creates distress, right?
Listen, listen to this. Listen to this list, right? So I used almost all the letters. I’m just going to read them and I don’t want to go down and talk about it with real solutions. So it’s
John-Nelson Pope: going to be when we didn’t [00:18:00] start the fire. Are you going to be doing that? Sort of like the Billy Joel song, we didn’t start the fire, so are you going to do the list?
Chris Gazdik: Yes, absolutely. Alright, sorry. I hope that you’re going back on a musical theme there, John. Yeah, I know. I do know the song. Victoria, do you know the song?
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah, because I’m pretty sure Fallout Boy redid it.
Chris Gazdik: She knows the redo. Real issues, real solutions. Addiction and relapse, depression, social phobia, new family experiences with newlyweds, blended family issues.
What happens in hospitals? Sicknesses don’t plan the date, right? Mental health hospitals, just the same. Travel, stress, financial distress. Grief and prior loss, military families, weight distress, relationship estrangements, divorce, new empty nests, religious persecution, how [00:19:00] about that one, right? Caretaking role, elder care when they’re in nursing homes, untimely accidents, trauma effects, especially with family, domestic violence.
Unemployment. I actually started to struggle at this point. I wanted to get all the letters. Letter X, if you’re counting the alphabet, is actually war. How about war in the holidays that we have around the world, right? And then I ended with shame based feelings. You know, I’m not enough. I’ve done something wrong, etc.
And I have letter Z as the focus that we want to end with that creates the hope. I’ll leave that as a cliffhanger. That’s a heck of a list when you really look at real specific problems. And I want to talk about real and specific solutions,
John-Nelson Pope: right? Yeah. You know, another thing, did you mention natural disasters,
Chris Gazdik: for example?
I did not. That could be a legit Z.
John-Nelson Pope: Because of the tsunami that was horrific back on Christmas time. It was almost 20 years ago now and and it killed [00:20:00] over 300, 000 people. A lot of loss. Wow. Also in in the US if you get the warm fronts going during that time, you get the tornadoes and a lot of houses and trailers are destroyed, a lot of property, a lot of lives lost.
Chris Gazdik: Not only mentioned house fires with heaters and stuff that are in house. I mean, stuff really happens and when something happens that clicks into your memory and when you get to future Christmases, you remember those memories. It’s amazing the way the psychology of that works. The
John-Nelson Pope: loved ones who died on Christmas.
Yes. Or around Christmas.
Chris Gazdik: Right. Right. It’s a powerful, powerful source of sadness and renewed grief for people and these things are all riding around in our mind and so, you know, how do we, how do we deal with this? I know there’s a lot on my list and I, and I, and I almost feel like each one of them can be a whole show note, but so I just kind of thought like.
What kind of immediate thoughts? Let’s take a snapshot of [00:21:00] what we might be able to suggest for these types of things. Does that sound like we could do a rapid fire guys and then kind of talk about all that we were thinking about While we went through how about that? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. The first one that came onto my list in my mind was addiction and relapse Because as a substance abuse professional, I’ve thought about that a lot and I’ve worked with that a lot.
Like, I would say the recovering community really does a good job of really kind of wrapping around as a community and as a, as a, as a, as a culture to kind of help people, you know, maintain their sobriety through, through this tough time. Have either of you guys dealt much with John, I think you’ve talked about addiction.
What would you say to the recovering
John-Nelson Pope: community? Oh, well, I. This is a very, it’s interesting that what I say is you need to be with your mentor, your sponsor rather also have that great support. One of the people in the religious services, for example, [00:22:00] Even if they’re not actively involved with AA, that they would, that they would participate in a community aspect so that they’re not by themselves and isolated or self isolating.
Then so that’s just kind of what I would say
Chris Gazdik: that’s what comes in my mind first as well john and I think that with this rapid fire what comes in our mind first because We deal with all of these issues and i’m thinking community community community. You don’t be isolated alone Be with the group and that works re
John-Nelson Pope: that’s one of the things that we’re asking when people Have their slips or their relapses and hopefully it’s just a slip, but when they have their relapses is that they do not reach out to their sponsors, they do not reach out to their community, and if you have to go to 10 AA meetings, do it.
Absolutely. All
Chris Gazdik: day long. They have meetings and groups that last all [00:23:00] day. It’s wonderful. And it’s a good time. Yeah. Have a blast. And if
John-Nelson Pope: you think you can do this by yourself, you’re diluting yourself. And so you are, you’re setting yourself up to, to relapse.
Chris Gazdik: Do you have any thoughts about that? Cause I don’t know that you work with addiction as
Victoria Pendergrass: much.
Yeah. I mean, I’m still pretty new or early on, I guess if you could say, in working with addiction. I mean, I would just second everything that John said. I mean, I would. Tell clients basically the same thing, lean on your support system, you know, don’t go at it alone, take precautions, you know, I mean, you can like set yourself up for success.
Chris Gazdik: I think, interestingly enough, to transition, Victoria, you deal with a whole lot more, right, is depression. It’s the second one on my list in our rapid fire, because I think it’s a similar solution. What say you?
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah, support, you know, find the happy, try to replace, you know, a lot. I think a lot of these [00:24:00] things that we have on this list can be just like replacing bad experiences with positive ones.
And so. Like, yeah, finding the happy, finding the joy where you can, when you can and again, not letting yourself spiral, lean on your support system, all those things.
John-Nelson Pope: Work, work with your anger, because I think in terms of depression. That a lot of anger and depression are the same coin. It’s just opposite sides.
They’re same thing. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: That’s an expression. Anger and depression are on the same coin. Right. Yeah. For me, it really, I thought that was a similar thing with the addiction, just because of the idea that being really into the need to not isolate. Really, it is very similar in that regard to addiction in the holidays.
Because depression you want to isolate anyway. I’ve said many times over that isolation is enemy number one for depression. So you think you want to be [00:25:00] alone and not deal with the stress, avoid the stores, do all of that. Oh, that is a, that is a recipe for not good when it comes to depression. We want to do the exact opposite.
Okay. Rapid fire. I think we’re doing pretty good. Social phobia. What about that? With all these crowds, all of these holidays, all of these stuff that’s going on, you know, how do you deal with that when you have real experience with that specific type of anxiety?
Victoria Pendergrass: Amazon.
Chris Gazdik: Amazon is your friend. That’s for sure.
Victoria Pendergrass: I mean, like, I think it’s the same, like, you know, it’s the same, like, advocating for yourself. If you know, like, it’s okay to put yourself out there and try to break through the phobia, but if it has a really strong hold on you, like, try to avoid those situations. Like, if you know, If you don’t like big crowds, like, order all your Christmas presents online.
Like, or do, like, Target Drive Up Pickup, which is one of my personal favorites. Like, there’s alternatives for still being able to [00:26:00] participate in the holidays without having to, like, succumb to your phobia. Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: Well, one of the, one of the things that I, that I think, because I deal, you know, work with veterans that have developed significant PTSD.
And part of that, there’s an anger at God that something bad happened, horrible things happened, but, and people don’t want to be in, in a, in a church service. The other aspect is that, that fear that comes over someone. Having to be with a large group. And one of the things that I’ve suggested to some of my clients, and I think that, and some of them have taken me taken it up and were successful, is that instead of having to go up front and meet people, they sit in the back of the pew, by the, in the back of the church, and there’s people there, there’s activities going there, or let’s say [00:27:00] synagogue.
And then they’re able to, to actually worship communal communally, and at the same time not have to be so stressed out that they have to meet everybody, and they can leave before the end of the service, and, you know. Well,
Chris Gazdik: you know, it’s interesting. I love, I I love that. I, I’m, I don’t wanna disagree with you, Victoria, but I was listening to you and thinking, and John, I think you’re, you’re saying something similar, but be there and engage, but, but in a different way.
Yeah. You know, in therapy when it comes to social phobia and anxiety, the idea oftentimes is you immerse yourself and really try to work towards engaging that. And that can be hard. I was actually thinking what came to my mind first when I. I was thinking about this listening, you guys is sort of different from don’t isolate, engage with anxiety or with depression and or substance abuse.
To me, what occurs to me is. Definitely don’t isolate and don’t engage. That is a fight for somebody that has anxiety, though. We need to realize that. But instead, make sure that people, or [00:28:00] at least somebody in that community, knows that that’s the case. Yeah, John’s clapping on YouTube, right? So that, that, that person can be an advocate and aid, a help to you.
And you can leave if you need to. They, they’ll escort you out, or we’ll, we’ll work together on that. I think that’s important.
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, yeah, and I think I say a lot, what, what, what, what. Does that make sense? Yeah, and I think with, like, what I say, it’s more, like, I know the holidays are a lot, and so there are other opportunities for you to, like, immerse yourself in, like, Conquering your phobia, but like, you don’t, I think you don’t always have to like choose to do it during the holidays because they’re already stressful, like on top of it with everything else that we experienced throughout the holidays for the most
Chris Gazdik: part.
So you’re giving permission for people to really have that struggle. And I, yeah, and I
John-Nelson Pope: believe in a general landing. So that’s why I said that sort of in between the two is that. They’re able to, to, to [00:29:00] reach out. There’s a great Tom Petty song, Refugee. You don’t have to live like a refugee. Love that. Yeah.
Yeah. You can be a part of something. greater than yourself.
Chris Gazdik: Now we’re getting a groove with his bit with his virtual stuff. We, we, we just incorporated the song earlier. Yeah. Failed a little bit, but that was perfect. John. All right. New family experiences, new ways. And I’m going to blend in blended family issues and things that happen.
You know, when you talked about blended families and step parenting, gosh, there’s a plethora of challenges that people have with these different extended family members in these different new situations that you encounter. I mean, it’s just a lot. And I think what I want to kind of say that comes to my mind with this, that people are struggling with is this is a perfect reframe.
Yes, it’s new. And in that newness of all that you’ve got going on, it’s new. There’s a wonderful opportunity to create new traditions, [00:30:00] new routines, new experiences, new fun, new hope, new joy. It’s a lot new, but new doesn’t have to be bad. That’s what occurs to me.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah, I was gonna say boundaries.
Boundaries, boundaries, boundaries. Like, you know, you can As a semi newlywed, I guess, I mean, four years, I guess the newest one out of all of us, like you kind of, yeah, you kind of have to like set your boundaries and say, you know, like I’ve am informing my family, for example, that this year, this is the last year that we will be traveling on Christmas day, like next year, we, I will be staying at my house.
with my kid and my husband on Christmas day. And I am not, I’m not traveling all over North and South Carolina to like, see everybody we can jump it out of
Chris Gazdik: my skin. Cause I did the same thing. I’m like, we can
Victoria Pendergrass: do things other days, but like Christmas day, I want to wake up like in my own house, in my [00:31:00] PJs with my small family and like, enjoy our time together without having to worry about like throwing everybody in a car and driving.
It’s
Chris Gazdik: exciting and fun. Right? Yeah. Boundaries. Yeah. John, what do you say? Oh,
John-Nelson Pope: I would, I would say ditto on that. We did it a little differently. But when, when our kids were of age like kids, the Santa Claus stage, we, we celebrated Christmas at our home. And Joy’s, my wife’s mother would come And, and join us with the unwrapping of the presents and my mother didn’t but we did that later because everybody was in town at that time, but it was something where you had, you develop your own traditions.
Yeah. That’s very, very important and to respect those traditions so that the kids will have a good experience and I’m assuming kids. we’ll, we’ll say [00:32:00] this is what my experience was and adds to that positive experience. Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: I’m saying new, new and fun, new and energizing, not new and bad, new and loss, right?
Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: And, and, and blended families. I know that that’s very, very difficult, but, and I think it’s very incumbent upon the, the partner, the spouse of, of let’s say the step parents and that sort of thing, that they would be, everybody would be on the same team. I know that doesn’t always happen. Reality is such that it doesn’t.
But if you can make it as positive as possible, remember, it’s not about you. It’s about your family, your children.
Chris Gazdik: So let’s combine together a little bit. What happens in hospitals? You know, sicknesses don’t plan the date. I. And mental health hospitals are just the same, you know, the, the, the reality that nurses out there, man, that’s another one, you know, work.
I didn’t have that on my list. Right. But sometimes [00:33:00] work is a distress and a, and a, and a source of the, the harm and struggle.
John-Nelson Pope: I’ve worked all my, all my career as a pastor. I mean, as a chaplain and as pastor. I’ve done these Christmas shifts, and people are kind of really lonely. They’re difficult, and especially if somebody is that that you’re, let’s say, a young mother nurse, and you are, are nurse’s aide, or, or CNA rather, assistant, then you’re also having to deal with, I can’t be with my kids.
Right. I can’t be with, I can’t be with my spouse or my partner.
Chris Gazdik: I don’t know what, you know, it’s interesting. It’s a tough one. What is the solution here? I think the solution is maybe occurs to me of getting.
Getting an openness to shift as you need to work a shift, right? Like, it doesn’t have to be the way everyone else does it.
You can celebrate Christmas [00:34:00] on, you know, the 26th or the 24th, right? Yeah, I mean, that’s okay, but I think people get so rigid.
John-Nelson Pope: No, it doesn’t have to be Christmas. That Christmas day could be the boxing day, the 26th. Or it could be Christmas Eve. So that’s that’s good. That’s what we did when we sometimes it would take us a little while when we were stationed in the Philippines.
And if we happen to get to the States, it was hard to get there. And if we did, it might be a day late, but so family, we all did a big family gathering on the 26th instead of the 25th.
Chris Gazdik: And just to make this even real I’m going to share I think I’ve said, you know, I’m super proud of, of Adam, my son, who is currently in bootcamp, like we’re not going to have him for Christmas this year.
It’s just, we’re just not. We’ll be able to talk on the phone. I know, right?
John-Nelson Pope: Thanks, John. He needs to talk to the [00:35:00] chaplain if he’s got it. Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: probably, probably so, but we’re going to do FaceTime in this net. But my big point is, guys, we kind of celebrated Christmas on Thanksgiving. Now, I know that might be like a bummer still, but I really.
We got him his record player. He’s all into records now and a vinyl. And it was a new, a new hobby of his. And that was so pleasurable. It wasn’t Christmas. It’s not going to be Christmas day. And I’m not saying I’m happy about that, but it’s okay. Is, is the main, is the main point. Flexible. Yeah. What do you think in Victoria hospitals?
My
Victoria Pendergrass: mom always says that the ER is busiest on holidays and weekends. So like, don’t go getting hurt on the holidays or the weekends, but yeah, I think it’s just about being flexible and knowing that like, like how I gave with my example earlier, how, you know, I’m spending Christmas day next year with my [00:36:00] family at home, like we’re going to be flexible and we’re going to find another day to celebrate Christmas with.
Like our families and laws and everything. So I think it’s very similar to workers, you know, who are not just in hospitals and, you know, mental health hospitals, but anybody that has to work on Christmas day, wherever, like, or Christmas Eve, Christmas day, like. Just because everybody else in the world is celebrating it, or who celebrates Christmas does it on the 25th, doesn’t mean that you have to.
Chris Gazdik: Absolutely. Well,
John-Nelson Pope: when I was again, going in the Navy, and I’m so proud of Adam. Is that overseas is that we had Sunday or Christmas morning services. We did that. And then after, after we celebrated Christmas with the kids on, on base, I went and I would go and sit with all the people that were [00:37:00] having to do duty.
And I would have, I’d go to the, to the mass. And have a Christmas dinner with them and they appreciated that or I’d go to the brig and I’d visit with the break people
Chris Gazdik: and John, you’re such a sweet soul. I honestly goodness. I’m so glad that you worked with. I
John-Nelson Pope: wish therapist could do that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
So, yeah, it’s also
Chris Gazdik: important. Yeah. It’s crucial. It’s really it’s just how much love and kindness can you give rather than receive on christmas? How about that as a little bit of a solution? Highlight, so, you know, let’s take a quick break and and I want to mention two things one if you’re following all on youtube live, you know pop in the the comments, you know What is your you know struggle that you know people have and and we’ll answer it if we’re not answering it Also, we really want you to click the subscribe button on youtube.
So that’s an ask that we have click the subscribe button moving along though travel stress and financial [00:38:00] distress Yeah, I know right? Boy, what’s what’s the answer? What’s the solution? What’s the cure for i 85 here in town on the holidays? Or I 95 going to Florida. Avoid it. Oh, I 95 is terrible. I 77 is awful.
Victoria Pendergrass: If you can, I would say, not just planning for travel, but also like, did you say financial too? I did. For financial, and I’ve been mentioning this with a couple of my clients, is it’s funny how all year long we
know that Christmas is going to happen. Yes. Like all year long it’s going to happen. But yet, people don’t start like, Financially planning for Christmas until like Thanksgiving or right before Thanksgiving.
And you’re like, okay, well back in April, you knew that you were going to buy like this 300 treadmill or whatever for your cousin. And like, you know, you can save [00:39:00] throughout the year.
Chris Gazdik: Like you got it.
John-Nelson Pope: That is a three 300 clothes rack.
Chris Gazdik: That’s what they tend to be John. I agree.
Victoria Pendergrass: I mean, it’s just like on both aspects, financial and travel.
I think it’s just planning like. You know, you can, you know, if you, if you’re traveling and you’re able to travel like two days before Christmas, where traffic might be a little bit easier or less or whatever, like, you know, figure out if there’s an easier way, back roads, whatever, same thing with financial, like, you can plan and save throughout the year so that that way when Christmas comes around.
You’re able to like, financially support your daily bills and necessities, but also like, get the things you want for other people for Christmas.
John-Nelson Pope: And not everybody has that ability. They’ve to, to plan. We under, [00:40:00] right. And understand that, but the kids shouldn’t have to suffer. I think there’s some, some sense that as much one may feel pride.
There’s nothing wrong with going to Salvation Army, or Samaritan’s Purse, or Angel Tree, which is, all of those things can take advantage of, of those services. Toys for Tots, for example, done by the best branch of the service, other than the Navy, the Marine Corps, which is, is so important that,
Chris Gazdik: that people, And John, I think the thing is, is to allow that, like I hear you saying.
Like part of what I was thinking when you were talking Victoria is to give yourself the allowance of that flexibility And john, you’re you’re adding. Yes the permission the allowance like Feelings and be careful about that taking over because so many people just ban themselves from health that’s out there john.
Yeah
John-Nelson Pope: That’s it. That’s in So there’s that [00:41:00] isolation that that takes Give me an example was that there was in Florida last year, remember the Christmas cold snap that we had and it was the coldest even though there’s global warming and all of that, it was probably one of the coldest Christmases that that was there in Florida.
And I remember riding my I, I take my bike down and and my parents and then I, I ride it to Planet Fitness and I went to there was a homeless woman and she had severe psychiatric issues and I, I asked her if there was a way that we could help her and it was just this, this horrible example where she, She was so closed off from, because she needed to be warm, she needed shelter, and she was, she was refusing it.
And, if, if, in this [00:42:00] case, the woman had such severe mental illness that she wasn’t able to, to, to receive that help. But, that is, if there’s any time that a person can go out and ask for help, it’s Christmas. It’s the holidays. Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: absolutely. If you give permission, allow yourself. Absolutely. We mentioned grief and prior losses.
I mean, that really is a whole show. It’s what people are experiencing a lot, and we covered military families with some of the grief and, you know, change with new experiences. I don’t know, guys. This is kind of a big one. It’s a heavy hitter, and I think that I would refer, you know, everyone to our shows that we talked about grief.
Because. I don’t know. Is this, is this the big one? Is this the back daddy during the holidays? I think
John-Nelson Pope: so. Especially, I think if it’s if it’s a, if you’re a parent and you’re, you had a child die anywhere [00:43:00] near Christmas day or a birthday.
Chris Gazdik: Or any day for that matter.
Victoria Pendergrass: I think it’s, I also think it’s more along the lines of if it’s, if this is the first Christmas That you’re experiencing without them.
Yeah, like just past this year, you know, and this is the first Christmas without them. I think that’s typically like when it’s I don’t know. I mean, I can’t speak for everybody’s grief, but that
Chris Gazdik: tends to be what it is. Actually, I want to jump in, Victoria. I want to jump in because I learned something from my friend who I’ve mentioned on the show several times, Aaron, who lost his 13 year old son.
And he actually said, you know, the second year is harder than the first. I’d never heard that before. I don’t think it gets easier. Yeah, you know, people often times fall into the trap of not even just like saying, you know what, the heck with the holidays, we’re not celebrating them. And you know what, I want to give permission for that as well.
Like, that’s okay if that’s where you land. There are no hard and [00:44:00] fast rules here. But, but there is laws that you have to deal with and this forces it at you.
John-Nelson Pope: I would agree with that. It’s been from my own experience and doing a lot of the grief counseling is that there’s a lot of attention paid the first year and then, and then boom, then it starts to, because you don’t have that you can’t rely on that support group anymore and people mean well, but then they don’t you know, like I had one woman say to one of my clients.
Well, and it was her sister and she said, well, I can’t deal with you anymore because you’re too broken. Oh boy. Yeah. Yeah. Ouch. And so she felt ultimately, yeah. So, I think if it’s a very bad time, you, you dial try to, to reach out if you feel like you can’t talk to somebody, dial 988, [00:45:00] I believe. Is that what it is?
Yeah,
Victoria Pendergrass: that’s the you can text or call.
Chris Gazdik: Huh, yeah. Well, go, go more, Victoria, what that is.
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, okay, so 988 is the National Suicide and Crisis Hotline. Now I think it, I think they released it maybe about like two years ago now, year and
John-Nelson Pope: a half, or year within the last year.
Chris Gazdik: Has
Victoria Pendergrass: it? Okay. So within the last
20, 22, yeah. Yeah, and so you can call or text it. So they created 988 because it’s a lot easier to remember, like 911, rather than a 10 digit phone number. Which I think is what it was before. So now you can, yeah, now you can dial 988. You can text or call and there’s a professional on the phone or someone ready to talk to you.
And I think that’s great because especially during the holidays, we don’t always have people that we can talk to or that we feel comfortable talking to, or even sometimes we don’t want to [00:46:00] talk on the phone. Like sometimes I just want to, I. Can’t verbally say it, but I can text it
Chris Gazdik: Love that absolutely in it and it works guys.
Yeah, it is free. It’s it’s and it’s anywhere in the country I called him on the way to west virginia on a road trip just to see what would happen on I 77 in the in the hills of west virginia and somebody was there to take my call. I loved it Yeah, did it
John-Nelson Pope: did the state trooper pull you over on the turnpike?
Chris Gazdik: They did not sir. No, no, no They did not All right. Here’s a little bit of a different one, but still, you know, maybe a little bit funner than you know That grief and loss is a heavy one Heavy get that weight Issues weight distress concerns about nutrition and weight like people don’t think about that.
But boy,
Victoria Pendergrass: no.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Oh, yeah, boy That one gets you right victoria.
Victoria Pendergrass: Oh, yeah I mean, especially if you’re someone who like already struggles with weight and I feel like it’s It’s not, it’s not fair that Thanksgiving and Christmas and [00:47:00] New Year’s are all like right now, and it’s like food, food, you know, and so, and beer and wine and alcohol and like, you know, all these other things that like make you so floated and like make you gain weight.
And you’re like, I’m just trying to have fun and like have my cake and eat it too. And. Again, I think, I think and could be wrong, but I think again, when I say like planning, I think a lot of it goes like you need to make sure you’re not depriving yourself of fun. But also like, I think just planning, you know, like what you’re going to eat, incorporating exercise still like in a healthy way,
Chris Gazdik: new tradition.
Yeah, I think that is the case. You know, I’ve worked with Cirilla, our, our, our lovely nutritionist. And she, she actually helped me understand, like, you know, you can make a huge vegetable based plate, like, [00:48:00] Oh, I didn’t know that, like, I don’t know why, because, you know, you get so rich into these traditions and it just adds to the problem that you’re already having.
And so, yeah, you know, let yourself create, let yourself have fun with it.
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, like, and like, sorry, John,
John-Nelson Pope: that’s okay. Go
Victoria Pendergrass: ahead. So it’s like when you make a salad. And you add your tomatoes and your cranberries and your, you know, your feta cheese or whatever you’re adding. And then you add your dressing.
Well, the amount of dressing that you add does not take away the nutritional value of the lettuce and the tomatoes and the healthy things that you already put in your salad, like those still have nutritional value. So I think just. It’s all going to be okay. Like you can work with it and if you need help, yeah, like reach out.
If you need help planning, like reach out to someone like Cirilla who can help you like prep and prepare for the holidays in a new, healthy, like nutritional
John-Nelson Pope: way. But food and guilt kind of work [00:49:00] together and a lot of times in shame. And so one of the things is when I was growing up is I tended to be a little, you know, they put me in the husky jeans, that sort of thing.
So I, I graduated out of that, but, but I would have one of the, the, my grandparents who would, she would make the most rich desserts and food. And then she’d say, are you having too much or something like that? So what I’ve learned over the years of having is for me is I give myself by days and a by day would be Christmas and I don’t feel guilty at all.
Love that. And then what I do is I, I, I step down and I don’t have to eat all those leftovers the day after. Those leftovers are going to be good for three or four days. And I can eat them a little bit at a [00:50:00] time afterwards and not have
Chris Gazdik: only three or four days. I go maybe a couple of weeks, man. Chicken is still edible.
I don’t know. Victoria. Yeah. Yeah. Well, he’s no, no,
Victoria Pendergrass: no, no. Your your leftovers are not good for that long.
Chris Gazdik: Alright, listen, let’s move. Let’s move on since
John-Nelson Pope: I have. If Cirilla’s listening, she’s probably.
Chris Gazdik: My god. Upset with me. Yeah. Relationship estrangements, divorce, and I’m throwing an empty nest like, you know, these are things we’ve mentioned already a little bit, but.
You know, I think I would climp them into like, look, yes, things are different and allowing yourself the permission to create new things. It isn’t just a a, a silly cognitive reframe that I’m throwing out from a therapist’s brain. I’m [00:51:00] saying like, it really is legit. Things really are different, and the beauty is you get to create newness in that different, and I want to, to get excited about that.
I want to, to, to, to encourage people to. To revel in that and, and make the day what it is that you want to be staying present is, is an important piece of that.
Victoria Pendergrass: I agree. Also, I mean, the holidays are a great time to like rekindle relationships, to mend those bridges, broken bridges. Yeah, that’s true. And, you know, I mean.
A lot of times we do, you know, even though we look at the holidays as stressful, they are a time of like joy and being kind and being forgiving and providing grace to yourself and like other people. So I think also, you know, it’s a great time to reach out to those estranged relationships and possibly, you know, heal with them [00:52:00] and like be able to move forward.
Chris Gazdik: I love that. I hadn’t thought of that. That’s why I think our initial impressions are are kind of cool in this rapid fire thing. That’s, that’s really awesome, Victoria. That’s totally part of the new. You can revisit the old and establish those reconnections. I
John-Nelson Pope: love that. Self acceptance in the sense that you have Maybe you run into people, I run into people all the time.
There’s an old Dan Fogelberg song because they don’t write them like they used to, but it’s, it’s same old side by Dan Fogelberg, and it was where he meets a former lover on after Christmas. And they’re, they go through, he had all these
emotions, and bitterness, and sadness, and innocence, and he said, we drank a toast to innocence.
We drank a toast to time, reliving in our eloquence another old Langside. And just for a moment, I was back at school, and I felt that old familiar pain. And as I turned to make my [00:53:00] way back home, the snow turned into rain. And so it shows the transitions. Wow. Yeah. So I,
Chris Gazdik: I, I think. Transitions is a good word there.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because that’s the whole new year, too. Right. So maybe we need to do something on the new year, because I asked people about resolutions this year, and my, a lot of my clients, they said, I don’t do resolutions. I don’t want to disappoint myself. But there’s, there’s a, there’s a chance that maybe you can make a change that’s positive.
Chris Gazdik: And, you know, with divorce, you’re renewing some things. With relationship estrangements, Victoria, you kind of said, you know, you have a renew. And empty nesting, though it’s sad the kids are leaving, we have that this year. I mean, Adam’s in boot camp. You know, that one’s near and dear in my heart right now.
But, you know, there’s also newness in that. So you can renew and have new. I love the the transitions. It’s life [00:54:00] and its transitions is real. Yeah. Yeah Yeah, okay. Let’s let’s move on to to Before we run out of time. I want to get to a couple of these other things, right? Religious prosecution and I developed the idea of war, you know in the world that we have nowadays like You know goodness gracious War what it’s
John-Nelson Pope: good for absolutely nothing in the world Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Edwin Starr. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. So. So it’s, go ahead. Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: No, no, go ahead. What, you’re talking about religious persecution, especially with with the folks of Judaism right now. Yeah. The. And this is, yeah,
Chris Gazdik: and we, you know, we Ramadan and, and, you know, I don’t think any, any group of people is left out of that.
And I think that there’s a, there’s a certain amount of safety that you have to kind of think about, but, but you know what, it’s okay to celebrate your faith [00:55:00] tradition. It’s okay to be, to feel good about that. And that’s hard to stand in the face of that sometimes. So again, it gets back to like, give yourself permission.
Yeah. So here’s another, I think, a big lead, you know, big kind of reality that, that people struggle with, which is caretaking roles and nursing. Yeah. And you mentioned older people, John, with disabilities that kind of come up. This is kind of another big one too, you know, and it touches on that grief and loss thing that I think.
Just cycling our thoughts around this. I mean, that, that, that’s the Mac daddy, I feel like grief and loss. And this is a specific in that nature. I mean, mama’s in the nursing home. Daddy’s in the, you know, unavailable. This is all different. And people really struggle with that. What do y’all think about that off the cuff?
I
Victoria Pendergrass: think a lot of times, like inclusion, like making sure that those people are not forgotten [00:56:00] just because, you know, And I think, again, you know, just because everyone else does things on the 25th does not mean you have to do things on the 25th. There you go again, right? You know, and you can go to, you know, Billy Sue’s Nursing Home on the 27th and open gifts.
It’s still going to be as meaningful as, you know, as if you did it on the 25th. Like,
John-Nelson Pope: you know. So, in other words, instead of cramming everything into one, one day, and that puts a lot of stress, but there’s, there’s also that having to deal with one’s own mortality, because I think when somebody sees a loved one, who’s, who’s having dementia, for example, and it’s a long, slow goodbye.
Bye. Yeah, it’s very difficult and and that you might have trouble, let’s say, with your loved one [00:57:00] who doesn’t recognize you anymore thinks that you’re, that you’re her mother or his mother and it’s a tough one. Yeah, it’s a tough one. It’s a tough one.
Chris Gazdik: And I guess, I guess I hear is really kind of saying, you know, again, getting back to that, you know, we get so steeped in tradition.
We get so steeped in the way that it’s supposed to be that we fail to give ourselves again that that real permission that grace. Yes. Talk about grace. John.
John-Nelson Pope: Grace is, is sort of like that on the It’s that unconditional love that one receives from God or higher power or from other people. It’s that openness to be able to say, okay, or from, or one gives to oneself and that is, I don’t have to have all the answers.
I’m just, I, I’m just a, I’m a human being. I’m sharing in this human experience. [00:58:00] And I’m making myself vulnerable and I’m also letting down some of my guards and allowing myself to be vulnerable to receive a gift that is not necessarily merited. It’s unmerited in many cases and that it’s okay. You don’t have to prove yourself.
You don’t have to, you know show yourself as, as being superior or anything like that. You don’t have to you don’t have to see yourself as inferior. You can actually just be. That’s grace, living in grace.
Chris Gazdik: I love that grace, John, and it relates to the, the, the listing of trauma effects on, especially with family and then, you know, domestic violence when you’re living in a circumstance where you’re not certain about your safety.
You know, the, the grace, the, the, you know, I am hearing some themes, right? You know, the avoid isolation, the, the, the give yourself permission concept, you know, when, when you’re dealing with [00:59:00] trauma, particularly of families, it might be sexual trauma, or you got to be around the cousin who actually.
Perpetrated drama. There’s all sorts of things that kind of pop up with people, right? Like it’s okay to say no I don’t want to be present Boundaries, right? Yeah, it’s it’s a complete sentence Go ahead victoria. What’s
Victoria Pendergrass: that? No is the complete sentence. Yeah
John-Nelson Pope: You don’t have to explain
Victoria Pendergrass: Right, you can just say no.
Hey, are you attending christmas this year? No Next topic. I
Chris Gazdik: love that. I love that. And again, you know, we’re giving you permission to say, you know, sometimes it’s kind of silly that you don’t really realize It’s okay to do this or that or have a different plan or stay in a hotel
instead of your family’s house Like that’s what we’re doing this year can be okay Yeah,
Victoria Pendergrass: yeah, we’re going to greenpole south carolina to see my husband’s family and I [01:00:00] said Like we’re getting a hotel in downtown Yeah, it’s not staying at anybody’s house.
Not that we don’t want them.
Chris Gazdik: And sometimes people might be upset with that. And sometimes, you know, but in there we deal with, you know, conflict and domestic violence. Boundaries. Really big conflict, you know. And boundaries. Boundaries, yeah. Here’s an interesting one for you. How about unemployment occurred to me on my list?
Oh, does that not hit your heart in the holidays?
John-Nelson Pope: Oh, yeah. Unfortunately, there’s a tradition that in the States here is that people are let off at the end of the year and they’re terminated or
Chris Gazdik: fired or We do have that tendency, don’t we?
John-Nelson Pope: Ah, man, that is so cruel. Yeah.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah, like Happy New Year.
You’re fired.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Here’s your lump of coal. How bad is that? I wonder if that’s a thing around the [01:01:00] world too. If that’s just a state’s business. Because you’re right, John. I mean, we, you know, in the states, we do that. I mean, it’s, that’s, gosh, why? Why? I
Victoria Pendergrass: don’t know. A lot of businesses will hire more for the holidays. Just to like, let people go after the holidays end.
I get seasonal people, you know, like retail specifically higher,
Chris Gazdik: for example, Amazon.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. And they tell you up front, like, Hey, we just need you for the holidays. Like, so you’re going in with the expectation that you’re not, but yeah. And unfortunately I think also the unemployment provides a lot of like.
Financial stress if you are going into the holidays unemployed and you haven’t necessarily planned to be able to support yourself during the holidays, because I mean, if you think about it. The amount of money you spend on your regular gifts, but then you have like the [01:02:00] white elephant parties you have the like you got to cook for parties.
You let
John-Nelson Pope: up, you let the white elephant party in our at our office, didn’t you? And so we everybody got to get gifts and all of that. So, yeah, at our office, I made that up. Okay. Well, we, we didn’t exchange gifts, but Victoria, Victoria got a Charlie Brown Christmas tree.
Victoria Pendergrass: No, that is Chris’s. That’s Chris’s tree.
Mine is the full tree out in the lobby. Oh, okay.
Chris Gazdik: I gotta take credit for that, John. I’m not the Mr. Decorator guy. But that Charlie Brown Christmas tree I’ve had with Metro Atlanta for a long time, I love that Charlie Brown Christmas tree. It’s wonderful. Listen, you know, it’s interesting, summarizing a little bit here, guys.
You know, it’s funny, just personally. You know, I think that as we go down through this list, I thought of a few of them. It’s like, you know, Oh boy. You know, restrained relationships in military family, that’s [01:03:00] what I am now. And, you know, empty nest and, you know, and, and el elder care. It’s like, you know, there’s these different things that like, I, I’m gonna be honest with you, I, I have a few of them on the list.
Oh yeah, for sure. Yeah. And, and, and that’s, that’s okay. Like, the thing that I wanna make, the, the loudest point here is, is I enjoy the holidays. Like I’m in good. Even though I had multiples of what we’ve listed out here today, you know, then, and, and I think it’s because honestly, you know, you have to really work at managing your own emotion.
Like managing your own emotional reality. And we can all talk for hours on that. Just a simple small example. One of the small things I’ve done over the years is I made a deal with myself. Like, look, you know, on the holiday day,
wherever I happen to be, I’m going to take a nap. If I just lay down for half an hour.
That’s going to be my, my gift to myself. And I actually don’t carry that out anymore because I don’t need to. But I [01:04:00] think the point I’m making is you may have multiple things on this list. This is manageable. It’s a wonderful time of year, but it, and you have to manage your own emotional realities. In what ways work for you?
Does that make sense
John-Nelson Pope: guys? It does and I’m thinking too now Because i’m somebody who’s very emotional and I cry And all of that, but I don’t do it like I used to when I was when I was a young adult I would have that those highs and those lows and I miss the deep deep emotion of joy of christmas Yeah, I miss that, but I don’t miss the sadness that was there.
The, the, the, the, the downside, I like more of the even keeled nature, the older I’ve gotten, and then I’m able to see things in perspective a lot better, and in one way, I enjoy, I enjoy Christmas more now [01:05:00] than I did 40 years ago, I
Chris Gazdik: think I can see, I can really see that. And that’s developing for me too, as, as, as well.
Victoria, what are you, what are you thinking
Victoria Pendergrass: over there? I’m thinking that you’ve got to find the joy where you can and the positives where you can, I’ve been actually talking to a lot of my clients this week about that in relations to like self care and stuff, but I think it can work great in the holidays.
Like, yes, parts of the holidays suck, you know. That’s just the fact, but if you can find joy when you can, like, for example, I actually enjoy wrapping gifts. Like I would much rather wrap something than like throw it in a bag with some tissue paper. And so I’m in charge of wrapping all the gifts in my house because like, I actually, like that brings me joy.
I like doing it and I don’t necessarily see it as a task, as a burden. You know, I am thoroughly enjoy wrapping [01:06:00] gifts. And so. Like, it’s, I think it’s about finding the joy where you can, and they don’t have to be big things. Like, it can be little things.
John-Nelson Pope: I’ve talked a lot about, I’ve talked a lot about in the past hour about creative things.
It’s a great time, Christmas and the holidays. And I think Eid was at one time around Christmas and of course with Hanukkah is you could be creative and you can go to concerts and you could go to plays. You could do some things that are very affordable. You could go and, and walk in nature. And be in that time and really develop your spirituality during this time.
Chris Gazdik: And Christmas lights. I agree, Christmas lights for sure. You know, listen, I focused on my thought, you know, of really remembering as they. You know, the reason for the season and, and obviously that you could think of Jesus in, in, in, in the religious kind of components of that, but you can [01:07:00] also think of connecting with the people that you’re in relationship with and relating to.
So the, the reason for the season, you know, is. Is is a good focus point and and that’s a joyous occasion with where as you said victoria you find that joy And it doesn’t have to be in the traditional spaces and places or or ways that that is
John-Nelson Pope: What so so you’re you’re saying make me make meaning
Chris Gazdik: And live meaning.
Yeah. Yes. Yes Make meaning and live meaning. I love that but you did a thank you for taking my thoughts and putting it into that framework That is a perfect That is a perfect gift wrapped ending, I think. Make meaning and live meaning. Listen, you know, the holidays really, as John said, are, they’re a beautiful time.
They’re a wonderful time in many ways. There are struggles and we created a long list and talked about really specific things that you can do and that’s just tipping of the iceberg. You know, get help. Don’t be alone. Reach out. [01:08:00] 988. You know, it really is a time for families and fun and joy and creativity and permission and newness and new beginnings and especially, you know, thinking about New Year’s.
So, listen. Have a great holiday season. We’re in the middle of it. I hope you had or have a wonderful holiday. Guys, we’ll be staying with you. We’ll be here, I believe, next week. And we just bid you, bid you a Merry Christmas and soon to be a Happy New Year.
Victoria Pendergrass: Merry Christmas and Happy Ho
John-Nelson Pope: Christmas.
Happy New Year. A blessing. Happy Hanukkah. And Take
Chris Gazdik: care, guys. We’ll see you next week.