In Part One  of this series last week, I shared two tactics you can use to have less stress and more joy during the holidays. Just by using a few simple tools, you can find yourself looking forward to the holidays rather than dreading them. Here are two more. 

Tactic Three: Look around you.

A pastor friend told me he does more counseling during the holidays than at any other time. He added that people know their lives and families aren’t perfect. However, during the holidays, they have unreasonable expectations or at least make themselves believe other families have it together.

TV commercials paint an idealistic picture. There’s the military son coming home for Christmas or a family gathered around the table, talking and laughing together. And there’s someone buying, giving or receiving the “perfect” gift as they sit there in their “perfect” home with their “perfect” family.

Besides the commercials, other families seem to have it together and to have enough money. We don’t see them wondering where their kid is tonight or asking why their spouse walked away or grieving because someone broke their heart. Comparing our lives with theirs, how can we help but be discouraged?

The first thing we need to understand when we’re comparing our life, our family or ourselves with anyone else is we’re always, and I mean always, comparing our inside with their outside. We can’t know what struggles someone has by looking through the only window they have opened to us. Some people who seem the happiest are dealing with burdens or heartaches that would shatter us if we had to carry them.

If we look around, we’re certain to see someone who is struggling more than we are. And that’s more than a tool; it’s the unvarnished truth. Someone I know said she had found “half a loaf of bread” at Walmart. I realized immediately it couldn’t have come from the bakery that way. It’s more likely someone was hungry enough to steal bread from the loaf. That broke my heart and made me wish I knew who was hungry enough to steal bread so I could share with them from my abundance.

Tactic Four: Reach out to someone.

It had been a tough year financially, and I was doing a paper route and selling “Discovery Toys” on the side. The toys in my kit weren’t age-appropriate for my kids, but the money I made doing the parties would provide Christmas for them. At least I hoped it would.

My daughter Margie and I were collecting money from my paper route. The man who opened the door at one house was surrounded by three or four little kids, and you could almost feel the poverty in that house. He handed me a check he had received as a Christmas gift, already endorsed and made payable to me.

I didn’t want to take that check, but he insisted. He said he wanted his kids to learn that a man pays his bills. As Margie and I drove away, we knew we needed to help them in a tangible way.

We went home and, from my kit, put every toy that was age-appropriate for his kids into a box with wrapping paper and tape. All my other kids helped. Then we went back to that house after dark. We were so stealthy in our approach, it’s a wonder someone didn’t see us and call the police. We put the box on their front porch, rang the bell and ran!

We still had the same problems. We didn’t have any more money than before, and Christmas was still going to be tight. But our spirits were soaring! Why? Because we stopped looking at our “circumstances,” stepped outside ourselves, and saw that other people were hurting. Then we did something about it.

Neither my kids nor I remember what gifts we had that year. But 30 years later, Margie remembers every detail of making Christmas for this honorable man and his family. If you’re struggling this Christmas, maybe it would help to look around and then do something about what you see.

Be sure to check back next week for some more tactics you can use to take the stress out of the holidays. If you missed last week’s tactics, you can find them at www.newsaegis.com.