How to Cope with Holiday Stress
Society, culture and social media might tell us that the holidays are supposed to be the most wonderful time of the year but for a lot of us, that’s not the full truth.
The holidays can be a complicated time. For some they can activate immense joy, for others there can be a lot of pain and anxiety and for most I’d say it’s probably a mixed bag.
While there’s undoubtedly so much to be grateful for, many of us are stressed out, burnt out, going through major life / career / relationship transitions, dealing with financial strain and not to mention that we’ve been in a pandemic for nearly 3 years that’s deeply and uniquely impacted all of us.
All of these factors can impact our nervous system, leading to higher levels of stress and emotional dysregulation.
For those of you wondering what the nervous system is: the nervous system guides nearly every single thing we think, feel, say or do. A vast network of nerves receives information from the world and then these nerves interpret the information and control our response(s). It is a complex system that operates as the command center for all parts of our body.
As a means of trying to keep us safe, part of these responses are our stress responses: Fight, Flight, Freeze & Fawn.
During the holidays, some examples of what these can look like in real time are:
Fight: hyper-productivity without knowing how to turn off; impulsive behavior (like over spending); agitation; overly-confrontational
Flight: avoidance / avoidant behaviors; jittery body movements; nervous ticks; ghosting
Freeze: Procrastination - waiting until the last minute to buy something, see someone, complete a task, etc
Fawn: People pleasing (saying yes to those holiday functions you actually don’t want to go to); No boundaries (hello over-spending); Struggling to speak up on personal desires / opinions; Saying yes when you want/need to say no (or vise-versa)
In addition to these stress responses getting activated, if we aren't able to get out of them (i.e regulate our nervous system) they can then be the cause for ensuing thoughts, actions and behaviors that lead to / cause more stress for ourselves and others. It can become a vicious cycle.
But it doesn’t have to be this way.
This is why I created "How to Re-Wire Your Stress Response", a 75 minute self-paced workshop giving you foundational tools, techniques and resources to support your nervous system and guide you in emotional regulation.
When we have the tools, resources and information that can help us understand what’s happening to our body as well as begin to learn to self-regulate, we can begin to work with our nervous system instead of against it.
We can learn to reduce our stress in real time which can drastically impact the things we say (or don’t), the people we spend our time with (or don’t) and the decisions we make.
…….Just in time for the holidays 🫠.
For the next week, I’ll be offering this for $33 and after that it will be going up in price.
Sending you much love and regulation,
Bianca