Prioritizing Your Mental Health During the Holidays - Part 2 - Realistic Expectations
by Adam Nash
Tell me if this sounds familiar: You are preparing for Christmas day when you start thinking “This year has got to be better than last year” or “There is no way my family is gonna be as immature as they were last year”. Then, just like the year before, after the first little while with your family things turn negative and the arguments begin. What can we do to attempt to avoid this situation again this year? Or is it just inevitable that every year will be the same and you should never talk to your family again?
Family Dynamics
Let's first talk a little bit about family dynamics. In the world, every single organism has a desire to maintain “homeostasis”—baseline functioning. This is the state in which that the organism feels the most comfortable. Think about how your body works to keep a consistent temperature. If it’s off by more than a few degrees, your body will begin to work to re-regulate your temperature (think teeth chattering, sweating, that kind of thing). In order to stay at this baseline, organisms will work very hard to keep anything that could throw it off—like a cold virus—out of the system.
What does this have to do with family dynamics? Your family, and mine for that matter, function like an organism. Anytime something within the organism disrupts the normal expectations, the organism will work to regain homeostasis. This is why every year you, and me, come to Christmas gatherings believing that this year is going to be different because we have grown since the year before only to find ourselves responding the same way we did the year before because we have been forced back into the expectations that the family has for us. Your family (consciously or subconsciously) is used to each of the members behaving a particular way. If you start acting differently, the rest of the family has to find a baseline again by either everyone adjusting their behavior to fit the new norm, or trying to force you to go back to behaving the way you used to.
Establishing Realistic Expectations
With that in mind, how do we establish realistic expectations so we don’t set ourselves up for disappointment when our family doesn’t act the way we want them to, or we feel pressured to behave in a way that no longer feels in life with who we want to be?
In this video, mental health expert, Dr. John Delony talks about the six choices you have to make everyday that are essential to living a healthier life. One of those choices is to “live in reality.” Part of spending time with our family is accepting the reality of who they are and how they are likely to behave—WHICH WE HAVE NO CONTROL OVER.
If your aunt always asks you highly personal questions that you don’t feel comfortable answering, she’s probably going to do that again this year. If your brother is notorious for interrupting during conversations, anticipate being cut off. I’m not suggesting that you preemptively get yourself angry and worked up over all your frustrations. What I’m encouraging is to walk into your holiday interactions realistic expectations of your family members. People aren’t magically going to change just because we want them to. The only choices we have power over are our own.
With that in mind, it might be a good idea to have some quick coping skills in your tool belt (like deep breathing, sensory mindfulness, taking breaks from the conversation if you feel yourself getting heated), and have some polite boundary statements prepared (for instance, “that’s not a topic I’m comfortable discussing right now, is there something else we can talk about?” or “I’d love to hear the rest of your story. Is it ok if I finish my what I was saying first and then we can come back to your’s when I’m done?”)
Having these realistic expectations with yourself will allow you to have a happier, healthier holiday season by allowing you to focus on enjoying the good moments.
Resources
https://blog.brookespublishing.com/7-steps-to-establishing-a-family-vision-and-expectations/
