1/1/25
I was watching a Christmas movie with my daughter called That Christmas. At the beginning, the commentator said something so profound, and we had to pause the movie for me to think about it a minute. The commentator, who is Santa, said, “Christmas is like an emotional magnifying glass. If you feel loved and happy, Christmas will make you feel even happier and more loved. But if you feel alone and unloved, the magnifier gets to work and makes all those bad things bigger and worse.”
This feels so true, right? But, if you’ve been listening to this podcast for any length of time, you know that your feelings of love or happiness – all of your feelings – are created or are a result of what you are thinking. So, what Santa should have said was, “What you are thinking about Christmas will be an emotional magnifying glass.”
Christmas is and should be a joyous time to celebrate the birth of our King and Savior, Jesus Christ. His birth is the focus, the reason for the season. But this rightful focus can get blurry as it brings up past trauma, feelings of loneliness and loss, and emotions surrounding unresolved relationship conflict. And based on what we are thinking, we can quickly make Christmas about our loss or trauma – or even about our preferences, desires, or unrealistic expectations. And it affects us adversely.
According to surveys led by mental health professionals, 64% of people say they are affected by Post-Christmas or Holiday Blues, and 24% say they’re affected to a significant degree. I know this is true, I talk to a lot of you who are experiencing it to one degree or another. I’ve been on social media in the last few days after Christmas and I’ve seen a lot of posts that would fall into this category of Post-Christmas Blues. That is, from those who are willing to be honest about how they’re feeling. Most people aren’t letting us see that on their social media, though, are they? They are blissfully happy with their Hallmark movie family, and that makes your feelings of loneliness or lack of love, or even emotions surrounding personal problems and conflict, magnified.
You could call this temporary, reactive emotional state after Christmas, or any holiday really, a general malaise or melancholy. Melancholy is just one of hundreds of emotions or feelings available to us in this human experience of life. If this is how you’re feeling right now, it’s okay. You’re allowed. Nothing is wrong with you. Again, let me assure you, it’s temporary. You don’t have to let this derail you. Or make it mean anything about you.
But you can use it to uncover something more about yourself – what you are thinking, and why, and where that line of thinking is coming from. Like, why you are inclined to think that particular way? Because the way you are thinking is actually what’s making you feel miserable, or sad, or empty, or any of the other negative emotions. What you are thinking magnifies your emotions that make you act in ways that you really don’t want: Sulking, lashing out, accusing, withdrawing, becoming resentful or bitter, throwing yourself a pity party. Hey, let me tell you, I’m talking to myself, too, here. We act this way instead of appreciating and enjoying the blessings we do have. Learning how to process through things keeps you from getting stuck there, though. This is processing for awareness. And it’s a powerful tool for significant and meaningful personal growth. And leads to living a beautiful, full, abundant, Zoë life that Jesus said we can live in John 10:10. Regardless of our life’s circumstances. Yes, it’s possible to live in less than desirable circumstances and still feel like your life is full and abundant. I am living proof. But it takes intentionality on your part to have this, to live this way.
The most beautiful thing about processing for awareness that leads to changing our minds is that it also changes our hearts and clears the blurry lens so we can focus on the real reason we are celebrating Christmas – the birth of our Messiah. Emmanuel, God with us. With us in the darkness, in the fog, in the brokenness, in the hurt, in the loss. We’re able to get our eyes off ourselves and onto the One who came to heal the brokenhearted, to strengthen the weak knees, to straighten the bent back, to comfort the hurting, to bring peace in the chaos. He is the One. He is the answer to all that we consider malady of life. He came that we might have abundant life. Yes, eternal life with Him when our days on earth on done, but also abundant life for our days on earth now. We’re able to live in abundance because of the gift we’ve been given in the Holy Spirit - the third of the Trinity that has been deposited into every believer to comfort, convict, teach, remind us of truth, and lead us in the abundant life found in our Messiah.
Galatians 5, verses 16 though 18 in The Message translation is a very clearly stated admonition for us to allow the Holy Spirit to direct us to get our eyes off ourselves and our temporary emotions. It says, “Live freely, animated and motivated by God’s Spirit. Then you won’t feed the compulsions of selfishness. For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are antithetical, so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day. Why don’t you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence?”
This scripture is saying, don’t be led by your emotions. Don’t be yanked to and froe by the way you feel on any given day. Choose to be led by the Spirit.
And like I said, this takes intentionality. You have to want to have your mind and heart changed. You have to want to change your life. And like my friend, Dr. Lee Warren says in his podcast The Self-Brain Surgery, “You can’t change your life until you change your mind.”
It’s right here that I’d love to point you all the way back to episode number 31 - What In The World Are You Thinking? That episode has all the good, foundational stuff about the brain to help you understand why you can choose to be led by the Spirit and change your life…completely. Why even when things don’t go as expected or as you wanted during the holidays, you can live in stability and peace of mind. The mind of Christ. You don’t have to let the melancholy take you under.
Listen to verses 19 and 20 of Galatians 5 in The Message, because this is describing what happens and how we end up acting when we don’t process for awareness; when we don’t do something intentionally to right our wrong thinking, to clear the blurry lens. Verses 19 and 20 say, “It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness, trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on.”
When the scripture is saying that these are the results from trying to get our way all the time, that “getting our own way” is coming from a blurry lens from which we’re viewing our life – from a Me-centric theology, a self-centered focus and way of living. I talk about this in my book, Another Beautiful Life in chapter one, when after my tragedy, I realized that Christ and His glory wasn’t truly in the center of my life and the focus of all things of my life. Surprisingly, I found that seeing things through the lens – a very clear lens - of right theology brings stability, peace and calmness, and real comfort even in the midst of unbearable circumstances. I encourage you to get the book and read more about how I was able to change my life when I changed my thinking.
Christmas can be an emotional magnifying glass. As can any holiday. Or any other day that you are allowing your malady – whatever that might be – to create thoughts of melancholy that persist and make you miserable. But here you have the opportunity to learn something more about yourself that makes you think, feel, and act the way you do…and to change it. You have the opportunity here to radically change the way you experience your life. You have the opportunity to make 2025 the best year yet.
Philippians 4:8 tells us this is the magnifying glass we should be looking through: “whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, anything excellent, anything worthy of praise.” This scripture says to think about these things. That is, magnify them in your mind. You have the opportunity to redirect your thoughts and focus to something and Someone better and bigger than yourself...to magnify Him who is bigger than your malady.
Friend, this magnifier gets to work and makes all those bad things – your past trauma, feelings of loneliness and loss, emotions surrounding unresolved relationship conflict, pain, sorrow – the magnifier gets to work to make those things come under the obedience of Christ; to become subject to the work of the Holy Spirit that reminds us of truth, and leads us into the abundant life found in our Messiah, Jesus Christ. Friend, this is your opportunity to choose which magnifying lens will conduct your life.
If you feel stuck already in this emotional state of melancholy, Life Coaching might be what you need. Let’s have a brief chat so you can find out more about it and to see if we’re a good fit. You can book a free call on my calendar. The link is in the show notes.
Also, I’ve put a link in the show notes for this week’s Listener’s Guide that has a few prompt questions to help you work through this topic on your own. Be sure to grab that.
And also, don’t forget my book, Another Beautiful Life, is now available on Amazon. Paperback and eBook. I’ll put the direct link to that in the show notes as well.
Happy New Year, my friends. I pray that 2025 is your very best, blessed year yet. See you next Wednesday for the next episode of Another Beautiful Life.
SHOW NOTES:
Do you feel sad and blue after Christmas? Do you know why? Do you want to feel differently?
What is the magnifying glass you are looking through? Is it your thoughts about your pain, loss, tragedy, fear, loneliness, etc that’s making you feel sad and melancholy? Or is there a different lens to look through that magnifies something better, more helpful, more true?Today, we talk about how to start 2025 by looking through the right magnifier of your life.
Are you wondering how Life Coaching works? Would you like a free, 30-minute session? Click this link to set up a Consult Call: https://calendly.com/triciazodylifecoach/30min
Get the free, printable Listener’s Guide here: https://www.triciazody.com/guide
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