I cherish the opportunity Christmas brings for me to build relationships and meet more people.
The month of December can be a great month. The gradual incline towards the festive season is one that brings a great deal of excitement to many, the approaching holiday, maybe a trip away, a few big parties and sometimes lots of drinking. I’ve noticed people who usually don’t say anything or only give a passing glance, say “hello”. I’ve also noticed people who quite often just give me a nod when passing in the corridor but surprise me with a question like “what have you got planned for Christmas?” Come January, I see we often retreat and withdraw back into the ‘grind full existence’ – so what has happened?
For those interactions where we exchanged an extra smile, nod or extended ourselves to make a passing comment or brief exchange before the break, I now have a point or marker that I feel allows me to continue with the relationship.
For me it’s wonderful to hold that point when the post holiday emotional retreat comes, and the so-called mundaneness of life kicks back in. So my gift is now the nurturing of the initial hello or pre-Christmas smile. It is a pre-Christmas effort toward me returning. I can continue from where the relationship reached and for that I’m very grateful.
I was once waiting for the high of Christmas and wanting to escape and splurge on anything that took me further away from myself. The development of my Livingness by re-connecting to myself and thereby allowing deeper connections with others that I have found through Universal Medicine has provided me with the tools to tackle life with joy and a fulfilment that is overflowing.
So yes, I love Christmas, but now for a very different reason — the opportunity to build relationships with everyone I meet.
By Matthew Brown, Subiaco, Perth, Western Australia
440 Comments
The interaction we have with people open the door to being open and transparent in the most Loving ways and when these relationships deepen it is one of the most fulfilling experiences we can have.
From what I’ve seen this year for many it’s a much anticipated break from other parts of life that are going 100mph. Only to go into the festive period at the same speed! It’s not what we do that drains us it’s how we do it.
Yep its a con! Christmas stands for a lot of things that really aren’t about love.
Every day can be a festive day one of celebration and luxuriant joy-full-ness as we are simply pleasured to connect with everyone with whom we pass or interact with, now that should be a standard or foundation for life.
The focus on holidays, festive periods and long weekends is completely arbitrary. It’s a particular period on the calendar that we focus on as being special and as a consequence often overlook all of the other days of the year, apart from the weekends. This eyes on the horizon approach to life means that we skim over so much and completely miss out on the potential depth of each and every day.
The gift within the gift is to stay open in every encounter, allowing its expansion beyond Christmas.
Christmas is an opportunity for people to be together and the most loving present we can offer each other is to just be who we are in true Brotherhood.
I love this; ‘I cherish the opportunity Christmas brings for me to build relationships and meet more people.’ It’s beautiful to deepen relationships at this time. This year I really enjoyed seeing my family and friends and found that I had let go of expectations about Christmas being a certain way and simply enjoyed connecting with people.
I have noticed that on the 25th December when going out for a walk people are much more open with each other. I went for a walk with some relatives and almost everyone we met on our way smiled and wished us a happy Christmas. There was a real sparkle and warmth to their greetings and I felt very touched. So often when walking, people are in protection and whilst talking there seems to be a holding back which makes the hello forced.
I have found over the years that the more open I am the more others open up with me, regardless of the time of year. Yet when I speak to others they don’t have that same relationship with other people that I have. I’m like a walking Christmas vibe. It’s the connection to my essence that allows people to open up more. When we don’t have that connection we retreat.
Mathew, I love this; ‘ I now have a point or marker that I feel allows me to continue with the relationship.’ I have noticed this in my community this week, that people have been around more and that by me delivering by hand Christmas cards that this has opened up a lovey connection with people. I have had neighbours round for tea and it has been lovely to enjoy this time when things have slowed down to connect with and enjoy those in my community.
I love this part of Christmas as well but isn’t it weird (or maybe sad) that one day in the year or leading up to it we suddenly want to make it about people when we could make it about people and connection every single day all throughout the year ✨
I went shopping for presents today and it was so obvious that just about everyone else was doing the same…..there was a much more intimate feeling in the big department store and yet an openness too as people discussed whether so and so would like such and such…we were coming together for the benefit of others. I did not feel the usual rush and stress that can come with last minute shopping. I chatted to lots of people and everyone was very patient and very friendly. Yes there is something about Christmas and it’s great to be part of it.
Despite the negativity around the increasing commercialisation of Christmas it does offer the opportunity to connect with each other and that is a gift to be cherished.
By connecting more deeply with ourselves allows us to deepen our connection with others, ‘ re-connecting to myself and thereby allowing deeper connections with others’.
This is lovely Matthew, as I find most people love being connected to, using Christmas as an opportunity to build relationships with more people, ‘the opportunity to build relationships with everyone I meet.’
Matthew, this is beautiful; ‘So yes, I love Christmas, but now for a very different reason — the opportunity to build relationships with everyone I meet.’ I love how you make Christmas about people and relationships.
Maybe the very fact we have fallen for the idea that ‘one’ day of the year is ‘special’ is the very reason we are not loving all of the time how we should naturally be, Making one day special makes a mockery of the rest.
I agree with you that there is the potential for something amazing when it comes to Christmas, because everyone stops for a few days and so has more time to connect with people – I also totally agree this does not need to be reserved for Christmas and that potential is there everyday.
Oh no, its only just gone August and I saw in our main supermarket chain yesterday Christmas cards for sale – I had to double take, really for the purposes of retail and sales Christmas is one big gimmick.
I went to a business event at a bank yesterday (it is July) and they themed it as Christmas complete with a Santa MC so no need to wait until December for a ho ho ho – available every day.
I originally come from the UK and have lived in Australia for 25 years now but I still have it programmed in me that Christmas is in winter and not summer – so it seemed more normal to hold Christmas in July (winter in Australia) than in December (sunny summer)!
I remember being quite flabbergasted when walking one Christmas Day morning and a man invited me to pick as many frangipani flowers I liked from his front yard; he struck me as a miserly man, barely willing to engage and communicate and even though I accepted his offer and picked a few more, it made me wonder why we might think we need to reserve our true nature for a particular time of year. Do we use Christmas as an excuse to show more of what we truly are? Lest we’d be told of for our truth and on account of our truer nature, per chance?
The ups and downs of life are a normalised part of human life which we feel innately is not true to our body or our essence. The answer to living a truly consistent life comes from living the essence.
It is like we have accepted that life is very intense and a struggle and so we live in a way of ‘battling’ with this instead of going about life a different way, surrendering to something deeper within and recognising that there is a consistent joy that can be lived each day.
Matthew, this is very gorgeous; ‘So yes, I love Christmas, but now for a very different reason — the opportunity to build relationships with everyone I meet.’ I love how you embrace the Christmas period and make it about people and connections, very inspiring.
Opening up instead of re-treating back into our shells should be the way that all relationships develop. This is because of the way we express to each other with love brings in a deepening of our evolution.
When every day becomes the same day then the joy of living with our divine connection brings us closer to those we interact with.
This is so gorgeous Matthew. It is inspiring to feel you honouring the connections made along with honouring the value of the connection itself. This is precisely how we restore trust in our relationships throughout humanity, through being open to sharing ourselves and building loving connections.
I like this part about connecting with other people during the Christmas festive season. It reminds me of the common experience of human life that we all share.
I agree with you Matthew. I have found people are more open to connect, and certainly a time for giving and sharing some moments together. I am with you also that the consistency of Joy I now live through The Way of The Livingness is all year round.
Agreed Rik, The Livingness brings the same day every day no matter what the day so each day is a celebration of true connection.
And if we then don’t reserve this greater openness just for Christmas but are open and welcoming towards others and nurture these relationships, however fleeting the encounters may be, our day to day life would be much richer and more fulfilling.
I agree, people are often a bit more open during this period and are more willing to stop, open up and have conversations. I love the opportunity that this offers as it is a time of coming together and deeply appreciating each other.
I love the stillness very early on Christmas morning when the chaos and buzz have come to a halt and the human world takes the time to breathe in and be in repose, even if fleetingly.
I have been stoned walled by a colleague of mine for years I am always the one to initiate the conversation, I took everyone at the home office some Scottish Shortbread as Christmas presents to say thank you for all your help during the year. One of the members of staff came and told me how much they enjoyed the Shortbread biscuits they said they had not had anything like them before. And the other member of staff who always stone walled me piped up and said she thought they were lovely too. I take this as a break through even if she didn’t talk to me directly she was gracious enough to say how much she enjoyed the treat.
Great how you use the opportunity of other people being more open at this time of year to build on the relationships subsequently – a truly positive aspect of the gift of Christmas.
This is true, ‘the opportunity of other people being more open at this time of year’ and is something to appreciate that we have this opportunity and that we embrace it, a true Christmas gift.
The gift of connection – a gift that keeps on giving.
Xmas has never been a time of year that I enjoyed whilst in the UK, I worked on the main streets of london and the commercialisation was horrific to say the least. But now I love having friends and family over for a meal when you know so many are doing the same thing, in it together sort of thing. We don’t actually need this to bring us together but until we are living with a lot more harmony this will be our reminder of what is possible when we open up and let ‘strangers’ in.
What a great conversation Matthew, I hadn’t considered Christmas as a benchmark for a new normal but you are right, in terms of the potential for relationships everyone is far more open. Perhaps the low of January is that that goes away and seems to get put back in the cupboard for another 11 months.
Christmas is here again and there is definitely more footfall in the shop that I work in and the takings reflect the rise in customers coming to buy goods. People are not buying mainly for themselves but are thinking of friends and family and some are making gift boxes to send abroad for those who are “less fortunate”. There is an atmosphere of supporting each other to get whatever is needed to make this time the best it can be. As you say there is a potential here to build on this way of being and not fall back after Christmas to old patterns of isolation and disconnectedness. It is also an opportunity to see where we were at this time last year and appreciate how we might have changed becoming less judgemental and more open and willing to connect with others in absolute equality.
I enjoy the Christmas season too, because I find it is a time when people slow down a bit, and there is more opportunity to connect more deeply. I enjoy the conversations, work lunches and chances for people to come together more.
If it’s possible for that extra smile or conversation before Christmas then it shows we can do it. So why wait or withhold that openness for the seasonal period? From experience it’s exhausting holding back our pull towards each other.
Great to come across this blog now as Christmas cards and decorations are coming into the shops and many are complaining that it is so commercial. I feel inspired to share myself more openly when these conversations start to come up and allow for a deepening of relationships also.
I have worked many a Christmas and I have loved it, in the health and social care industry with such shortage of staff already, come Christmas some places find it really hard to find staff to work over the festive period.