Leah Dawkins

I love Christmas. I also kind of hate it.

The Christmas season always seems to come with so many possibilities. It’s the time when people talk about loving each other and how it’s better to give than to receive. All the commercials show perfectly decorated homes and perfectly happy people spending time with their many perfect family members and friends, often doing choreographed numbers to annoying pop songs. It makes you feel all warm inside. And then it doesn’t—because all of that is fake.

I’m chronically single, so the holidays are going to be a little depressing for me no matter what. For years, I didn’t even put up a tree because no one ever comes into my little apartment and I’d just have to take it down again in a few weeks. Over the last few years, I’ve gotten better. I’ve put up a tree and I even do outside lights now. I’ve really tried to enjoy the season. So why do I always seem to run out of steam before Christmas even gets here?

For most of my adult life, I blamed work. I had a job I didn’t like for nineteen Christmases, and I got to work on Christmas Day for over half of those. It was a retirement community, so there was always a series of crowded Christmas parties with non-stop people asking me for directions and handing me their phones to take pictures of them in front of the lobby Christmas tree, and all I wanted to do was go home and be away from people. Last year was better, since I had left my job to finish work on my first book, but being unemployed, I was constantly thinking about how long my savings would last before I had to get another job, so that put a damper on seasonal activities.

And then there’s this year. It’s been a weird year. For half of it, I was totally focused on the book. I was working at home. I was reasonably happy. But by the time I published, I had no choice but to find a job. I got one, and it was okay for a while. It was in a warehouse, but I had a desk that I could personalize and people around me got into holidays. We decorated for Halloween and did department trick-or-treating, and it was fun. I was starting to make plans for Christmas. Then they mandated 58-hour work weeks for the last six weeks of the year. I decided it wasn’t worth it and I quit. I thought I would enjoy the break, but it wasn’t a break, because I had to find another job. And I had to be cautious about spending in case it took a while. I started to not feel very Christmas-y anymore.

You’ve probably been there. A little bit of stress affects your outlook on everything. It’s cold. I hate cold. It seems like we haven’t had sunshine for about 427 days. (It’s snowing right now, which just feels so unnecessary.) The days are getting shorter. It gets harder to get out of bed every morning. I have a parrot with arthritis who has to live in a drafty apartment, and there’s nothing I can do about it, and it grieves me. Minor issues start to really irritate me, like how unfair the apartment decorating contest is, since people who only have a balcony to decorate don’t stand a chance against the ones with a first-floor corner apartment with plenty of yard space and an apparently unlimited Christmas lights budget. (I hope the prize money is worth your electric bill, Corner People.) The Christmas tree that I thought was pretty the day I put it up is now just in my way, and so is every driver in the city.

Then I got a job offer. This is good. Except I got the offer on Thursday and it starts Monday, so I spent the last two days hurrying to get paperwork done, and I now have only this weekend to do everything I had left to do before Christmas. And the truth is that I don’t really even know what this job is and I don’t want it. But I have to work.

So that brings me to last night. My favorite band is for KING & COUNTRY. Their music has meant so much to me over the last ten years, and they put on an amazing concert. Last night was the Christmas concert I had been looking forward to for months. I went with my parents, and we had all had pretty stressful days already, which wasn’t helped by the awful traffic and security people shouting at everyone as we walked in the door. But as we hiked the narrow steps of the Coliseum and crammed into the tiny seats with no leg room (which became painful in about 0.2 seconds), I held onto hope that this concert would somehow make everything better. With the first beat of the bass drum, I knew that wasn’t going to happen.

I’ve been to their concerts before, so I expected volume to be an issue, but last night was horrible. It was ear-splitting. It was so loud that the sound was distorted, and the drum made my chest hurt for over two hours. I couldn’t enjoy the songs I love so much. I just wanted it to be over. (I also felt guilty, since I knew how much my parents paid for those tickets and couldn’t imagine that they were having a good time. They were nice about it, though.)

You know that feeling when you realize that you just can’t do something you used to love anymore? As I went to bed with my headache, I felt like something inside me broke—like that last bit of Christmas spirit I was hanging on to was gone. I don’t want to hear anymore Christmas songs. I don’t want to see anymore Christmas lights. The rest of my Christmas shopping will be half-hearted and unimaginative. I want Christmas to be over. I want to get past it and get on with next year and hope it won’t be lousy.

Maybe this is you. By this point in the season, I’m guessing it’s a lot of us. You know what? It’s okay. It’s normal. It even makes sense.

Anxiety and depression are at an all-time high, and it’s no wonder. Our culture has set the most unrealistic expectations of what our lives are supposed to look like, and it seems like those expectations are compounded at Christmas. We overdo everything. All of nature slows down in the winter, but we humans don’t have enough sense to do the same. It’s our busiest time of year. The days get shorter and we work longer. We even overdo Christmas itself. The decorations are up in stores sometimes before Halloween. Even for those of us who insist on waiting till after Thanksgiving, that’s still a month of trying to be holly and jolly, merry and bright. No one outside of a Hallmark movie has that kind of stamina. Add to that the steady consumption of junk food from Halloween to New Year’s, and you have the perfect recipe for exhaustion.

I admit it’s a pretty bleak outlook on the holidays. So is there anything to give us hope?

Yes. It’s Christmas.

I don't mean the decorations, presents, sugar cookies, or Elf. It's not Mariah Carey. (Sorry, I had to.) It’s what Christmas really is—a celebration of Christ.

I’ve been in church my whole life. I’ve always known the Christmas story. But to be honest, I never used to “get” Jesus. I believed in Him, but He always seemed a little impersonal to me. I guess I didn’t understand Him very well. Maybe other Christians can relate to this, but I was more interested in God the Father than God the Son. I don’t really know why. Maybe it’s because I always found the Trinity a little confusing. Lately, though, I’ve noticed a change. Our church did a long, in-depth study on the book of Luke, and it opened my eyes to not just how amazing Jesus is, but how personal He is. He’s God, but He’s like us. He understands us. He loves us. He rejoices with us, and He cries with us.

It seems like reminders of Jesus show up in my life daily now. It’s partly because I keep watching clips of The Chosen on Facebook. (I haven’t seen the show yet. It’s on my to-do list.) It’s also because I listen to the Brant & Sherri Oddcast every day, and they talk about Him all the time. I’ve realized that of all the voices coming at us every moment of every day, Jesus is the only one who makes sense. And when the stress or depression of everyday life hits me, I can view it all through Him and His promises, and I have a lifeline. Things that seem bad aren’t so bad. Prayers that I doubt will be answered are answered. My future is merry and bright. I have a Savior, and He gets it. I’m so fascinated with Jesus now that He’s become a huge inspiration as I’m working on the next book. I hope someday I’ll have it done.

If you’re anxious or depressed or just plain hate Christmas, I urge you to push aside all the frills and expectations and just consider Jesus. Read about Him. Think about Him. Talk to Him. He is the incarnation of our Creator who just wants to be with us.

I’m always dreaming of what my “perfect” is. I like to think that someday I’ll be in a beautiful, warm house that’s paid for without my having to work a depressing job. It will be decorated for the holidays and I will have lots of people over to eat amazing baked goods that have no calories and sing Christmas carols, and I will be happy and stress-free. That’s probably never going to happen. But there is perfect. Jesus promised us. It happens after this life, and it’s worth the wait.

What the world needs most (even more than leg room and decent sound people) is to know the One we were meant to give thanks for at Christmas. This season is beautiful, and I can see it through Him. Even just writing this has helped me feel better. I think I’ll go listen to for KING & COUNTRY. I love those guys.