Do you believe in god/religion? This post is for both believers and non-believers to get an idea of what the other side lives like during this time of year. The Holiday’s for many are an incredibly isolating and depressing time for people who don’t have families and don’t believe in god/religion. There’s really no designated spaces for us to co-exist with society around this season. This week we’re going to cover the following:
1. What is Anti-Christmas?
2. How To Survive The Holidays Without Family
3. My Top 3 Looks Of The Week
What is Anti-Christmas?
Anti-Christmas is the opposite of celebrating Christs birth. It’s for non-believers in god/religion to celebrate things they are grateful for without celebrating god/religion. It’s a personal space to let others know that your not into mainstream tradition (so don’t expect any gifts!) but you will celebrate for the sake of celebration (to not be typecast as a Scrooge). Who doesn’t like a good dinner/party? You don’t have to celebrate/believe in Christmas to enjoy that.
I purposefully do small things for people I like all year round. Random acts of kindness go farther to build relationships/community than waiting for gift exchanges once a year. I try to make time for friendships as much as I possibly can around my work. I practice this daily. The key here is to make it a practice not a task. Do something small for someone (animals included) outside of yourself every day.
Anti-Christmas is about surviving the holidays without having to celebrate them. We don’t decorate, we don’t over consume, we don’t over eat.We use this time to get a head start on the new year. It’s business as usual with a few more parties/events thrown in so we don’t feel totally isolated from the outside world.
My only tradition on this day is playing “Love You To Death” when I wake up on December 25th and ripping through an entire Type O Negative playlist. It’s the perfect gothic rock soundtrack for outliers.
How To Survive The Holidays Without Family
This isn’t nearly as simple or easy as Anti-Christmas which is why I separated the two. It’s one thing to believe or exercise your right not to believe in things. It’s quite another to be born into this world without a family or a any blood relatives you can rely on. You might be an orphan or a runaway like myself.
Personally, this has been the hardest struggle of my life thus far. Getting over the fact that every year everyone gets together with their families I am left alone. This used to drive me to black out drink, over dose, over spend and fall into a deep depression from December until January. I remember one year in my early twenties sleeping from December 24th and not getting out of bed again until December 26th. The pain of loneliness was so strong that I could not deal with consciousness. This is a weight of pain a lot of the population will never know.
Now a decade later, I take pride in each day. I have learned embrace the loneliness because you can never beat it. If you can feel something it’s better than feeling nothing. It means your alive and life will always be painful. Surviving the holiday’s without family is how we balance our internal pain. I tried almost everything imaginable to combat it for a very long time. When in reality what was lacking from my life was balance to put the all madness into perspective.
 |
| Starting a pet family also helps! Meet Baja top & California bottom. See what I did there? |
If I sleep past 7 a.m I feel guilty now let alone sleeping through several days in a row. The only reason I came this far from my former lifestyle was because I was able to face myself. Instead of trying to hide/mask my pain I learned to accept it. Even writing this post today is an exercise of facing/embracing and admitting to myself that some things will never change. However, I can change what I do despite not being able to change who I am or how I feel.
Not having a family changes you forever. It can break you down or it can define you and give you one of the strongest back bones of all time. You can use the power of radical independence to live your life your way and for no one else but yourself. That is the greatest gift the world can give us. Freedom.
 |
| California overlooks Baja California Norte |
My Top 3 Looks Of The Week
I Think My Puppy Is A Person…
