Thank Goodness It’s Thanksgiving

In the United States, the national Thanksgiving holiday is a powerful time-compressor. It supposedly celebrates a history of sharing the bounty with immigrants or natives (depending on one’s side of the table), beginning in 1621 in Plymouth, Massachusetts. But in practice it celebrates being able to fit as many commercial activities as possible into one very short period. That alone can be stressful.

On Thanksgiving Day, people take to their cars and crowd the highways to rush to a family dinner (if they haven’t crowded the skies the day before). Thanksgiving audiences for TV football are probably second only to Super Bowl Sunday (a made-up national holiday from clever NFL marketers). The day after Thanksgiving has traditionally been the biggest single shopping day of the year, when retailers rake it in, inducing crowds to line up at 5am for heavily-discounted early bird specials. While some family dinners might appear to stretch on endlessly (a function of how one feels about relatives), the holiday time itself is very short. Many people seem to think of all the pieces of work to save to get done over Thanksgiving, as though it were a really big break instead of a teensy time-out that not everyone gets anyway.

So there’s a lot of modern frenzy surrounding what undoubtedly started out in the 1800s as a nice day off with family while recalling the squash of 1621. One way to get through the frenzy is to follow some very simple tips.

• Lower expectations. Everything won’t get done. It doesn’t have to be perfect. There will be another sale. There will be another football game. If just a few small items are crossed off the list, that is a start in the right direction.
• Volunteer. Food kitchens, churches, synagogues, or community service groups are always looking for volunteers to serve shut-ins or the poor.
• Bring a sense of humor. Tell funny stories. Keep it light. The cliche that “laughter is the best medicine” might be over-used by Readers’ Digest, but it is true nonetheless.
• Collaborate. Whatever the goal, having partners makes it easier to achieve. That works in the kitchen, at the table, and at work.
• Find reasons to say Thank You. Before doing anything else, make a list of nice things that have happened and who was part of them. Write notes thanking people at work or home for something they didn’t even know was noticed.
• Focus on a future goal. Have something satisfying to look forward to Monday morning. Envision the year ahead.

Come to think of it, these are also good tips for surviving recessions, flu season, and stress at the office. Thank goodness we can save time by re-purposing these lessons.