Guilt-free holidays
I grew up with a Jewish mother and a Catholic father, so I’ve got the guilt thing nailed down. I feel guilty for just about everything. The holidays always bring up extra guilt: are we spending time with the right people? Is it enough time? Do we have gifts for everyone? Are the gifts good enough? Should we also get that person something? It goes on and on.
The first year I started reviewing my household finances, I looked back at what we spent on Christmas gifts the previous year. The number was astounding. Not only did I feel guilt of all of the actual holidays, but I also felt it starting the new year for all the money we spent during the holidays. That first year I learned a few things:
We felt compelled to buy gifts for everyone and to be fair, we decided the cost of gifts had to be equal for all people. Once we started spending $100 per gift, that became the standard and that very quickly added up.
We weren’t prepared to give - we had no savings set aside for gifting.
We loved giving gifts – more than receiving them. It was important for us to be able to do.
My favorite parts of the holidays were eating delicious food, spreading goodwill, and connecting with friends and family.
After those revelations, what could I do, going forward to ensure that I had a less-guilty, or even possibly, guilt-free holiday season?
To start, we began having conversations with some family about gift giving and came to similar conclusions – the gifting was feeling impersonal, over the top, and some family was expressing that they, too, were feeling unprepared financially. So, with some family, we decided to stop exchanging gifts and instead focus on sharing meals and time together. We continued giving in different forms to a lot of people. Every year, we give all our close friends and family homemade cookies. We decided we’d continue to prioritize that. It allowed us to still feel like we were giving in a way that felt good for us: connecting with friends and family and spreading goodwill. Finally, mindful of what we spent the previous year, we planned out how we would give in the coming year and added it to our budget. If, for example, we found that we spent $1,000 on Christmas gifts, we would budget to save $83 per month beginning in January so that we would have $1000 by December for Christmas. This gave us permission to spend, if we wanted, because we would have planned for it.
Beyond monetary guilt measures, there are also the guilt that comes with spending time with people (or rather, not spending time with people). Remember, the holidays are for you, too. You should enjoy the holidays as much as anyone else. Set the boundaries you need for yourself. Several years ago, my husband and I began our own Christmas tradition. If we’re in town, at our own home, we realized we wanted to spend Christmas day together, just with our nuclear family. We didn’t want to pile into a car to go somewhere else. We’ve drawn boundaries around that day being ours. We can celebrate with family on the eve-of or the day after, but we want to enjoy that day in the way that we like to. This gives us something that we want and by setting that boundary, we remove resentment and guilt about offering the other days.
If guilt also plagues you during this time of year, think about what makes you feel the best. Is it receiving an elaborate, expensive gift? Is it getting, or giving, something thoughtful? Is it something else? Does it depend on the person getting or gifting? How do you like to spend your time during the holidays? Can you have conversations with those you love to let them know what you need?
Set boundaries ahead of time. Set boundaries on what you want to spend, both in terms of time and money. There’s no use in feeling guilty about being generous, just work to plan for your generosity. Even planned generosity can still be spontaneous.
If you are planning on giving gifts this holiday season, I’ve created a PDF template for you to plan out the budget. And, if the amount you spend takes you by surprise this year, that’s okay. Use it to plan for how you want to do it next year.
I hope that you have a guilt-free, or at least reduced-guilt, very happy holiday season!