This Thanksgiving I'm on my own. I'm not sharing this so you'll feel sorry for me, or to get an invite to your dinner. I'm sharing it because from where I sit, I can see something you might miss this year. From the outside, the chance to have dinner with your family looks perfect. It's a gift.
I also know how it feels on the inside. You walk through the door and in five minutes you're fifteen again. All the usual family members are there: the aunt who keeps the peace, the cousin who barely looks up from his phone, the sister whose voice carries through the house, the uncle who has one drink too many, the brother who knows exactly how to push your buttons. Grandma warms your heart and makes you wish you'd never moved away. And in the air hangs a feeling for the ones who are gone, who everyone misses but no one talks about, for fear of making the occasion sad. Someone makes a comment about your life choices, and something tightens in your chest. Ugh.
Growing up we all heard "Do unto others as you would like others to do unto you." This year I want to offer a twist: you are the others. What you do unto them, you do unto yourself. I'm going to share a practice I've done for years with you. I look at something, a tree, a face, the sky, for a few minutes and at some point I stop feeling separate from it. I feel that I am what I'm looking at, and this changes how I acknowledge and treat what's in front of me. Helps me think twice.
Your brain already knows this. A 2010 Harvard study found that the part of the brain we use to think about ourselves also responds to the people we feel close to, and it didn't matter whether they shared the same interests. Closeness mattered, not agreement. So we don't need to agree with anyone at the table about anything. We just need to find a little bit of "we."
If your brain perceives the people you love almost as part of you, then the way you treat yourself spills onto them. Some of us push ourselves hard. You can definitely handle your own rigor, but maybe they can't. So let's not be as demanding with others. Everyone has their own rhythm.
Here is a little something you can try: pick the person who is sitting across from you at the table and find something you have in common, like you both love old movies, still laugh at the same old joke, or used to fight over who was Daddy's favorite. Hold on to that one thing, and let it be the bridge.
From my small table to yours: make it a magnificent Thanksgiving, because you can. Not only for yourself, but for everyone around you.
With clarity and intention,
Paz-
