Post Holiday Feels

For many, the final months of 2025 will bring up nostalgic memories from each year before. Whether or not you are religious or celebrate Hanukkah, Kwanza, Christmas, or the solstice, there is virtually no escaping the spirit of winter and some version of the “holiday” season. And unless you have a time machine, the New Year comes for us all. These annual cycles of celebrations, decorations, and gatherings create the perfect confluence for holding onto old traditions and opportunities to build new traditions alike. Traditions can be exciting, grounding, bring up old memories (both positive and negative), and, also, utterly exhausting. As we reflect, it provides a chance to consider what we are ready to let go and which moments we can’t wait to re-create next year.

As you read this, you might already be experiencing the post-holiday blues. The build up of excitement and potential might now be a pile of crumbled wrapping paper. The joy you felt when you pulled out holiday decorations many weeks ago might suddenly feel like a burden and one more “to-do” on your list as you break them down. The moments spent sharing and laughing with your loved ones might leave you feeling a little bit empty once everyone returns home.

In this installment of Two Things Are True, we will acknowledge what the holidays give us that we’d like to hold on to and what we’re ready to leave behind as we look ahead to the new year. Polarity, symbiosis, light and shadow: that’s what Two Things Are True is all about. This is a place to explore and make space for our humanity and the complicated feelings we can simultaneously hold.

Looking Back

How do you determine when something you’ve been doing forever is because you genuinely enjoy it or because it's just what you’ve always done? Traditions are often like their own little gifts, something bestowed upon you by those from generations past. Some traditions, like gifts, are welcome, thoughtful, useful even. Others might be indulgent, coveted. And then there are those that seem less intentional, obligatory, formulaic. When you reflect on the traditions and moments of the past several weeks, what do you notice about your feelings toward them? Which type of ‘gift’ are your traditions?

Whether your traditions are old or new, it’s nice to have the layers of next year to look forward to, and the memories of this year and the years before. It’s also worth considering moments that felt novel, new things you tried. Maybe those are experiences that develop with the coming years, or maybe they live in the context and time of this year, not to be repeated.

Which experiences gave you a sense of joy, peace, comfort, connection? Maybe it’s baking your great-grandmother’s amazing apple pie recipe and the experience of sharing a slice around the table with your family. It could be a friend group get-together with the inappropriately themed gift exchange that you look forward to every year. Or perhaps it's taking the long way home in the evenings so you can explore another neighborhood’s holiday lights. Whether your traditions are old or new, it’s nice to have the layers of next year to look forward to, and the memories of this year and the years before. It’s also worth considering moments that felt novel, new things you tried. Maybe those are experiences that develop with the coming years, or maybe they live in the context and time of this year, not to be repeated. I once tried to force my family members to sit and listen to me read the story that I believe best encapsulates the spirit of the holiday season, O. Henry’s Gift of the Magi. It only took two years of their indulgence as I watched their eyes glaze over to make it my own personal holiday tradition, reading aloud not required.

I think everyone can relate to the traditions that feel more like obligations. These experiences might bring up anxiety, dread, annoyance. I can tolerate a well-meaning family member’s insistence that we go around the room and open one gift at a time, an exercise that has taken hours in the past, because I know it brings joy to someone else. Other traditions I’ve let go of for my own sanity and peace. It took my mom several holidays to come to terms with my decision one year that after we departed the family gathering on Christmas Eve, I would no longer be pushing my family out the door the next morning to do it all over again. It also led to some new traditions with my nuclear family; staying in our PJs all day, watching movies, doing a puzzle, and snacking on charcuterie. While it was hard to let go of how things had always been done in my family of origin, the relief of choosing what felt best for me and my household was unmatched. 

As you think about the moments this season that left you feeling harried, overwhelmed, and made it difficult to enjoy yourself, I encourage you to sit with the possibility of what you can let go of. Letting go of the guilt for being so busy or the thing you didn’t get to, letting go of the responsibility for other people’s experience and expectations, and letting go of future obligations that no longer serve you, which ultimately serves no one. Making changes in our traditions can feel difficult. We worry we are disappointing others or missing out. Beginning to think about what changes you’d like to make now gives you time to become more comfortable with the possibility by the next year.

Looking Ahead

This holiday season is over. Taking a moment to soak in that which brought you joy and to shake off that which you no longer wish to carry can be a great way to reset and set your sights on what’s ahead. Here at Tendril, we’re setting our intentions by choosing a word of the year. This year, our word is MOMENT. Its meaning reminds us to be present (moments are brief) and to pay attention; gives permission to have moments that encapsulate our complicated lives and feelings; and to take each moment as it comes. We encourage you to set your intention for the new year by reflecting on a word that helps you continue to grow, grounds you, or reminds you of your goals.

Now is the time to move toward a new season of intention, one that I hope you will carry with you until the holidays are upon us once again.