The Sensory Cheat Code to Surviving Holiday Stress
While the holidays are enjoyable, they can be a major source of stress. When I was thirteen, I received my first advice about managing stress from a movie. The film begins with a plane landing at LAX airport, carrying an NYPD police officer who has travelled to Los Angeles to celebrate Christmas with his estranged wife and kids.
Observing the officer’s hands tightly gripping the armrest, a businessman sitting nearby offers his secret to surviving air travel: “After you get where you’re going, take off your shoes and your socks, then you walk around on the rug barefoot, and make fists with your toes.” The officer expresses skepticism, to which the businessman responds, “I know, I know, it sounds crazy. Trust me, I’ve been doing it for nine years.” Following advice, Officer John McClane removes his shoes later that evening just as the building, where he is attending a Christmas party, is seized by terrorists. Caught off guard, McClane is forced to fight the bad guys barefoot; a dicey proposition when the bullets and shattered glass begin flying.
The movie, as you may have guessed, is Die Hard, featuring Bruce Willis. While the businessman’s advice didn’t work out for McClane in that life-or-death situation, making fists with your feet on the carpet is actually a great way to relieve stress. Give it a try. Grass and sand work just as well if you don’t have carpet. This technique is effective because it provides a highly sensory experience. The sensation of clenching your toes and feeling something soft on the underside of your foot has a quieting effect on the mind. It grounds you in the present and helps you focus on your breathing. So the businessman in Die Hard was right: Making fists with your feet on the carpet is a cheat code for combating anxiety and bringing your mind into the present.
Peace in the Pines: The Tree Lot at El Con Mall
Like Officer McClane flying cross-country on Christmas Eve, some holiday activities provoke anxiety. One good example is Christmas shopping at the mall. Malls at Christmastime mean bustling crowds, irritable people, and financial strain—all common sources of stress. For over twenty years, however, El Con Mall in Tucson, Arizona, was home to one of my most relaxing Christmas pastimes: Picking a Christmas tree at the tree lot.
From 1980-2001 and 2005-2012, the Tucson Arizona Boys Chorus (TABC) ran a Christmas tree lot in the parking lot of El Con Mall. Julian Ackerley was elected as the TABC director in 1980. His father, Gene Ackerley, was manager of El Con Mall that year, so the pair made a deal: In exchange for the right to sell trees in the El Con parking lot, the Boys Chorus would perform for customers in the mall during the holidays. Here is an excerpt from the December 4, 1980, issue of the Tucson Citizen newspaper describing the first instance of what eventually became a nearly three-decade tradition:
“Many children of all ages joined with the Tucson Boys Chorus in welcoming Santa to El Con on November 28. With the joyful sounds of ‘Here Comes Santa Claus,’ the Tucson Boys Chorus escorted Santa to his special corner in the El Con Mall where he will be talking to youngsters throughout the Christmas shopping season.”1
“The Tucson Boys Chorus is a non-profit organization, requiring the boys to raise expense money by selling coupon books, chorus albums and Christmas trees. This year the boys and their families will man their traditional Christmas tree lot in the southwest corner of the El Con parking lot in front of Levy’s.”2
While Christmastime at El Con Mall was stressful, the TABC tree lot held the secret to surviving the holiday shopping season: An environment that completely engages the senses. After more than two decades of shopping at the El Con Mall TABC tree lot, here are three suggestions for getting the most out of your Christmas tree-buying experience:
1. Embrace Tradition: Pick a Tree Lot You Can Revisit Annually
There is something magical about getting your Christmas tree from the same place each year. For my family, it was always the Boys Chorus tree lot at El Con. For 29 years, the tree lot set up shop on the southwest corner of the mall parking lot. Each December, I looked forward to visiting the familiar site with the 45-foot-tall inflatable snowman named “Frosty.” This jolly Christmas Colossus, featuring a top hat, corncob pipe, scarf, and mittened hands, was the perfect holiday ambassador. Frosty’s white translucent body attracted tree buyers like partridges to a pear tree. Blazoned across his midsection were these welcoming words:
Season’s Greetings
El Con Mall
&
Tucson Boys Chorus
Upon arrival, you encountered a familiar scene year after year: Trees arranged in neat rows under a circus-like tent, floors made of pea-gravel, and the Boys Chorus trailer where you paid for your tree. Returning to this familiar scene each year creates a sense of tradition, which is comforting. So, when possible, try to visit the same tree lot each year.
2. Maximize the Magic: Buy Your Tree on a Cold Night
A daytime visit to the tree lot takes all the mystery out of the tree-buying experience. For the best sensory experience, go at night when the Christmas lights are on. Sure, some places keep their Christmas lights on during the day, but it’s nowhere near as magical as seeing the lights shine in darkness. If possible, go on a cold night too. Nothing gets you in the Christmas spirit quicker than brisk winter weather. Seeing your breath in the air never gets old, and the cold gives you an excuse to wear that jacket and pair of gloves you rarely use. It also makes the cup of hot chocolate, apple cider, or Starbucks coffee that’s warming you that much more enjoyable.
The greatest sensory experience is the trees themselves. Nothing beats walking onto the lot and getting that initial blast of fresh pine scent. The second it enters your nose, you are swept away to another world. It’s as if you stepped through a portal and emerged in Germany’s Black Forest. Rows of noble firs, douglas firs, grand firs, and scotch pines greet you, their bright green needles glistening with water droplets. To maintain freshness, volunteers keep the tent interior cool and humid by frequently hosing down the trees. Walking around this dewy forest scene, hearing the crunch of gravel underfoot and music from the Boys Choir playing in the background, is a surefire way to relieve Christmas stress.
3. Be Present: Leave Your Smartphone at Home
Too often, the temptation to take out your phone and snap selfies or record videos takes over in novel situations like this. The second you yield to this pressure, you take yourself out of the experience, and the magic of the moment is lost. While you’re busy photographing the amazing foam art in the hot chocolate you purchased, or documenting every step of your tree-picking experience in a video, you’re disengaged from the experience itself.
Taking my kids to the Boys Chorus tree lot ranks among my favorite Christmas memories. Watching them run around, playing hide-and-seek while the grown-ups searched for trees, is something I will never forget. I don’t have a single picture from those nights, but I remember them clearly because I was fully present in the moment. Had I preoccupied myself with capturing the “perfect” moment to share on social media, the whole experience would have become just another Christmas obligation to stress over.
Old Habits Die Hard
Christmas is always stressful, but the season has become even more complicated in the 21st century. Social media has injected new opportunities for anxiety into the equation. For many, the pressure to present an idealized image of their holiday experience looms large. My pre-Internet era Christmas experience taught me a valuable lesson: Be in the moment. Whether making your feet into fists on the rug or visiting a tree lot on a cold winter night, find ways to engage your senses completely during the holidays. If you find yourself reaching for your phone to take a picture or record a video, stop. Old habits die hard, but trust me, you will enjoy the Christmas season much more if you focus on being in the present moment.
FOOTNOTES
1Tucson Arizona Boys Chorus. (1980, December 4). Silver Bells: Boys Chorus ushers in holiday joy. Tucson Citizen. Tucson.
2Tucson Arizona Boys Chorus. (1980, December 4). Silver Bells: Boys Chorus ushers in holiday joy. Tucson Citizen. Tucson.
