All is Calm

Simplify your holiday season

The holidays are coming! The good news is that most of us will be able to fully celebrate and enjoy the season. We are ready to haul out the holly, or pull out the Chanukah gelt, or set up the Kinara. Ready to get together with friends and family for Thanksgiving, to celebrate Solstice or Christmas, Chanukah or Kwanzaa. Ready to welcome in a new year—because we are all just about OVER 2024, am I right?

In an ideal world, all that holiday prep would sound like a hell yes! to you. With the weight of the world this year—from the US election results to wars to natural disasters and more—a lot of us have diminished energetic capacity. And that is before factoring in things like family dynamics, job stress, losses, health issues, and so forth.

If you could use some help figuring out your holiday plans this year, then this is for you.

The holidays tend to make stress worse.

The holidays are chock full of stressors. There are so many things to do, from shopping to wrapping to packing, from cleaning to cooking and then cleaning up, not to mention planning and decorating and socializing. Plus they usually involve getting together with a lot of people, some of them requiring a lot of “management.”

Each thing piles on, like one more straw on a camel’s back. Pretty sure I don’t have to point out that most of it tends to fall on those of us who identify as women. (Thanks, patriarchy.)

Given just how stressful the holiday season can be, many of us are on track to disappointment, stress, and even burnout. That’s especially bad news if you are the person who is usually on the hook for making it all happen.

What if your holidays could be calmer? Less chaotic. Less stressful.

What if instead of doing ALL THE THINGS—the planning, the shopping, the decorating, the cleaning, the cooking, the wrapping, the managing—you simplified things for yourself?

What if instead of trying to make everything look perfect on the surface, you made the holidays more meaningful? What if instead of trying to please all the people in your life, you started by pleasing yourself?

What if you gave yourself the gift of a calmer, more expansive holiday?

ALL IS CALM is a four-session program designed to help you do just that.

Whether you celebrate Thanksgiving, Solstice, Chanukah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, New Year’s, something else entirely (St. Lucia’s Day or Festivus, anyone?), or an assortment of holidays, ALL IS CALM is all about checking in with yourself to discover what is meaningful to you, and paring down the holiday planning and celebration in a way that honors your traditions without breaking your spirit.

Does this sound anything like you?

You are at your wit’s end. You’ve lived through a global pandemic and just as the road back to “normal” started to smooth out, we were plunged into chaos with the 2024 election results. And those are just the “big world” issues, let alone work and health and caretaking and other things in your personal life.

The world is a mess right now, and you have experienced setbacks and losses along the way. You really want the fun of the holidays, but frankly, the holidays sound like a lot of work, and you aren’t sure you have the energy to deal with ALL OF THE THINGS.

I don’t know about you, but here are some of the things my clients tell me they worry about:

• Parties, gatherings, get-togethers can feel fraught. Being in a crowd can feel very draining. How do you strike a balance between people and your alone time, and how do you protect your own energy?

• You’ve been reconsidering whether you want to do things exactly the same way as always, or if you want to mix things up a bit when it comes to the holidays. Maybe you want to add a friendsgiving, or drop someone from your guest list. Maybe this is the first year since a loved one passed, or it’s the year you’ve decided to stop going to family for the holiday in order to preserve your mental health. Or maybe you simply want to streamline or modernize the way you decorate, or update the way you put meals together.

• Prices for everything from food to gifts appear to have gone up and you worry about your budget. You’d like to reconsider how many gifts you give, or what sort of spending you want to do.

• When there’s so much loss and sorrow in the world, and in your own life, you feel some kind of way about things—sad, angry, drained . . . It’s normal to want the diversion of the holidays, and also to worry that they don’t have as much meaning as in the past. How can you reclaim some of that nostalgia without feeling like a fraud?

OR

You’ve sworn for years that you are going to reconsider the holidays after you almost burn yourself out doing

• all the planning,

• all the shopping,

• all the cleaning,

• all the cooking,

• all the clean-up, and, of course,

• all the emotional work of making sure that everyone is happy, everyone has a good time, and everything is smoothed over.

And that was in a good year, before the world turned topsy turvy.

OR

You've always “done” the holiday a particular way.

• Pulling out all the stops for your Thanksgiving dinner, with every person’s favorite dishes, three pies, and a ton of leftovers. Fresh flowers, candles, three kinds of wine, linen tablecloths and napkins. (Or whatever your particular way is.)

• Latkes, brisket and sufganiyot (jelly donuts) for Chanukah, with candles (and maybe even presents) for all eight nights. Watch the dreidel spin!

• Decorations—indoor and out—and cookies and special breakfast and dinner and stockings and presents (so many presents) for Christmas.

• Feasting and big get-togethers and a Kinara for Kwanzaa.

• Drinks and food and party favors and music and dancing and fireworks for New Year’s Eve.

Except maybe large crowds feel dangerous to your physical or mental health. Or your cousins/neighbors/brother-in-law tend to overimbibe and become unruly. Maybe you already feel stretched too thin from everyday life these days. Maybe shopping and other holiday preparations feel overwhelming on top of work and the other daily obligations of life.

What if you could simplify the holidays this year? What if you could create a calmer, more mindful celebration?

ALL IS CALM was created to help you:

• evaluate and reconsider the way you usually do things

• decide what is still meaningful to you now, in 2023

• create a vision for the sort of holiday celebration you want this year

• plan a calmer holiday for yourself and your family

• create a meaningful, less-stressed holiday experience that honors your values as well as your current capacity

What you get when you join ALL IS CALM

All is Calm is a four-session, self-paced course that helps you to achieve a simpler, less-stressed holiday. It includes coaching to help you figure out what plans you want to embrace, and what things you “have to” include to feel you had a meaningful holiday. It also includes practical tools like shopping and pantry lists, and tips for how to plan a get-together in a way that meets your vision (without blowing your budget).

Mostly, it’s about creating a state of mind that allows you to jettison the shit that you truly don’t want to do, while also allowing you to find meaning, peace, and a sense of serenity.

Each of the four sessions includes resources for you to use, including planning tools, journaling prompts, moments of mindfulness, and more. The course is designed to allow you to review past holidays and your “usual” routine, envision a new holiday, plan a way to accomplish your vision for this year, see that plan through, then review so you are ready for next year.

I will also host a live, 45-minute Zoom call on Wednesday, December 11th at 1 p.m. (EST) to talk about whatever is coming up for you. You are encouraged to enjoy your lunch or a snack and beverage during the call. A recording of the Zoom call will be sent to you by email, so if you can’t make it, or wanted to revisit something, you will have access.

You will also have access to a Facebook group inside which I will post daily mindfulness prompts to sustain you through the course. Think of it as a place where you can share any thoughts, frustrations, dreams, or goals. A place to find sisterhood and support as you navigate this year’s holiday season. Take what you need, and leave the rest: this course is a judgment-free zone.

Right now, you may already be struggling. Maybe you have to work from home; while it has its benefits, it isn’t without additional stresses. Or maybe you have had to return to work, and you’d feel happier if you were at home. Or maybe you are dealing with sickness in yourself or a loved one. The uncertainty of our current times can feel overwhelming.  

Despite all that, you've been getting it done. Because that is what you do.

The fact remains that even without the stress of the holidays, you are likely stretched too thin. Taking on all the usual planning, shopping, cleaning, cooking, decorating, wrapping, and everything else that comes with the holidays may feel like way too many straws on top of the load you already carry.

Imagine this instead  

Rather than launching yourself into “what you’ve always done”, which—let’s face it—may always have been too much, you:

• grant yourself some grace and pause to evaluate things

• think through what you usually do for your religious or cultural holidays, and consciously choose to keep only the things you value

• release the things that cause too much stress and overwhelm

• make space for ease and calm.

Instead of a frantic holiday season, you implement the plan you create in this course to ensure that you only do the things that you find meaningful. You take care of things ahead of time, ensure things can reach people by the holiday, and reduce the amount of pressure you put on yourself.

Doesn’t that sound more expansive and far less stressful?

Frequently Asked Questions

I am stretched so thin right now—is this going to take a lot of time and effort? No! All is Calm us only four sessions, and the total investment of time per session is probably around an hour and a half. That gives you ample time to watch the video and complete the workbook for each session, and includes daily moments of mindfulness.

You get to decide what to do and when to do it. Though All is Calm includes four video sessions, each session is only 45 minutes. You can easily do it during lunch or break-time. The workbook for each session can be completed whenever you’d like. Or you can skip the writing part, if it stresses you out too much!

How do I join the course? Click here to sign up right now. It will take you just a couple of minutes to join.

How much is it? Just $97.

Can I try it out and then get a refund? Sorry, but no. If you join the course, you should expect to honor that commitment to yourself. There are no refunds.

When does it start? The course and the Facebook group will open on Monday, November 21st. The course dates are set up so that you will have plenty of time to plan for Thanksgiving, Chanukah, Christmas, Kwanzaa and/or New Year’s.

No need to imagine a calm holiday season: you can create one.

Just think . . . This year, you could be sitting calmly at home next to your favorite scented candle drinking a hot cup of tea or cocoa, instead of throwing yourself into a frenzy of holiday preparations that no longer brings you joy.

This year, you could have a workable plan for an enjoyable holiday. That is true whether it’s right-sizing your traditional celebrations or adjusting due to travel or health-related issues.

Instead of

• spinning in place because you can’t decide what you want to do

• fretting about shopping for gifts people don’t really want or need, just so you can say you have them,

• making yourself bonkers as you try to race from task to task, never getting a moment of rest or any time to enjoy the parts of the holiday that you like best

I invite you to pause. Take just a bit of time to formulate a plan that works for you. Maybe one that allows you to minimize your outings and ensure that things get where they need to go on time.

In addition to discussing wants and needs, All is Calm includes practical, hands-on tips for scheduling things, whether it’s purchasing or packaging, creating celebrations, or something else. All is Calm is full of ideas to brighten the holiday season for yourself and others.

All is Calm is designed for you to be able to create a peaceful holiday experience for yourself and for those around you.

Rather than continuing to add more and more things to what you do each year, All is Calm is about stepping back to consider what brings you and your family joy, then dropping things that can be left undone this year.

It’s about finding the meaning in your holiday for yourself and creating ease, rather than forcing things.

All is Calm is being offered for only $97, despite a total value of more than ten times that amount.

Why? Because I know what it’s like to be stressed out and worried, to feel overextended and underappreciated. Women like you hold up the world, and deserve to have someone see them and support them. And that is what All is Calm is here to do. I would love for you to join me.