Remember when you were a kid and you didn’t feel so stressed - when you were a daredevil and you would climb the tallest tree and didn’t fear falling down? And now that you’re older you cringe at the thought of all the things you did as a child. Remember how Christmas morning was the only morning, besides cartoon Saturday, when you would wake up early and run downstairs, eager to open new toys and watch movies with your family? I thought that the holidays would continue to bring back the feelings I had as a child, even though I was getting older. But I began to realize that the holidays only get more and more stressful as you age. As you get older you’re expected to work, and the more you work the more you are expected to spend on gifts.The holidays aren’t really about family time anymore. Instead, the focus has shifted to who can get the best deals. Black Friday has become a new American tradition, leaving Thanksgiving to be a four-hour anticipation celebration for getting cheaper electronics.
The price tags get higher each and every year, making the competition to buy cheaper gifts more and more intense. The rush to get better deals or get the newest electronics is more prominent and can cause us to become stressed. The holidays are meant to be about family, togetherness and the time we spend with the people we love, but lately, the holidays are becoming more commercialized. I always thought the holidays brought out the inner child in all of us, yet as I continue to grow up I can see the stress my parents are under to make sure our family (cousins, aunts/uncles, friends, grandparents, nieces/nephews) all have a nice gift to unwrap. As the years grow so does the number of people you have to buy gifts for, which then increases the amount of money you need to spend. Sometimes you can even find yourself starting to save for Christmas gifts as early as March in order to have enough to spend during the holidays.
The holidays are short-lived nowadays. The adrenaline and the happiness we feel are now the relief of being able to snag the last PS4 at Walmart or the Urban Decay Naked Palette that has been sold out for months. Before the holiday happiness was about the happiness we felt being with one another and seeing the small kids happy and off from school, likewise all the seasonal food that brought the family together at the dinner table. The race to savings and the demand for earlier savings has caused companies to open earlier, pulling workers away from their families. This has caused us to be with one another earlier and spend less time together. People have even lost their lives due to Black Friday frenzies, trampling and getting trampled to be the first to get what is on their lists.
If we could all take a step back to realize that the holidays are about family and the memories we make, the companies and corporations will stop profiting from our need to satisfy each other and ourselves with “cheaper” goods. We take back our right to enjoy our time with loved ones and we take back our holiday happiness and the memories we make.
