The holiday season is seen as a time of joy and celebration. Many people are excited to plan events and spend quality time with their loved ones. Unfortunately for professionals, this season also comes with different demands that can cause holiday stress.
How can employees manage their year-end tasks and personal commitments without getting overwhelmed?
Surprisingly, the key isn’t striking a balance. Instead, it’s finding the strategy that works best for you.
The Myth of Striking a Balance
For professionals during the holiday period, balance is seen as the ideal state where one can juggle work responsibilities, family obligations, and social engagements with equal attention and energy.
No matter how ideal, this concept of balance is unrealistic. In reality, different tasks and commitments require different amounts of time and effort.
There are drawbacks to striving for perfect balance during the holidays.
- It sets unrealistic expectations. When you believe you should be able to do it all, you’re automatically setting yourself up for disappointment. It’s impossible to always excel at work or attend every single holiday party you’re invited to.
- It may be impractical. Various amounts of time and effort are needed for different activities. Some tasks, like a critical work project, require more time and mental energy than watching a holiday movie with family. Trying to equalize these inherently unequal demands can frustrate you.
Striking a balance is presented as a solution – but when you’re too focused on that balance even when it’s not working out, it just adds to the problem.
What Is Holiday Stress?
You may hear this term more commonly during the fourth quarter of the year.
Seasonal stress is a form of pressure and anxiety. Many employees experience this during the festive season. It’s the feeling of being overwhelmed due to the collision of work responsibilities and personal obligations that intensify as the year comes to an end.
Professionals who experience this may find themselves struggling to maintain focus at work. This may be because their minds are occupied with holiday to-do lists. Conversely, when at home or attending social gatherings, they might feel guilty about unfinished work tasks or incoming emails.
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How Can You Handle Holiday Chaos?
First, recognize that stress is a common experience. It’s important to understand that it’s unrealistic to create a perfect holiday experience while maintaining peak work performance. Too much focus on perfection can lead to overthinking and even burnout if not properly managed.
Instead of putting effort into striking the perfect balance, the key is to find a strategy that works for you. Reduce stress and manage your seasonal responsibilities by using one of the following methods:
1. Prioritize Tasks
The first method is prioritization, the most practical of the strategies.
Prioritization involves carefully assessing all your tasks and commitments, then deciding which ones deserve your time and energy. Decide based on the importance of each action. Focus on choosing the tasks that directly align with your own goals and values.
Prioritize what matters the most. This can ensure that your most crucial responsibilities are met. It also prevents you from feeling overwhelmed by letting you tackle one thing at a time. This strategy allows you to redirect your effort where it matters most.
To effectively prioritize during the festive season, follow these steps:
1. Identify your core values and the most important activities.
Reflect on what the festive season means to you. What do you want to achieve both personally and professionally? This might include spending quality time with family, maintaining key work responsibilities, or engaging in meaningful traditions. Remember that there are no right or wrong answers in this step. Use your goals and preferences when accomplishing this first part.
2. Categorize tasks by urgency.
Once you’ve identified important activities, focus on the urgency of accomplishing each one. Use different tools such as the Eisenhower Matrix to sort your tasks into four categories: important and urgent, important but not urgent, urgent but not important, and neither urgent nor important.
The usage of a matrix can be helpful, especially for visual learners. It serves as a representation to help you see where you should be focusing your time and energy.
3. Learn to say “no” to less important commitments.
This is often the most challenging but vital part of prioritization. Recognize that you can’t do everything, and that’s okay. Politely decline invitations or requests that don’t align with your priorities. Learn to set clear boundaries for both your colleagues and your loved ones. This will help you free up time that can be dedicated to the most important things. It can also prevent you from stretching yourself too thin throughout the festive season.
Read more: 5 Reasons Why You Should Prioritize Employee Wellness and Well-Being
2. Set Realistic Expectations
This approach involves adjusting your mindset and plans to align with what’s achievable. Focus on attainable goals rather than reaching for an idealized version of the holidays.
When your expectations are in line with reality, you’re less likely to feel frustrated. This approach also allows for more flexibility and adaptability since you’re not rigidly attached to a perfect vision of how things should be.
To set realistic expectations for the holiday season, consider the following steps:
- Reflecting on past experiences. Think about previous festive seasons and consider which tasks you accomplished. On the other hand, which activities got left behind? Which caused you stress? Is there anything you would’ve done differently in the past years? Ask yourself these guide questions to gain insights about what you should do for this year. Plan for the fourth quarter according to your gained perspective.
- Consider your available time, energy, and resources. Be honest about what you can realistically accomplish. Take into account your current context and circumstances. This might mean scaling back on decorations or simplifying the gifts you want to give. Instead of always thinking idealistically, give yourself some room for errors and delays.
- Communicate your expectations with coworkers, family, and friends. Have open conversations about what everyone wants and needs from the holiday season. This can help your entire group work together to create plans that are manageable for all involved.
- Embrace imperfection as part of the process. Remember that the “perfect” holiday doesn’t exist in real life. Striking the ideal balance is impossible since things are unpredictable both at home and at work. With this in mind, accept imperfections and learn from your mistakes. This can aid you in becoming less stressed in the final stretch of the year.
3. Practice Mindful Activities and Transitions
Mindfulness is distinct from the practical prioritization method and the more mental expectation-setting method. Without radically changing your daily patterns, it’s a good way to relieve stress and survive the holidays.
By incorporating mindful activities and transitions into your routine, you can stay grounded and centered amidst the busy season.
- Being mindful can be as simple as thinking critically about your tasks and situation. Be watchful of your stressors. Learn to pause and breathe when you know pressure is building up.
- Practice transitions between your activities. You might want to try taking a quick walk around the room before moving on to the next task to signal your brain that you’re shifting gear. It’s also physically good for you to stretch and move out of a sitting position.
- You can also ensure your workspace is meant only for professional tasks. Finish holiday-related activities in your personal space; don’t mix the two. This method can help you stay focused on one aspect of your responsibilities until they are accomplished.
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