Retaking Christmas

Why? Because I want the message to be heard.

1) I don't need stuff this Christmas. Feel free not to spend your money on me, but give it to someone who needs it more instead. Consider, for example, Lifewater International - a Christian organization, with the seemingly simple goal of providing clean water wells to the poor in developing countries.

2) You probably don't need stuff this Christmas. There are exceptions, but lots of people have lots of stuff and the gifts we get at Christmas are appreciated for a moment, then banished to a shelf. Consider asking your friends and family who may plan on giving you gifts to donate to a charity instead.

3) We still like getting things. If people ask what you want, give them an option - like a picture they took, or a stuffed animal representing a donation made to a group like Heifer International.

Here's a Journal Article about people's happiness at Christmas. Happiness research tries to quantify what makes people more or less satisfied. There are some interesting conclusions, but probably stuff you already guessed were true: Shopping is stressful, Time with family is much better, and those that focused the most on material goods at Christmas felt less satisfied overall. An excerpt, for everyone who isn't big on the idea of correlations and statistics:

(All emphasis and parenthetical notes mine)

If, however, following the dictates of society is the primary way by which people obtain happiness at Christmas, the season’s materialistic aspects should also be positively associated with well-being, given the number of cultural messages trumpeting the path of spending and receiving. Such a prediction was clearly not supported in the current study. Instead, individuals reported significantly lower well-being when spending and receiving were especially salient experiences. Despite the fact that people spend relatively large portions of their income on gifts, as well as time shopping for and wrapping them, such behavior apparently contributes little to holiday joy. Further, the amount individuals spent and went into debt was unrelated to their CWB (Christmas Well-Being), suggesting that excessive economic activity does little to enhance satisfaction. Additionally, when people received gifts that totaled a substantial percentage of their income, they reported more NA (Negative Affect).