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Ghosts of Christmas yet to Come

January 2, 2023   ·   0 Comments

By Brian Lockhart

Christmas is just around the corner.

It happens only once each year and everyone celebrates the holiday season differently.

Many prefer the old-fashioned holiday of family gathering on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day and enjoying a traditional meal of turkey and all the fixings that go along with it.

Others like to enjoy the season by attending parties. Why not? You can have a pre-Christmas party, a Christmas day party, a Boxing Day party, a mid-week party, and cap it off with a New Year’s Eve party.

Of course, if you’re going to party that much, you may need a holiday from the holiday, when it’s all over.

Some people like to use the holiday break as a reason to have a vacation and escape the cold. I have known a lot of people over the years who decided to spend Christmas Day at Disney World or a casino in Las Vegas.

That can be a lot of fun if you don’t mind missing time with the extended family or friends and are prepared to finally realize that the casinos always have the advantage and your odds of coming home with more money than you left with, are about zero.

Christmas always provides many memories – usually good ones, I hope. Although I do know some people where the family dynamic just creates a nightmare every year, but that’s a whole different story.

Almost everyone has a favourite Christmas memory. It could be that time you received a special meaningful gift as a child. It could be a time that you were finally able to reconnect with family or friends you haven’t seen in a while. Or maybe it was a special winter trip to the cottage where Christmas Eve was spent by a bonfire and you gazed up at a million stars unfettered by the city lights.

In the Dickens classic, A Christmas Carol, Ebenezer Scrooge is visited by three ghosts. I’m sure you know the story and have probably seen one of the film versions of the book.

The Ghost of Christmas Past presents a memory of things that have happened in previous years. The Ghost of Christmas Present, shows Scrooge the current Christmas and helps him see the life of an ordinary man, a little clearer.

The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, provides Scrooge with a look into the future. For Scrooge, the future does not provide a happy ending.

He realizes that his miserable, miserly life ends with him dying alone – and no one cares that he is gone. It does, however, offer him a chance at redemption. It’s never too late, and of course, at the end of the novel, Scrooge, knowing the future, changes his ways and is determined to be a better person.

While Christmas memories will be made this year, and you can reflect on the past, maybe having a visit from the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, would be a benefit to a lot of people.

It may be a good time of year to not only reflect on the past but take a look ahead and see if you can make improvements in your own life over the coming year, then celebrate those achievements when Christmas comes around next year.

There are always ‘New Year’s resolutions people make, but how often do you keep them? The resolution to start working out usually means a few trips to the gym, followed by putting it off a day, two days, then one day you realize you haven’t been to the gym in a month.

By planning for the future, and taking a few moments during the holidays to visit the future yourself, you just might find catalyst to make some needed changes.

It’s easy to say you will plan ahead, but putting the plan into action is a different story. Some days you realize a month has gone by and you still haven’t made the effort. That’s okay – we’re all human, and the difficult things can take time.

In the end, maybe it is the special memories we make at Christmas that are the most important, and will stay with us for a lifetime.

I hope you do make special memories this holiday season, and enjoy your time with family and friends, and have a prosperous and happy new year.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all, a good night.

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