Expectations and Heavenly Onions

Dealing with 2020's inevitable disappointments

Heavenly onions have been tradition for Thanksgiving and Christmas with my kids for their whole lives. It was a recipe from my ex-husband’s family, and we all still relish it. It is one of those vegetable dishes that is hardly a vegetable, more a casserole of French Onion soup made of red onions, cream of chicken soup, Swiss cheese, and slices of french bread. But it feels like comfort.

During the holidays on a good year, comfort is sorely needed. The holiday season is rife with expectations. We all have our own ideas of how it “should” look, who “should” do what, and expectations that do little more than set us up for disappointment or worse. “Should’s” are always suspect.

Once I got married we had several sets of parents to please in different parts of the country. Now my kids are grown and there are even more branches of family scattered around and even with a spread sheet no one can keep up or please everyone, much less anyone at times. Unmet expectations can be a source of self inflicted wounds.

I have worked on being extra flexible in general, and especially during the holidays. I set my expectations on low, and am sometimes pleasantly surprised which is a lot better than being hurt and disappointed.

An Alcoholics Anonymous quote is “Expectations are pre-meditated resentment.” So true. When we learn that very difficult lesson we may find happiness that has always eluded us. And when we can apply this to ourselves, we can end a lot of our own suffering. Why are we always so hard on ourselves?

This year thanks to the pandemic most of us will have very different looking holidays. Many of us have family too far away to see. And many of us will be having smaller gatherings or multi-media versions of in person and some kind of zoom holiday non extravaganza. Traditions in many cases will be tossed out. After 9 months of pandemic fatigue we are almost all on edge and ready to kiss 2020 goodbye.

I feel the same way. Everything is all so “it’s complicated” and I am ready for the day when I can hug everyone and anyone. So, what to do. This year especially, I am going to keep my expectations low. I am going to be flexible. I am going to work on not sweating the small stuff or the big stuff. I am going to be less concerned about the get together on the actual holiday date. I am going to be less worried about what foods are served and when we see each other.

And I am going to be more intentional to look for little things to be grateful for. I am going to work on being more awestruck by little things. I am going to be more appreciative of whatever time we can see one another. I am going to be more “jolly” and less scrooge or grinch. I am going to relish my Heavenly Onions, calories be damned.

Will it work all day every day? Heck no. And since I already know that, I will also give myself some grace when I have lapses or feel disappointed. I will allow myself to feel the full range of feelings, good, bad and ugly.

Anyone want to join me on this perfectly imperfect journey as we send 2020 into the history books?

Betsy Smith Certified Happy For No Reason trainer and coach.

betsyrsmith@mac.com