How To Really Enjoy The Holidays

Yeah, it's time for a virtual campfire sit down with Terry Weiss. Welcome to Weiss's Thoughts. Well, hey, everybody, welcome, Welcome to the podcast. Welcome to Wife's Thoughts. I am Terry Weiss. That is correct, that is I and I am so glad that you decided to join us today for this episode of the podcast. And just before we get started and get underway, a few little cleaning duties to do, or house cleaning it some people like to call it. Weis's Thoughts dot Com is the podcast website, and you know, I'm still a little undecided. I guess undecided is going to be the word I'm going to use on whether or not I'm going to just keep that domain name for the podcast, because honestly, I don't know. I don't know. I've got feedback from some of you say, yeah, the website, it's great to go there, but why don't you you know, maybe you can spend that money somewhere else, you know, But I mean, I got a pretty good deal through the podcast. Oh so what can I say? But Weis's Thoughts dot com. You can also listen to us, obviously if you found us on your favorite podcast provider through a link just to you know, follow the show. There Wis's Thoughts, and I got a YouTube channel just look for Wis's Thoughts on YouTube. And I have a website Terrywiss dot com. Wyce is how I spell my last name, and some of you have spelled at wei ss and oh I've had all kinds of all kinds of spellings of my last name, which is kind of funny, but that's okay. I don't mind. It doesn't bother me as long as you eventually get to the place where you need to be at, which is one of my websites, Terry Weiss dot com or Weis's thoughts dot com for the podcast. I am also on social media at x. I used to say you can tweet at me on Twitter, but now you can't, so okay, So anyway, Terry Weiss dot com, tweet at me on Twitter at Terry Weiss, and oh so many other ways to find and get a hold of myself. There was something digging in the background. I'm not exactly sure what that was. I was rather odd, but hey, you know, weird things have. Weird things have happened on the podcast. I'll tell you that stranger things have happened on the show. So anyway, welcome one and all, welcome to the program. I'm so glad you're here today. And we are going to explore a bunch of stuff on the podcast today and delve into many many a thing. But as we get into the silly season and the holidays, some people call it the silly season, we're going to talk about that. We're going to talk about, Hey, your holiday shopping, are you doing a lot with your holiday shopping? And we're going to talk about the mindset during the holidays that maybe you have or you run into other people that they have. Do people, do you find yourself getting grumpier more stressed around the holidays or do you tend to kick back and relax. But before we do all that, we've got to do this. That's that time again. It's time for the Wordsmith Word of the episode. That's right, and it's time for the word Smith Word of the episode. That's where you can learn a new word along with myself and show everybody how big your brain is. And on this week's episode of the podcast, the word Smith word of the episode is is brute b are ui t. We don't have our lovely assistant or artificial voices, don't I guess you would call her to help us with that brute b are u I. It is a noun and its sense is a report to a rumor, or if you use it in the verb as a verb, it's to spread or report a rumor widely. A couple instances where you can use brute in a sentence. It's just a brute but I heard that there's a surprise musical guest lined up for the last night of the festival. Or you can use it in this sense until all the facts are in. Don't brute around any information? Or have you heard the brute that we're getting next week? Off? That's brute b our u I T. So there you go. You got a nice big brain. Now with this week's episode, word of the episode, I'll spit that out one of these euns. So, how are you? Welcome to the show, Welcome to the podcast, Welcome to all that we call wife's thoughts. And I am so glad that you've just again decided to join us today for the the podcast, and want to know how you doing, how you're feeling. It's that time of the year, my friends. Yes, I'm gonna take a little hang on, a little sip of water. Sorry about that little sip of water, because you gotta have you gotta have hydration when you're doing all this, trust me. So it's that time of the year again. It's that time of the year where we all get ready and we start buying gifts for loved ones and acquaintances and friends and what have you. And after Thanksgiving, you know, the sales really ramp up and well, look at that all that noise going on. Apologies if you hear that, we'll try to edit that out in post. Being a audio professional that I am. So it is that time of the year, and it's time for what some people call the holiday season, or some maybe more pessimistic folks, or maybe some moort lehman people call it the silly sies. And we ramp up heading towards Christmas and New Year's and parties and everything of that nature, where some people really get stressed out about it. Some people really find themselves in a whirlwind of you know, trying to find the right gift for everyone, putting pressure on themselves if they're hosting a party where they're ruminating maybe over having to deal with loved ones and friends that they really don't keep in contact with but now have to make the obligatory good faith showing. I guess it would be the easiest way to describe it. And some of us, unfortunately have lost friends and loved ones in the past year or years, and this time of year can really bring you down emotionally and mentally because maybe you know you have that loved one or friend, spouse, what have you that you you know, you really made some lifetime memories with and the holidays here just remind you of that loss. So, you know, we have things like sad seasonal effective. I believe disorder is the acronym that that that encompasses. So I guess I'm asking this time of the year, do you get wrapped up in you know, the the all the good that it can bring out in people, you know, the happiness, the togetherness, the forgiveness I guess would be a big one. Forgiveness would be definitely a big one at this time of year. Or do you find yourself maybe again ruminating on you know, the opposite set of the spectrum and feeling lonely or dejected. I to find myself I lean more towards trying to remain positive, happier as it were, and just enjoy the holidays, just enjoy everything that the holidays have to offer. And I look at it too as a opportunity for softening my heart and being more forgiving, more open as well. And I would hope that a lot of people would would think that this time of the year, especially this time of the year, because let's face it, guys and gals and pets of all ages, there's a lot going on in the world. There's a lot out there that can really bring you down and make you sad, even ilicit anger or feelings of contempt in some cases. And I think that the holidays, especially you know, around the Christmas holiday, whether you now, whether you celebrate Christmas or not entirely up to you. I know a lot of folks out there don't celebrate Christmas in the traditional Christian sense. They have different holidays. There's quansa you know, there's you know, all different factions and groups that have different meanings to this time of the year. But I think one thing I would hope, I would hope that we could fundamentally agree on is the fact that while there may be differences in groups and organizations of people that celebrate this time of year, that we could focus on the good, focus on love, focus on bringing the human race together, and being kindler and gentler to our fellow human being, and reaching out, especially especially reaching out to those in need this time of the year, which is really vitally important, especially around the world with all that's been going on with the calamity and the wars, and you know, the cost of living, you know, depending on the country you're in, has gone up substantially, substantially, the cost of living has gone up. So helping those in need, reaching out to the infirmed, and maybe those that may have been left behind by society. Now is the time to rekindle connections and show those people I mean, because look at it this way. You may be by reaching out to someone in need or doing an act of kindness, anything like that, you may be that person's last, last best hope. You may be the one that turns them and helps turn their life around and make them see, oh, there is still good left in the world, there is humanity left. That's important because in today's technomodern world, we all get wrapped up in technology and social media and who's got the most likes or who's trending, who's going viral. You know, a lot of a lot of folks put a lot of stock in those things. And while okay, it's cute and funny and sometimes it's you need it for your business or you know, depending on the type of business that you're doing. I get that. However, that being said, there's more to life than air quotes going viral. There's a lot more to life than that. It's humanity, it's being a human being. That's what we need. And I don't know, you know, some would argue that we as a human being, you know, as a human species, have lost that ability to connect, to really connect. We're connecting in ways that are unprecedented, you know, electronically. I can sit here and produce this podcast here for you all today, and it can be listened to around the world, even in outer space. If someone was to take a recorded version of Whice Thoughts to outer space. I mean, we can connect with people in nanoseconds, either you know, with audio or video. Think about this. We can chat with people around the world. We can go into you know, Zoom calls or Microsoft Teams meetings or Google, hangouts or what have you on platforms and stay in touch with relatives that you know. Normally it would have been a phone call decades ago, a decade or two ago, right, but we can visually now as well as uh, you know, with the audio visually see interact with people and individuals, which at its core is a great thing. It don't get me wrong. At its core, it's a wonderful thing to be able to do that and have that ability to interact. However, however, with technology comes great responsibility. And if you just look at the mess that social media causes and can cause, you can sit back and say, you know, but anyway, getting back on point here, I digress this time of the year, you know, with the shopping and the holiday shopping. I find that sometimes the holidays are being too commercialized. I've been saying that for well over a decade, and it's been increasingly getting worse and worse with you know, take advantage of this sale, take advantage of that sale. By now, I had mentioned on a previous episode here of Voice's thoughts. If you go back an episode or two that I started seeing at advertisements for shopping, you know, for the holidays during October. I mean, Halloween hadn't even come and gone. Man, come on, are you kidding me? In October seeing advertisements for hey, come you know by this product start shopping for Christmas now? And I'm like, can we at least get through Halloween and maybe get close to Thanksgiving, you know, before we start pumping out the uh, you know, the corporate things for shopping and we can kind of enjoy a fall a little bit here. I mean, it would be nice. And that can bring it down too. I've heard some people complain about that and it kind of gets them in a grumpy mood right from the get go. It's like, on they want is your money? On? They want is your money? Yeah, they're in business. I get it. But that being said, this is I think an opportunity every year. Every year, this is an opportunity for all of us to kind of do a little mental house cleaning, a little mental winter cleaning, as it were, to say, all right, check it, you know, or the younger generation says, they call it checking yourself. You know, hey, man, you better check yourself. They mean, sit back, take a a deep introspective look at what you're doing, how you're doing it, Why, you're doing it and what residual outcomes are. And I think that's a great opportunity for something like that, absolutely, and I find I need it, you know, and I try to incorporate that. And one good thing to do is kind of even put it on your calendar, because we can get so wrapped up and things we're doing, and you know, multitasking and going at everything one hundred miles an hour that sometimes I have found, at least over the past year or two especially, that it's good to just schedule in a mental check in for yourself, whether it be you know, a fifteen minute meditation or five minute meditation once a week, you know, to just clear the mind, clear the trash, clear the negativity, and get back to your roots and really get in touch with you. I think a lot of societal issues. And again I'm no psychologist, I have no degree, I have no formal mental or medical training. This is just a personal observation from yours, truly, Terry Weiss, is that we get so wrapped up in ourselves, we get so wrapped up in what we want, and we get so wrapped up in our own world. Okay, and the outside pressures or some might even go as far to say influences the constant bombardment of information and how you should act, how you should think about this, how you should feel about that, what you should do. There's a lot of people out here telling us what we should be doing. Okay, excuse me. There's a lot of people out here telling us what we should be doing, what we should be feeling, how we should be acting. However, you need to get to know you. And I think a lot of societal problems stem from us not really knowing ourselves. And I have found this might be the case if you do this now, or if you start practicing this. I have found the more I get in touch with me, more happier I am, the more calm I am, the more at peace I am by just getting in touch with myself. I was really amazed once I started just basic. I started it by basic breathing techniques, taking you know, ten minutes a day using the old Apple Watch app, the breathe app app on the Apple Watch, and just sitting. I started a sitting position, just doing some really conscious breathing to you know, to relax myself. And I started out at you know, ten minutes a day. Then I went up to fifteen to twenty minutes a day, just a little five minutes spurts here and there on the app itself, and I was amazed. After a couple of weeks of my pulse actually you know, dropped by about three to four points per day, my resting pulse rate, resting heart rate. I was like, hmm, something's changed here. And I also noticed my mind. What my mind was, how do I express it? Cleaner, clearer, able to handle, Like if something came up, I didn't you know, just go ah, you know, freak out, you know, and stress out as easily. I was more able to handle. If something of an odd nature tried to throw my day off, I was like, oh, okay, we're going to do this. We're going to do that. I know it sounds probably maybe comical to some of you out there or insignificant, but I'll tell you what, if you're not practicing this, give it a shot, especially now as we are into the holiday season and a lot of us can get overwhelmed really quick because not only is there the day to day goings on, but now you throw in a couple of major holidays here in the next thirty days and parties and obligations, and do I go to this party? Do I go to that party? You know, I got to deal with this person that I really don't you know, see eye to eye on or I got to deal with this relative or this family member or this happens, or that I got to buy a gift for that I gotta get that, and you know, don't put the undue pressure on yourself. I would say, enjoy the holidays. Try to look at it as an opportunity for emotional house cleaning, tidying up if you will, on your emotional state, and use it for yourself as well as for introspective reflection. You know, you hear me mention that a lot on this podcast. I'm really big about introspective reflection. And I don't say it on a lot of the episodes to preach to you, mind you, I say it also to help me and remind myself for constant intro prospective reflection or ir you know they have AI. Well we can talk about here on Whyite's thoughts I are introspective reflection. Some people call it meditation. I call it introspective reflection. It gives you a chance to get to know you and so while you're out there shopping this holiday season, doing your errands, deciding which functions you may or may not attend, dealing with the weather depending on the part of the world or country you're in. Here in the United States, in the Northeast, it's winter season, so you can make all the best laid plans, and you know, a winter storm might just take all that go, you know, so you know, try and take it all in stride. Try to take everything in stride, have a good heart, to have a joyous spirit this holiday season. And remember that it's not about the commercialism of the holidays, even though you're gonna get bombarded with tons of ads from advertisers of all you know, retail and travel and everything. I mean, it's just the nature of the beast. As they say, it's that time of the year where we're gonna get bombarded with all these ads. Okay, just remember, take it all in stride. Do some introspective reflection, take care of yourself, get proper sleep, proper nutrition, exercise in some way, shape or manner form. Do something that's relaxing for you, whether it's reading, singing, walking, talking, listening to nice music, lighting a you know, lighting a romotherapy, candle something like that. Do something for you, and just take it all in stride and remember that the best thing about being a human being is being alive. Though we all have troubles, we all have things that come our way. This too, shell pass. Enjoy the holiday season. Use it as a time to reconnect with loved ones, remember those that have departed. Celebrate life, Celebrate all the good that humanity has to offer. Don't let what some people label as the silly season drive you silly and insane. Just enjoy the ride. Like I said, it's you know, we only get one trip around this great blue orb, around the in this blue orb called Earth, we only get one trip around as far as I know, in life. To you know, some of you believe that we come back. Hey man, that's cool, that's your thing. But we only get one trip in life. It's a one way journey as far as I know. I mean, once you're born, that's it. It's a one way road. Man. You can't, you know, go backwards until they've done time travel. But there's other podcasts about time time travel for that. Enjoy it. Enjoy the holidays, Enjoy your loved ones, Enjoy your family, friends, acquaintances, what have you. Be good to yourself, be kind to one another. Hey, thanks for listening to the program today. I truly appreciate each and every one of you out there, and remember to see a change in the world, you have to be the change in the world you want to see. It all starts with you, the person looking back at you in the mirror every morning. Remember to be kind to yourself, be kind to others. If you want to tweet at me on Twitter, it's at Terry Weiss. Stop by the website Wis's thoughts dot com just to make sure you spell my name right. Wysee Wis's thoughts dot com, and hey, leave us a positive rating and review on your favorite podcast provider. Won't you tell your friends, tell your family, tell your pets about wife's thoughts. And I look forward to get ring yet again around the virtual campfire with you real soon. Take care.