Although nobody knows for sure what the next few months will bring, we are coming to terms with the fact that this year’s Christmas celebrations will be different from those of the past. After such an unexpected year of uncertainty, loss, and disconnection; our energy for the season may be more difficult to muster.

Our own emotions and those of others are likely to be closer to the surface. Particularly if family members have been separated by border closures or distance. The changes we have experienced – social isolation, cancellation of our usual activities, work and business challenges, financial stress and our normal lives going online have taken some toll.

The daily updates, in regard to case numbers and border closures, are promising here in Australia. We have recently experienced days of few or no newly reported cases of the virus or deaths and major state borders reopening. We view from a precipice, hoping the current positive trend continues in time to gather with our loved ones. We witness the rest of the world and realize how fortunate we are. For many other countries, where cases are still prevalent, lives continue to be impacted.

Although this Christmas season may be quite a different one, it can provide unique opportunities and gifts of time and connection with one another. Here are some ways to refocus the season.

Focus on what is important – The hardships of this year have made us appreciate what we have and those things that we value as important. In response, there may be a focus less on consumerism and more on connecting with those we love.

Spend Wisely – Families may have less income to buy gifts and food so the gifts of presence with each other will be particularly important. Spending will need to be more conscious. New, less expensive rituals can be implemented. It may be a time to be less rushed and to simplify – creating extra time to spend together, to decorate, to make a meal.

Spread out the festivities – There are opportunities to create additional celebrations and special activities together around the Christmas Season. Let the focus of Christmas Day be on fun and togetherness. This can be less stressful, calmer, and even more affordable as activities and mini breaks are spaced out over time. Travelling with babies and toddlers to visit family before the rush of the season makes good sense.

Stay in touch – Continue to stay connected even if being together in person isn’t possible. We have become accustomed to gathering online during the year, so this can continue through the Christmas season.

Share with others – More than normal, this can be a time to help other families and our communities. To share kindness and support with our neighbours and those who have had a tougher year than ourselves.

Start a new tradition– Perhaps it will be something that you have not done before in the usual lead up to Christmas. Focus on what is available and ‘doable’ now.

Empathize with others. Care and respect each other – actively listen, and acknowledge how others are feeling. Allow those we love time to debrief the year that was.

Plan for the year to come – Write notes to place in a jar of what you would love to do when it is safe to do so. We will eventually emerge beyond the challenges of this year. Whatever the future holds, planning for the possibilities can be a joyful activity.

Focus on the important things this Christmas season. Follow spiritual traditions, develop gratitude for those around you and give to others in meaningful ways. As we gather it may be a time to conquer 2020 and make it a unique celebration of our resilience. Yes, it may be different celebration, but perhaps less will prove to be best for all of us. (Thank you fellow matriarchs Ann and Myrell for these parting pieces of wisdom).

I have a love: hate relationship with our current world of technology. I can imagine most people see both the benefits and hindrances inherent in this relatively new form of living. The electronic revolution that has brought us computers, the internet, and new ways of communicating. It has opened up our lives globally in many ways. We can connect to people from all around the world both personally and professionally. The sharing of ideas and access to so much more information via the internet is mind boggling. Our children and grandchildren have access to a plethora of information compared to what we can possibly contain in physical libraries.

Technology has also benefited our health. New ways of intervening medically and surgically are available. People with disabilities have been privy to major advances that have improved the quality of their lives. Complex or physically demanding aspects of the workplace have seen advancements. It has helped us grow our economies and generally improved our living standards.

Unfortunately, in the brief time we have been dominated by technology (the last 2 generations of over 200,000 generations of human existence) it has also shown its limitations with some detrimental impacts on our world.

• Our children and ourselves are more distracted by devices. Rather than choosing connection we are more likely to reach for our devices for the immediate gratification of, for example, the loading of a game or video, the acknowledgement of a Facebook status, Instagram Post, or tweet. We are looking to technology for our validation and growing increasingly impatient with loading speeds and technical glitches. These instantaneous expectations cannot be replicated in our everyday face to face interactions with others. In real life we take time to do things and we do disappoint each other.
• We feel more emotionally affected and isolated by the content we digest. Mesmerized by our screens we find it difficult to turn away or switch off. This can lead to a heightened sense of anxiety or depression around life. It is harder for us to discern the reality of situations due to sensationalist media coverage. Developing brains have a difficult time discerning content they are exposed to. The guidance provided by adults is crucial.
• It is changing our bodies – posture, digestion, and function – through less natural exercise on a daily basis. We used to move throughout the day. Now we require prompts to alert us to our sedentary patterns and organised exercise regimes to keep us moving.

“Technology… is a queer thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand, and it stabs you in the back with the other”

Carrie Snow

Our bodies have changed in structure and function. As we sit hunched over our technology we put our spines out of alignment, particularly affecting our neck muscles. Our bodies are focused from the neck up yet our mind, body and emotions are so integrated that we may be switching off our awareness from the neck down. We can easily lose physical and emotional balance with our more sedentary, device driven lifestyle. One we have all unwittingly joined.

I am unsure what the solution is, technology and electronics are here to stay. Yet, our bodies have increasingly been taken away from nature and the way we were meant to function. How do we help ourselves and our children to become stronger and more resilient as we navigate modern life?

As a World, we are an aging population. Compared to the 1950s when eight percent of the population in the developed world were 65 years and older, by 2030 it will rise to twenty three percent and by 2050 twenty six percent of the population. In the developing world the percentages are lower, yet still rising in line with the developed world (United Nations development figures). The traditional pyramid model – a large base of youth which narrows as we age, is beginning to invert.

More of us are aging and the baby boom generation are moving out of the workforce and into the life stages beyond. Fewer younger people are economically supporting our economies and a level of fracture in inter-generational support is becoming more evident in our modern world. Where traditionally a multitude of generations relied on the physical support of each other to do life, our nuclear family model (mum, dad and the kids) is testing us. Is it no longer a sustainable way to live?

When I look at our current society I see large, distinct pillars where our youngest and oldest citizens spend a great deal of their time. Siloed in man created institutions separated from the greater world. Our economy based on long hours of work has dominated our culture and is required if we continue to focus on accumulating wealth and possessions rather than prioritizing our relationships with each other.

In response to the structure of modern life, our youngest and most vulnerable citizens are nurtured in childcare settings rather than in the family home. Their developing minds are like sponges and are greatly influenced by the world around them. The first seven years of their lives are crucial, yet as a society we undervalue the importance of these early formative years, parenting the young and the early childhood teaching profession.

Children then progress to school to be further institutionalized into the expectations of our modern world. We rely so heavily on the teachers and culture of our schools to get things right as we have less time to influence the beliefs and understandings of our own offspring. Yet strangely we have seen this year an appreciation yet undervaluing of the school teaching profession.

A similar institutionalization occurs at the other end of the life spectrum. Retiring singles or couples are encouraged to move to lifestyle communities where their activities centre on people of the same age group. As they live separated from multigenerational neighbourhoods, the young increasingly don’t see or interact with them. An unintended distance and intolerance develops.

As physical aging progresses, the options become more medicalized as individuals progress through various levels within aged care facilities. During Covid, we have seen how badly we have been doing in this sector. Lack of resourcing, professional staff, and respect for the elderly and those who care for them has been confronting to watch. Our oldest citizens have become our most vulnerable. It had laid hidden from our view for years, until it became prime time news.  

As a consequence of creating these silos we have fractured generational lines and the loss of influence and connection between the inquisitive and impressionable minds of the young and the wisdom and life experience of the elderly. During Covid, the hardest disconnection to experience seemed to be the inability for grandparents to physically connect with their grandchildren.

This year has produced a watershed moment, the possibility that we are being confronted with the realities of what we, as humans, have created in this world. Covid 19 has been a great impetus for learning life lessons. Our world is changing. What is no longer working is clearly evident and it is now the perfect timing to set things straight from the community level up.

We need this large demographic of elders to step up big time and really advocate for the future of this world. It is important that the wisdom of our life experience is consciously shared with the generations below. At the end of our lives we need to have successfully concluded our jobs as human beings and be ready to say our goodbyes.

Our world and everything in it has been feeling a level of exhaustion for life as it is. As a result, this year, we have been given an opportunity for temporary stillness. Philosopher Stephen Jenkinson believes one consequence of Covid has been an opportunity to slow down and realize our limitations as humans. We are becoming aware that no matter how much we desire to go back to the way things were, our lives have been changed. Perhaps in this time we have identified some crucial things for the better.

As a culture we had put a large focus on youthfulness. This had made us become phobic about aging and death. Yet death has been a dominant feature of the Covid pandemic. The elderly are dying, but we are also coming to terms with the death of the young. Covid does not discriminate.

In healthier times, it was easier to outsource and distance ourselves from the inevitable endings of our lives. Most of us believing somehow we would live forever. Never fully joining the conversation of the natural order of things. Not really noticing that we ourselves are continually changing – growing up then growing old. We shy away from conversations about death and impermanency. Yet we have been surrounded by it every day of our lives.

Yet a culture that does not believe in endings is a culture that has less heart. Our hearts were meant to be broken as we realize ourselves and those around us are continually aging. Each life stage produces its own endings and small goodbyes – at the school gate, as our children empty nest and become independent, as we change where we live, as we conclude work and retire, as we end relationships and marriages. It prepares us for the final inevitable physical goodbye from one another.

Once we acknowledge this reality, we don’t take each other for granted. We learn to sit in conversation with each other, to make time for our elders, to share the experiences of life and to learn all there is to know about ourselves and our ancestral links while we can. We invite our children and grandchildren to join us, realizing the valuable lessons they learn from being around people of all ages.

My hope is that we embrace the lessons we are currently being confronted with. That we change our ways and advocate for a better, more cohesive, and loving world. One where we understand the flow and impermanence of life.  One where we fully appreciate real connection between our generations while we can.