by Kelly Carrington, GAWD
Christmas comes but once a year, I go into panic mode 24/7 from November 1st. It’s not long after the high street Christmas ads have landed, and you’ve only just kissed goodbye to the Halloween pumpkins. Yet my anxious brain has taken a trip in Doc Brown’s DeLorean, back to the future, and told me that my Christmas will be a disaster, with a festive failure list as long as your arm. “The kids won’t like their presents; There will be at least one trip to A&E; I’ll probably get the flu.”
Welcome to my world of Christmas catastrophising, the ancient human habit of mentally auditioning disaster scenarios long before they have a chance to occur.
What the Elf is this all About!?!
With my Christmas cracker psychological hat on, catastrophising is best described as the festive gift of cognitive distortion. Which basically means the brain has exaggerated problems which could potentially cause trouble. For example, “Marks & Spencer might have run out of chocolate yule logs.” This gets rocketed to a mental version of a disaster movie: Tears, tantrums, last minute panic shopping!!! Noooooooooooo!
I’m going to go all neuroscientific on you now. This is the work of the brain’s alarm system, the amygdala, hijacking the prefrontal cortex, the planner. Dealing with these threats was a survival tactic. It was how we evolved to deal with predators and so on. Not necessarily needed for the passive-aggressive WhatsApp festive planning groups. Moreover, in absence of sabre-toothed tigers, the predictive powers have had to hone in on modern life.
Catastrophising presents itself as a problem-solving master. I often feel like I am preparing for the worst, as you never know what could happen. Sadly the reality is that like the Christmas bird, I’m marinating in my own juices, and my gravy is made of cortisol. These stress hormones are creating mischief for events that haven’t happened, and probably never will.
Festive Forecasting
Catastrophising’s chum is forecasting. Like an in-built mental weather app, I predict how things will go. “Everyone will hate their presents.” “There will be arguments.” “I won’t enjoy myself.” “It will rain on Christmas Day, we’ll all be sad about that.” “I’ll slip on a sprout and do myself a mischief.”
This in psychological terms is known as the ‘emotional forecasting error.’ We’re spectacularly bad at predicting how future events will make us feel. Studies show that people who imagine future misery tend to overestimate both how intense and how long-lasting it will be.
It’s all related to a theory called ‘impact bias’. (1) And, sadly, this pessimism is related to many mood disorders, mental health conditions. Now, I’m not suggesting we all walk around with painted smiles in an attempt to be overly optimistic. However, a slight reduction in pessimism could actually improve mood and predicted outcomes. (2).
I felt comfort in reading studies that spell out that we are predisposed to thinking the worst about our emotional response to a predicted outcome. Plus, regardless of whether the prediction came true, our responses were often not in line with what was predicted. So that means, it is not our fault. But we can try to rewrite the ending to our imagined dramas.
Why Christmas Ramps up the Gas
Christmas is like a pressure cooker for catastrophising. It’s a cocktail of nostalgia, expectation, and family dynamics, shaken with a cherry on the top. When emotions are running high, and you have bare-minimum control over how things will pan out, it’s no wonder the brain kicks in and assumes the worst.
Ways to Stop Forecasting Festive Doom
Call It
When you notice yourself thinking, “It’s going to be a nightmare,” say, “Ah, that’s catastrophising.” It sounds daft, but it moves the thought from your emotional brain to your rational one.
Embrace the ‘Good Enough Christmas’
Perfectionism is the sleigh pulling catastrophising along. Let it go, like Elsa from Frozen. The tree doesn’t need to be symmetrical. The presents don’t need perfect bows, bells, and whistles. Half the fun of Christmas is in the chaos, burnt parsnips, dodgy cracker jokes, and all those trimmings.
Be Here Now
Mindfulness isn’t just for pilates and yoga influencers. It’s simply paying attention to now. When your mind starts spiralling into “what ifs,” take a breath and notice something real, the smell of cinnamon, the sound of devices happily pinging away, the warmth of your hot mulled beverage. Congratulations! You’ve just outsmarted your amygdala.
Reboot the Story
If your brain insists on casting a “Christmas Chaos” trailer, rewrite it. Imagine a slightly messy, funny, real Christmas, the one where things go wrong and everyone laughs anyway. That’s the version you’ll remember fondly next year.
Mincing my Words and Pie
The pressure that comes with Christmas can magnify anxiety and other issues. It might be that you don’t celebrate, don’t want to celebrate, or can’t celebrate Christmas this year. It’s important to acknowledge that the festivities can’t always gloss over our problems, no matter how many fairy lights we put up.
Also, I sometimes think, “Wouldn’t it be nice if there was kindness, a sense of community, warmth and light shining bright, in every corner of the globe. Every day. Love is not just for Christmas.”
Christmas Wrap Up
To sum up then. The brain thrives on drama. It evolved to keep us safe, not to plan festive gatherings and stress about the fancy napkins and the table centre piece. Christmas almost never plays out the way we script it, that’s just part of the festive fun times. So this year, when your inner weather reporter insists there’s a “100% chance of chaos with intermittent family flare-ups,” just pour yourself something cheerful, and mutter, “Pipe down, brain. Instead of the panic, I’m gonna go cold turkey and wing it.”
References
- Wilson and Gilbert, (2013) –
ttps://dtg.sites.fas.harvard.edu/WIlson_Gilbert_2013.pdfh
- Is It Safer to be a Pessimist? –
