it's carol ricardo welcome back to the well you show joined again by my guest slash co host angel and julie and in case it is your first two time two men into the well you show we're really here just on a mission to make sure people have the tools to live well for twenty five years is what i did in a hospital and i call him the insider secret because he used to have to be inside the hospital in order to learn this stuff so so that's what we're here i don't know but do you guys find the holiday stressful at all yes in so because julius a year ago they did give them a little heads up that this is what we were going to talk about today and you know really the goal is just to see if we can come up with some solutions together around some kind of ideas and things that tend to be either for you or even people you know you know because sometimes i don't have the same stressors people around me do  so that's kind of where i want to start is actually where and what stresses you all out for the holiday and carol this could be stresses because you know what changes in families coming and much more traffic now when you go to do your errands then so for me that's kind of one thing about this holiday period december into january it really stresses me out and that covers like standing in a long line school setting a family said ing and you have all these different people that have expectations of you and sometimes are not always communicated you said it angel i got to get it up here family yes family and for no better or worse i don't know about you all but sometimes this kind of give me a little bit of stress to gatherings whether it is family or its coworkers or home anything else comes to mind you think back over the years you know because there may be things that don't stress you out now that somebody watching could have even so why did brainstorm and here you know summer traditions you know that that comes of the family going away to well you might want to do different but i think traditions need gets to be up here all by itself surely that is a really really good one that covers a lot of things like even decorating tradition or is that separate no i will put that separate ok so remember we talked about stress in one of our earlier shows and the definition was a change or a situation and this holiday time of the year i want to say from thanksgiving on seems to bring a lot of changes in situations that we kind of have to deal with right now of some of what we've kind of caught here anything else comes to know because that's a really good point trying to get the right gift well yeah and i think sometimes too that's there our own expectations of what are we expecting of people any any anything you know because again we're just kind of brainstorming right here i just thought we're getting close to the holidays we can kind of fit this show in and what a really good time to just maybe cover some areas that we don't usually get t about making the perfect cookies well it's interesting you said cookies because i it's what i was about to say hey i have a cookie tradition that i've started and it really right kind of having more things to do and less time to do them and just seems around the kind of the november to december kind of january sort of thing on new years anything particular come up for your that is one of the food you know having to deal with more food around you when you're really trying to kind of be healthy  here all right so because here's what we're going to do we're going to take we're going to go through each one of these you know and see if we could kind of come up with some ideas some solutions you know things that you all might have figured out that have helped you of take away some of the power of these things and again i think what's really important when you think about stress is that the same thing doesn't stress everybody out we put kind of waiting in long lines and there are some people that that's so here's i have a question for you ladies to you do any black friday shopping oh no our idea here i don't know that i ever did maybe many many seems like as i've gotten older i don't do crowds very well how about you oh i used a lot bother me but i'm kind of any more so i know somebody who goes black friday shopping and think i know shirley at times in my life his has been very stressful for me and you said cheap but to be honest here's the other day about the holidays can be really really all right decorating will come back we'll look at this a little bit later but we're moving on to decorating so if this is the structure we're going to come up with some solutions it's got any solutions that you have my solution i have downsized all right yeah meaning that at one point in time when i had the energy when i had the time i would really spend a great deal of time decorating like throughout the house and outside and i have to say one of my ways of managing that stress is kind of been or simplified downsize or simplified i a i totally agree i was thinking about this i seem to have more and more stuff but even trying to get to it there is just the thought of it is overwhelming and i used to be upset when thing till it's like it where ok well but that's the other thing that i'm using this year too is i've actually scheduled it into my like i've planned it you know in the past i would just kind of wing it but that's the other thing tomorrow tomorrow morning i'm actually going to get on my schedule to you know bring the boxes down try and get the tree up and then go to the store buy my stuff for my cookies because of those better prepared if i schedule better i'd already have the stuff for cookies and cooked and then hopefully throughout the rest of the we can finish kind of the decorations at least everything will be down so i kind of can do two things you know kind of go in there i endure trees traditional in country so over recent years i had to simplify for a number of reasons so i have a box of a little bit of everything that includes made and you know children from school and so if if i really want to go all out then i have this box of things that are very selective you know what i call that and quite honestly i think this is going to come up more often call that a back up plan than you know kind of choice a choice b and i think that's a really great tool to keep along not just for decorating but also for a lot of other things that we come across that's great i mean we just came up with four solutions kind of for dealing with you know so my tree already has lights in it and i love that but i too have some like if i don't do a whole lot i have all decorations ones that i grew up with and i love being able to put those kind of out because even if just a few of what is up here because for some people it might be for not going to be a solution for everybody so well that has changed for me over the years because the family was bigger and you know as the kids got bigger you didn't i guess the thought was there certainly ain't you know you don't buy just any more they want money but i was buying my clients tears it was like i have it was crazy yeah yeah yeah so you can really go overboard and i think you know what you know what comes to mind when i think about present you know it was when i was in college i didn't have any money i made mine you have to be crafty you don't have to be crafty you just gotta be you know kind of willing to so i made damn it all you know for everybody i bought above these jars and i bought some labels and i made like on prescription  was used to go buy these one dollar wooden frames that my calls who are these little banks and i would just personalize them because the thing to me was is i love i know people thought about me and it doesn't have to be a big prize in insidious more the thought where is quite honestly that's what my cookies are my presence these days right you know it's just you know thinking of people as i'm doing them so i actually kind but it just kind of like i don't know exactly which is if you're supposed to beat it you know or take it or when you're mad at something you know just kind of take it and shake it but in a way it kind of is a stress to our kind of a lot like us trust ball yeah a good idea i think this is another i think this is another great idea though i mean for people who are struggling around present right you know we're going to go into my extreme not buying any is an l if you're not into making it more than sad limits you know with yourself and then the other thing i love what you just said is do a car you know and write something in a car not just buy a card signed your name i think again you know i want to put this be personal because it seems to me it's not so much the gift i don't know about your was not so much about the gift as it is the thought you know behind that so yeah any any other kind of solution is to kind and again our goal is not to get rid of the stress we just want to knock it down a few notches if we try to reduce it a little bit you know i was just going to say as far as cards what i enjoy doing because i like to walk in my from but i don't you know care but it makes me feel it yeah yeah yeah so not so much like the friends of the family it's like people in the area where i walk that i just put a card in your mailbox if i know their name that's great you're an anonymous card they have i love that i love that now i mean it again i was just thinking too with the cards you know what my neighbor does she takes a picture you know like she she goes to maine and so she was always take a picture of an animal and over the years it's been a duck a moose like really cool stuff and i keep the cards i have a board saved but but again it's just a way of kind of letting know somebody know that you're thinking about it without having to add all the added pressure one other thing i think it is important to when i did this on the job when we had we had polly and so it was actually we bought people gifts we created i loved it because of rather than trying to think oh ok what is juli weiner this and you have a budget you pick three things that you would be interested in and i would have to lydia yes so we had just a master list you know on the wall and then people would write you know say carol i listed out three items that i would like you know my other coworkers listed out that and or we did something really funny like i forget what they called it like nasty santa or  like that but you buy the present and you just wrap it there's a dollar amount and you pick numbers out and whoever has number one has to go first to pick a gift but then whoever has number two salt lake there where you could take the gift for our i some ideas for actually helping me too because i'm kind of thinking about some of the things that you have said like here as i need to do so i want to put one up here your and you know which one i want to pick next so here's what we're going to traffic because here's the thing we all have to like we're live get around do errands you know so we're going to switch one more piece of paper here do you guys have any secrets traffic strategies that you use during the holidays so if it's possible too depends on where you're going if if you can choose the time that you're know i'm ok with one certain time but when it gets this time of the year i actually get out of the house earlier and i go before people actually show up and not so and you said wish i'm not embarrassed to admit this it was couple years that i would christmas shopping christmas eve and i thought it was going to be super swamp and it wasn't and it was it was really quite relaxing i remember thinking  so like if i have so i was going to that conference last week you know and driving and i just made sure that i had extra fifteen minutes in case i ran into some extra traffic to go and if i got there early that was ok the thing i didn't want to just kind of relaxing to the music or getting into the music or if you're not moving you're out a light or wherever i might have some mail you know just safe safely enjoying  are so i think this is really important you just brought up both think about traffic your stuck you haven't avoided it you know what do you make the best of it and make the best of it and i'm going to tell you what my my best best best best tool is it's the serenity prayer and add it is you know grant me the you know the courage to change the things i can you know  bit different yes basically i you know when it is in my head a lot of the in the moment stress version so the in the moment stress version is this can i do anything about it right now and if i can't then sometimes i got to turn the music off you know because the going why this is actually more calming to me than just you know and i tell you the other thing that i use for when i'm actually stuck in the traffic is this kind of positive self talk because they found is that i can work myself up or i can work myself down but that's from back here we've got time for a couple more and just  find with family and especially working in a hospital for twenty five years is that you go to family events where you may not have good relationships with everybody that's there and what i've always suggested is don't avoid the situation don't avoid glowing but kind of for no better word the word i say is steer clear steer clear of the people that try to push your buttons  and kind of kind of align yourselves even space wise you're in the kitchen in the living room creating a space in boundaries how about you guys when you think or deal with family what comes to mind far is thinking along a line of expectations you know you're expecting it it's going to go you know there's going to conflict or expecting there just your idea of what they think of you it's like a lot of it can you can control by just getting rid of those expectations yeah well and i think of that is quite honestly it's also the self talk you know like what you're saying to yourself if you're driving and i could say oh this is go horrible or could drive there say things are going to be well you know and just not feed it because i think the more you feed it is the bigger the gas or got have offered usually anything come to mind but with the family i feel you know are the traditions of the place and but a lot have changed over time in people and so some of those expectations and just take it easy if you know somebody you want to stay clear of or have not encountered go a little bit later b i've even had people who say ok i'm going to go for an hour and that's it you know or drop in or be part of it where they really couldn't oh i know with the traditions and about being open to new traditions certainly i have different traditions where ever had my family before but there it was eleven of us when i was growing up and so it's a very different kind of you know celebration gratitude yeah great well thanks again ladies for a great show for you we don't have any action sheets but if you would just tuning in at the end of the video you have my email address and if you got an idea or questions you can send it to us and we'll look forward to bringing you more tools and here's to living well today