five ways to improve family get-togethers |
On television, the advertisements for Thanksgiving, Hanukah, Christmas, and Kwanzaa look like festive times of joy and closeness. But research shows that for over 68% of us (1), there are unresolved tensions with specific family members that cause frustrating moments year after year.
For example, in your own extended family:
Based on the book WHEN DIFFICULT RELATIVES HAPPEN TO GOOD PEOPLE: SURVIVING YOUR FAMILY AND KEEPING YOUR SANITY, here are five realistic things you can do pro-actively to improve your family get-togethers:
1. Bring your sense of humorous perspective to every family visit or phone call. Instead of being a victim, you can regain your sense of strength and clarity by saying silently to yourself in the middle of a tense family conversation, "Thank goodness for my family. If it weren't for their obnoxious behaviors, how else could I learn who I don't want to be?" Or you can say to yourself, "This is the ultimate workout. If I can remember to breathe, stay calm, and set firm but compassionate limits with these folks, I'll be able to handle any tough situation in the other areas of my life."
2. Lobby ahead of time to create alliances and positive changes in the way your family gets together. Instead of having a 6-hour gathering where people consume too much alcohol before the food finally gets served, what if you lobbied with several of your relatives to make this year's gathering a 3-hour event with strict limits on booze and a much earlier meal. Call on the phone or have a face-to-face meeting with the more sensible or compassionate members of your family weeks or months ahead of the next big get-together. Brainstorm with this person what can be done to make the next holiday visit more comfortable for yourselves and for anyone who has felt mistreated at prior events. If you develop enough allies and support ahead of time, you might be able to stand up to a stubborn or offensive relative much better this year. Instead of feeling trapped or powerless, there can be three or four of you that say to this over-the-top relative, "Hey, let's treat each other better this year. We know you can do it."
3. Set a tongue-in-cheek budget for how many stressful moments or obnoxious comments still can be considered a "successful event." Instead of feeling defeated or devastated if a particular relative says one insensitive or hurtful remark, you can utilize your sense of irony to set a budget that says, "This year I'm going to stay calm even if this person says or does 5 obnoxious things. That's my budget – the first 5 idiotic comments don't count and the event can still be considered to be a success." Then if you hear this person say 2 or 3 strange comments, you can smile to yourself and say, "Wow, this has been a great success. We're still well under budget and it's much less crazy than in previous years."
4. Focus your attention instead on a few specific realizable positive goals for what will make the family gathering worthwhile for you. You might need to tell yourself ahead of time the one or two bottom-line reasons why you're making this investment of time and money to hang out with your relatives. It might be to spend 10 to 30 quality minutes with an aging relative that you love and who isn't going to be here forever. It might be to spend a few precious moments with a young child (a niece, nephew, cousin, or other distant relative) who is precious and you don't get to see this amazing soul too often. It could be to give your own kids a chance to get to know their cousins better. Or it might be that the reason for the family gathering is simply for you to learn a little more about the history, quirks, eccentricities, and complex personalities of your extended family because it will help you understand your own life better (and let you appreciate how far you've come from the situation you grew up with). Even in a very difficult family where lots of stressful moments happen, you can still feel successful because you are achieving these important positive goals during your visit.
5. Plan with your spouse or partner how to stay united as a team and not get split apart by any family strangeness. This pre-planning on how to be "a united couple" is crucial because quite often people start taking out on their current loved one the frustrations they are feeling from being around a difficult extended family. You may need to set some ground rules ahead of time, such as, "I'm allowed to criticize my own relatives and your job is to listen calmly. But please don't start criticizing my relatives, because like most people I'm probably going to get a bit defensive if you do that." Or you can check in with each other every few minutes at the holiday gathering and say (verbally or nonverbally), "We're in this together. I'm on your side. We're visiting this complicated family situation as teammates and we're not going to let any of them split us apart." Remember the goal at a family gathering is not perfection, but simply to enjoy a few quality moments and shared memories with people that you don't get to see very often.
(1) This survey asked 1,400 people about their family get-togethers and found that 68% described their family events as "sometimes difficult" or "rarely enjoyable, but an obligation I do anyway."
Recommended Reading
WHEN DIFFICULT RELATIVES HAPPEN TO GOOD PEOPLE: SURVIVING YOUR FAMILY AND KEEPING YOUR SANITY, by Leonard Felder, Ph.D., includes research on stressful family gatherings and practical tools and strategies for improving these events. For more information, log on to www.difficultrelatives.com.
