Seasonal Stress: Psychologist shares advice on how to avoid common holiday stressors
NEW YORK -- 'Tis the season for stress.
Family get-togethers, spending money, cooking a huge meal can all build up and make a mess out of your holiday dinner.
CBS2's Cindy Hsu spoke with Dr. Niloo Dardashti, an adult, couples and workplace psychologist with Manhattan Psychology Group, to talk about why we seem to get so stressed out around the holidays and how to handle some common holiday stressors.
"I think there's so many expectations and so many things we create in our minds about how it should be and how it should go, and it's just a setup because there's always going to be things that trigger us, there's always going to be challenges. It just is what it is with the holidays," Dardashti explained.
Hsu: Let's talk about family. Sometimes when we're all gathered around the table together, the conversation can get uncomfortable if topics like politics come up. How can we keep things civil, even when we disagree?
Dardashti: I think it's important to almost imagine what's going to happen at the dinner table, maybe based on relationships in the past year or what's happened at the dinner table last year. Imagine sort of, okay so this is what I anticipate could trigger me.
So here are the things I'm going to try to stay out of, to keep my distance about, or maybe even to put up a firm boundary and say hey guys, I'd really rather not get into that topic this year.
Hsu: Next up, travel -- whether it's long lines at the airport or traffic on the roads. How can we avoid getting overly frustrated?
Dardashti: You're going to get frustrated, so how do you deal with the frustration? One of the things I like to help people use is simply mindfulness. So just sort of labeling for yourself, identifying what's happening. Okay, here's that thing that I anticipated, here's that thing that makes me really frustrated when there's traffic, when I have to deal with these rude interactions.
Just like me, everybody is stressed out. So to remember that it's not personal to you, it's not just you. Everyone else is dealing with this. Take a deep breath, remember that it's going to pass. It's just a moment.
Hsu: Now on to shopping. As we start picking out gifts for loved ones, it can be frustrating to brave the crowds and pick out the right items. What advice do you have for that?
Dardashti: Having an idea of what you want to get people beforehand is always good. What is this person interested in? Okay, so you have a few different things so that you're not feeling like oh my god I have to get this particular item, because maybe it won't be possible this year.
Hsu: Finally, how can we take some time for ourselves during the holidays?
Dardashti: You have to create it, you have to put it in your schedule. Just like you schedule time to go to the gym. So you know that you're going to be go, go, go, go unless you create that time every day or even every other day, or at the end of the evening when the kids go to bed, even just 20 minutes just for yourself to do whatever it is that helps you to veg out.
Watch her full interview above for more advice.