You Don’t Have To Recreate Your Childhood Traditions

This morning I was doing a Facebook live with the women in Thrive — the membership community I run — and we were talking about Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving often begins the descent into completely off-the-rails behavior for many of us, and we follow this downward spiral until December 31st.

Then we vow to make changes after none of our clothes fit well (or at all) anymore and our kids are out of control because we have let any and all routines fly out the window for the last month.

This got me to thinking about holiday traditions and the mindset we so often have.

You don’t have to stick to Thanksgiving traditions if they don’t suit you or your family.

I remember back to when I was a kid.

We had a Thanksgiving Day tradition every year.

We’d watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and then we’d watch Mighty Joe Young and then we’d watch King Kong, and then we’d walk up the path through the woods to my great grandmother’s house.

There was no river, but it was literally out-the-back-door-and-through-the-woods-to-(great)grandmother’s-house-we-go.

I have such awesome memories of those Thanksgivings.

And I’ve tried to recreate them for my kids over and over again.

Not the great grandmother part. And not the Mighty Joe Young and King Kong part because those aren’t on TV on Thanksgiving anymore.

But the parade part? Of course!

And you know what?

My kids have ZERO desire to watch that parade.

I have tried to ram that &%$@ing parade down their throats for fourteen years, and they could give two shits about it.

To be honest, it’s kind of boring.

So I’ve given up on the parade.

Which is fine.

I think sometimes we feel like our kids must have the same memories and experiences that we had when we were kids.

Because if they don’t they’re gonna miss out.

But they don’t miss stuff they never had to begin with.

We forget that we can form our own traditions. New traditions!

We can give our kids wonderful memories of Thanksgiving Day that are different from our memories.

I saw this on Facebook today:

A few years ago I became the second kind of person.

I ran a 5K on Thanksgiving morning.

It was super cold, I left my family home in their pajamas, and I went and ran by myself.

It was a really nice way to start the day. I loved it.

Nobody in my family had any desire to run with me.

But something happened the next year.

Number 4 ran with me.

The seed had been planted.

Last year three of the kids wanted to run, but the temperature was below 10, so we decided to pass.

This year, four of the kids are running.

The fifth opted out.

But we are establishing a new tradition.

And I’m really looking forward to it.

And so are the kids!

They are looking forward to it way more than watching the parade, that’s for sure.

One of my Thrive ladies is opting out of the traditional Thanksgiving meal altogether.

Her family is going to the movies and they are making pizza together at home and focusing on what they are thankful for — each other — rather than freaking out over cooking a bunch of food that her kids won’t even eat!

We will still eat a traditional Thanksgiving meal. And my parents will come over.

We won’t be fancy. We will be comfortable.

Number 5 ate dinner in her pajamas last year.

I’m hoping we go on a walk like we did last year after we eat.

That would be a nice tradition to start, too.

I remember one year when I was in high school we went to the movies on Thanksgiving night.

That was fun, too. Maybe we’ll consider that.

Or not.

Maybe we’ll play a board game.

Or maybe we’ll watch Planes, Trains, and Automobiles.

I have a friend who does that every Thanksgiving and every year I say, I want to watch that with the kids.

Maybe the tradition will be that we don’t have a tradition.

As long as I get to chill out with my family and not spend the day cooking and cleaning while everyone else gets to sit around and relax and actually spend time with each other, I really don’t care.