Sunday Mālama: Please don’t shop for me!

As the winter holidays get closer, I find I want to push them away, somehow stretching the days as they are right now to slow the pace of the ones to come.

It’s not that I have too much to do already, for I have long ago come to terms with accepting that I will always have too much to do — and if I don’t, creating more for myself is no problem at all. I’m very good at filling my days.

What I dread is the shopping.

I don’t want any part of it. I’m trying to figure out how I can give great gifts without any shopping at all, giving them only by creating something that people will welcome much more gratefully. I want them to be gifts from the heart that you cannot hold in your hand, or wrap in a package.

I admit that my reasons are not altogether altruistic. They also have nothing to do with saving money, though they do have something to do with not wasting money on frivolous, clutter-creating, just-for-the-expected kind of gifts.

In one of my first Sunday Mālama essays, I had told you about Ma‘alahi;

“Ma‘alahi is a Hawaiian word I want to use more, folding it into my chosen habits.
Ma‘alahi means contentment within simplicity and ease.”

Three months later, I find this feeling has stayed with me, and I hope it never goes away. In these three months, I have discovered that I want to achieve ma‘alahi most by getting rid of a lot of stuff, the kind of stuff that we think of as material clutter. I am positive that a good part of any stress I may have, has to do with a great array of my clutter, and it has begun to feel like I can’t shed it fast enough.

I suspect that our attentions to the environment surrounding October’s Blog Action Day have contributed to my desires for the simplicity and ease of ma‘alahi too; I want no part of continuing to treat our earth as one big garbage can for our short-lived latest-trend material desires. We can do so much better.

The holidays mean gifts, both giving and receiving them, and that is what the thought of any shopping represents for me this season.

Let’s face it; this is not a time you buy things for yourself.

This is a time that others add to your clutter! Even worse, you make an extra trip to the nearest landfill yourself because you have too much garbage created by the tinsel and glitterazi of the season for your normal curbside pick-ups.

Whatever you may be craving, you’ll do others a huge favor by simply printing up your wish list so they don’t have to wonder what they should give you. Ask for gifts that you will actually use well and keep. If you think it’s too expensive to ask for, pay for the bulk of it yourself, put it on lay-away, and then attach the redemption ticket to your wish list. Your family and your good friends will understand, and I’ll bet they will really appreciate it. They want to give you a gift; you can’t just say “don’t bother” because they will, and so if you don’t help them out, you risk more clutter.

These are the things that would go on my wish list, as the clutter-free gifts I would really like to receive; things that are good for me, and that are good for reducing my stress with material baggage. On the top of my head...

In the non-material category:

• Yoga classes. If the people who normally give me gifts bought just a half session each, I'd be a much more fit and flexible person come this time next year!
• Similar to the yoga idea, more months on my Audible subscription.
• Lessons from someone really patient on how to use a Mac, or how to do more graphic wizardry on my PC.
• A house-cleaning visit from someone like the FlyLady (to do it, not to teach me how).
• Recommendation to a really good internist; can’t find one, and horribly overdue for an appointment.
• An introduction to someone who would hire me for another speech on Managing with Aloha, or would be anxious to distribute my book in a market I am not now reaching!

In the “but it’s not Christmas if I don’t wrap it and put it under the tree for you” category:

• A book from my Amazon.com wish list (after I update it...) My books are NOT clutter.
• Renewal to my subscriptions with Oprah’s O Magazine (all others I now read online)
• A packet of stretch bands: Just learned how to use them in my exercise routine, and they will be so great for when I travel!
• Fresh fruit from Harry & David, or other food that would get me to eat more nutritiously
• Honestly can’t think of anything else that I wouldn’t prefer to buy for myself because I’m getting so picky about stuff (hubby says I’m too choosy about office supplies, and he’s right) ... maybe a supply of AA batteries so I’ll start to use my digital camera?

So I think that is where I am going to start, by enrolling my family in this when we all gather together at Thanksgiving. No Black Friday shopping sprees; we’re staying in to enjoy each other’s company, eat all the leftovers (then work out together), and then cap off our evening watching the University of Hawai‘i – Boise game on ESPN.

If UH wins everyone will be so happy I may have a better shot at bringing up my garage sale idea.

I feel better already.

Bet you will feel better too if you work on your own lists. I would love more ideas; what would you have in the non-material category?

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You know what? Sunday Mālama falls in the value without clutter category!
If you think so too and this is your first visit, I hope you consider subscribing — now that would be a gift I would love :) Subscribe here.

This was how Sunday Mālama started: A Beginning.

Comments

[tim]

Congrats on the UH win over BSU. They are playing great football this year and deserve every opportunity to play at a higher level like BSU got last year.

[Rosa Say]

Aloha Tim! The Hawai‘i-BSU contest was the kind of game I like to watch; a rivalry where both teams have the utmost respect for each other, genuinely feeling they are worthy opponents to learn from. I thought of you often during the game, wishing you could have heard all the Hawai‘i-based pre-game coverage leading up to it – and still now as I arrived back home 4 days later! The win was sweet, but it became so much sweeter when that last knee was taken so close to the goal line knowing of the history of sincere admiration between our two states.