It’s hard to believe I can even be writing that this is the December edition of the newsletter, but here we are. This time of the year is like one of those log rides at the amusement park. Now we’re at the high point on the ride, about to plunge down the slope, plow through the lake of holidays at the bottom and get soaked to varying degrees by the experience, depending on where we chose to sit, front or back. OK, I might have stretched that analogy a bit farther than it would’ve liked, but think of the water as stress, and where we sit represents our expectations about what should or shouldn’t happen, what should or shouldn’t be said, how we should or shouldn’t be treated, etc. Holidays, for many, can be stressful times. In this newsletter I’ll be offering some ideas about how to manage that. Keep in mind, though, that stress is nothing other than the tension created by the distance between what is, and what we think should be. As a wise guy once wrote, “There is nothing good or bad but thinking makes it so.”