One sees clearly only with the heart. Anything essential is invisible to the eyes. ~ From "The Little Prince" by Antoine de Saint Exupéry

So here I find myself in the first week of my four week vacation from nursing school and I'm thoroughly enjoying every minute of it. I'm still amazed at how much I can sleep at night...thus far I'm averaging approximately 10 hours of sleep/night. Hehe. Amidst the business of my Christmas preparations (shopping, gift wrapping, planning get togethers, mailing Christmas cards) I've been thinking about what Christmas ought to mean to me. I see many people at the stores and post office that are super stressed out and make comments like "I can't wait until Christmas is over" and "only 5 days till Christmas, how will I ever get everything done that needs to get done?!" Fortunately I've never felt quite that stressed, even if I've been behind on Christmas preparations. Here's a description of Advent as posted in the bulletin at my church (Church of the Resurrection) that I appreciate:

"To get ready for Christmas, you speed up: you shop, bake, decorate, send invitations, negotiate with extended family, buy plane tickets, write letters, scan photos, take boxes to UPS.

To get ready to worship Christ at Christmas, you slow down: you try to get quiet, give to the poor, read portions of the Bible, wait, fast, feel how deeply you and the world need deliverance, and long for that.

For roughly the last 1,500 years, Christians have taken the four Sundays before Christmas to get themselves spiritually ready for it. We call this season "Advent," which means "Coming," and during Advent, we get ready for two comings of Christ: his first, when he came to deliver the world from sin; and his second coming, when he will come to create a new world. You might pray, "Come, Lord, and deliver me and all your people from our sin and from the broken, wrecked world we live in."

The color of Advent is purple, which the church chose because it's the color for our repentance and for Christ's royalty."

Although I admit that I've not fully learned to embrace this mentality and still find myself caught up in gift giving, etc., I really appreciate the philosophy of quieting myself and celebrating Christ's first coming and what that means for me and the world today, and waiting for his second coming. It's strange that this way of thinking goes against what our culture tells us is acceptable during this time of year and how people skirt the fact that they are celebrating a very Christian event.