This blog post is for you if you’re already feeling that steady creep of busyness and overwhelm as we edge into early December. It happens every year, doesn’t it?
You might feel it as body tension, feeling like you have less tolerance with increased irritability, disrupted sleep, searching for support like coffee, sugar or alcohol or simply not looking forward to all of the upcoming plans and commitments.
As a coach, I’m already hearing it more and more in my coaching calls. “I have so much on” or “I’m at capacity.” This construct of ‘more’ is socially accepted and yet likely saps some of the real joy out of the season.
Before we even get to the plans and logistics of December, this mounting internal load already starts shaping how the month feels.
With all of this simmering in the background, the word “Christmas” can land in very different ways…
When you hear the words “Christmas” or “Christmas holidays,” what flickers through you first?
A spark of excitement?
A knot of overwhelm?
A sense of peace, or maybe the pressure to make it peaceful?
We’re all wired a little differently, but from late November onwards there’s a predictable shift I see in so many people – patients, clients, friends. Social plans begin to stack. Travel starts being organised. Family dynamics float up. Gift lists grow. And somewhere in the background, you’re trying to keep your health on track.
“Your mind becomes full of all the things: people to see, places to go, plans to hold, decisions to make. If you were cruising along nicely on your metaphorical “health wagon,” this is often the season that creates the wobble… and sometimes the spectacular tumble.”
– Bee Pennington
You decided that this year would be different. You invested in your health. You committed to change. So what now? How do you move through one of the most social, emotionally loaded, and tempting times of the year without feeling like you’ve undone all of the work?
This is exactly where a more intentional, compassionate approach becomes essential. Let’s talk about that and explore some options for how to prioritise your health and the festive spirit.
Coaching becomes your anchor
At MFM, your coach isn’t here to force you to stick rigidly to a plan – especially at this time of year. Good coaching helps you understand yourself, not punish yourself. And this season is actually one of the best times to use your coach as your sounding board.
When everything starts to feel like too much, these are the three areas where coaching offers the most grounding.
Your coach can help you:
1. Prioritise
Of all the things you could focus on, what’s the one thing that matters most right now?
Not the whole plan – just the piece that keeps you grounded and mentally or emotionally well. For some, this will be sleep. For others, a focus on clean eating or sticking with your supplement plan.
This becomes your stabilising anchor, no matter what the season throws at you.
2. Plan (lightly)
We’re talking about a staged approach, something flexible that adapts and adjusts with the changes of rhythm in your December life. You can explore which strings to pull on and which pillars actually are most foundational and remain as your steady focus, as in point one.
Even if you’re months into your health strategy, it’s actually OK to revisit the plan to find some ‘give’ and softness with your increased load. Your coach can help you to figure out where to wiggle and what is most helpful to stay focused on.
Think of this as creating a plan with breathing room instead of pressure.
3. Permission
This might be the most important ingredient. Together with your coach, you can find the places to soften, reduce load, and/or stop holding yourself to impossible standards.
Sometimes one single behaviour or belief adjustment is enough to carry you through this season with more ease.
This is where the concept of the intentional pause starts to become meaningful.
Depending on your personality and social style, you might find it deeply challenging to say ‘no thank you’, or to put yourself near the front of the care line.
This is intimate work with your coach – unravelling your social beliefs, habits and tendencies. Learning about why saying ‘no thank you’ feels like the hardest or most confronting thing. It might be to do with your need to be liked, your fear of missing out, your peace keeper tendencies, or that you believe you are the glue that holds it all together.
These are perceptions rather than facts, and so getting deep clarity on how you show up, and then figuring out what can change (and how to do it) will be the very first step in changing your experience.
The intentional pause
The permission you grant yourself naturally leads into the idea of the intentional pause – a grounded alternative to pushing through.
During December, most people try to push harder on their health plan because they’re scared they’ll lose momentum. But in reality this is the month where your body and mind are asking you to pause intentionally, and that is not abandoning your health.
An intentional pause is not giving up and it is not undoing your progress – those hard fought wins you’ve already made are still wins. We don’t let go of the reins entirely.
In practice, an intentional pause looks like choosing to:
- Release some pressure
- Reduce expectations
- Soften the internal grip
- Create space between stimulus and response
- Allow the nervous system a moment to exhale
It’s practical and emotional. And paradoxically, it’s one of the most effective ways to remain connected to your health during the holidays.
Your plan doesn’t need to be rigid right now – it needs to be responsive, and intentionally pausing is part of a responsive plan
When people try to force perfection, or if you feel like you’ve completely failed if you indulge on social occasions, this increased emotional stress can really play out in your physical health.
Scaffolding support: tools you can discuss with your coach
Think of these supports as scaffolding that holds you steady when life feels fuller and faster.
If December tends to rattle you or have you feeling unbalanced, you might benefit from the support structures your coach can help you build:
- Healthy boundaries – to navigate relationships, expectations, or how to respond to that one person who insists you have “just one more drink”. Setting boundaries is not about being rude or unkind, but instead it’s letting people know what you have capacity for or what’s important to you. It’s one of the loveliest acts of self-care
- Positive intelligence – to help you understand your patterns, saboteurs, motivators, and also what supports your best self. This short assessment helps to define and then explain how your habits and behaviours might be playing out in ways that are unhelpful or unproductive. Perhaps your saboteur is hyper-vigilant, a stickler (perfectionist) or a hyper-achiever. This clarity gives you deep insights that you can then become aware of and consciously make alternative choices. If you’re curious to explore this further, see our resource on positive intelligence
- Mindfulness tools – micro-moments that soothe your nervous system, especially as your calendar fills. When it comes to practising mindfulness, you don’t need to create big spaces to soothe your nervous system – instead using breathwork or meditation in bite-sized doses to regularly reroute your nervous system towards rest, digest and repair. By adding these small moments to your day, you will experience an increase in capacity, resilience and internal peace
Mindset shifts to carry through December
These small but powerful shifts can completely transform how you move through the month:
Aim for less
- Say yes to less
- Spend less
- Do less
- Less screentime
“Less isn’t about shrinking your life – it’s about protecting your energy so you enjoy what actually matters.”
– Bee Pennington
Be gracious, kind, and forgiving (especially with yourself)
December is not the month to demand perfection from a very human body.
Understand your emotional drivers
Why do you say yes (when you want to say ‘no thank you’)?
Why do you push through?
Who are you prioritising ahead of yourself?
Why do you keep filling your plate (or your calendar)?
This is subtle but powerful and will play out far beyond December. When you have clarity around your emotional drivers, this awareness gives you choice and agency.
A few practical actions you can try now
Here are a few simple steps that can immediately shift how December feels:
- Choose one non-negotiable behaviour for December (e.g. maintaining a focus on hydration, having a consistent sleeping window, choosing quality protein for breakfast – keep it small and achievable)
- Put three micro-pauses into your day: 30 seconds of breathing between tasks; standing outside for one minute; unclenching your jaw before bed
- Decide where you can lower the bar without compromising your health. This is about choosing softness and ease over rigidity and perfection.
Share your December quandaries with your coach so you can create a plan that feels human, not heroic
If December has historically been your month of derailment, maybe this year can be the one where you don’t push harder… you instead pause with intention.
What happens when, instead of being swept up by the familiar December spiral, you create space and grace? Perhaps this becomes the year December feels lighter – a month where you honour your health while still soaking in the social and sunny moments.
