The 4 gift rule for Christmas
I LOVE gifts. I really, really do. I think they are one of my top love languages – definitely inherited from my family I think. I love giving gifts: the planning, considering, buying, wrapping, giving, and watching them open and be surprised. Placing so much thought into what the person will love and enjoy gives me joy. Truly, it’s better to give than receive.
I like receiving gifts too. Especially when it’s clear that they have put deep thought into what to get me. I feel known and loved.
So it’s our first Christmas together as newlyweds for B and me! I started considering what we should do once Thanksgiving (and our wedding) was over. In my family, Christmas involved an abundance of gifts. Both in receiving, and in spending weeks planning and preparing for others. It’s not that my family was mega rich, but there was an emphasis on giving gifts that is very opposite to B’s family.
They like giving gifts too. But what can be more common in Asian families is emphasizing eating a meal and sharing time together around a table. The focus for my family on Christmas morning was the gift opening. He stopped receiving gifts after he was a child, and Christmas was all about the communal gathering over a meal. Both are expressions of beautiful traditions and can be honouring and sacred.
B is on board with giving and receiving none, or just 1 gift for Christmas. I was less enthused about that idea. And yet, there’s an obsession in our culture with gifts, pressure, and buying that I don’t want to fall into either.
I want the joy and pleasure of giving and receiving gifts, without the cultural pressure that bigger is always better, and the more gifts you receive the better you are.
So this year we are trying the 4 gift rule for Christmas (for each other).
We have a strict budget of $100 each to buy 4 gifts for the other person. Each of these gifts needs to come from one of these categories:
Something they want
Something they need
Something to wear
Something to read
Hopefully this will help spark thoughtful giving and creativity. It also prevents us from going over the top financially or materially. We do know that even $100 each for the other person can be generous. We could go lower. We could buy everything from thrift stores. The point isn’t the material value, the latest tech, or receiving the most items, but that someone curated and thoughtfully considered what you need, want, would like to wear, or would like to read. And as always creativity reigns.
Also it promotes equality and fairness, in value and number. We both get relatively the same things. So I won’t feel bad if B only gets me 1 gift and I buy him 5. It also puts a strict cap on our spending.
It’s our first Christmas together and it’s a chance for us to figure out which traditions and celebrations we want to do as a family. I look ahead to the days when we may have kids, and I know that I don’t want to go overboard with gifts. Whether we do the 4 gift rule with our kids or something else, we want to put a cap on the crazy spending and excess material stuff that comes along with the Christmas season.
I’m excited about it, and I think he is too.
Credit: Nynne Schroder from unsplash.ca