The Christmas Game Plan

The 10 Pieces to Our Christmas Game Plan

In the words of legendary football coach, Nick Saban, “what are you willing to do to get the outcome you desire having?” Like anything else in life you plan to do, you need a plan or else you plan to fail. Christmas isn’t excluded from the failure list if it’s done without a plan. What are you willing to do to get the results you desire this year at Christmas?

The Thought or Concept:
Let’s talk about a game plan.
We are in the pinnacle of college football season. However, this year our team didn’t make it to the college football playoffs. At any rate, there’s a takeaway we can use from any football team and that’s to create a game plan. The game plan is your strategy around how you can make your team the most successful against your opponent. Whether you think of your life as your business or your life as your field for the sport you play, to be the best and most successful you that you can be requires a game plan.  

In the same way, Christmas needs a game plan. If you want to defeat the opponents that work against you having a memorable Christmas, you need to establish a clear game plan. With a plan, it gives you things to focus on. It gives you specific actions so that you’re not left to think much about anything else. Without a plan, you’ll have thoughts that move you away from the desired results, like what’s the use or what’s the point. How will this benefit me? You’ll think selfish thoughts like staying away from others and having the day to yourself. You’ll think about your pains and hurts from the year. You might even think of relationships gone wrong. However, with a plan to execute, you have very little time to think about things that are outside the plan. That’s the key to having a plan for anything. It changes your focus. This year establish your game plan before your thoughts counter what you truly desire to accomplish. What are your willing to do to get the outcome you desire?

The Practice:
The game plan for our Christmas.

Let me open the Clark family’s game plan and let you take a sneak peek behind the plan we execute for Christmas. 

1. Save all year for the people on our Christmas list.
   We’ve noticed a trend that occurs over time with the gifts we give at Christmas time. We usually have the same names with one or two more added and/or removed each year. The number remains relatively the same or grows only by a couple each year. So it’s predictable and so we add these names to our family plan. We then budget $50 per person to purchase Christmas gifts. This activity serves two purposes: 1) it ensures we give gifts to the people we intended to and 2) it’s a part of our annual giving strategy (game plan) where it’s our goal to be generous to those closest to us.
2. Start purchasing thoughtful gifts starting the day after Thanksgiving.
   The beauty of having a game plan is that you’re focused on executing it all year and not at the moment that you noticed the season changed. In other words, we’ve saved for this and it’s not going to impact our day to day needs and financial obligations. Because we’ve saved and planned, we can take advantage of sales during the holiday season. 
3. Schedule the day for putting up Christmas decorations.
   We’ve made a tradition out of decorating our home together as a family. Because we have a game plan it helps us to make it something other than a chore. It’s a very special event. We play our Christmas playlists and sing our favorite Christmas songs. Each family member knows their part to decorating and it goes very smoothly.
4. These films must be seen multiple times but at least once during the Christmas holiday.
   Do you have a list of Christmas movies that you enjoy each year at Christmas time? For example, here’s three of ours:
   • How the Grinch Stole Christmas
   • Home Alone 1 & 2
   • Rudolf, the Red-nosed Reindeer
5. Attend our local church’s Christmas candle lighting service.
   What makes this special is that we all go to church together and have dinner afterwards. It’s like going to a special event that’s a part of what we do at Christmas. How special would Christmas be if you all got dressed up and attended a Christmas event together as a family? To do this takes a game plan.
6. Have our annual Christmas lesson with a time of communion.
   Each year on the eve of Christmas Eve, since we celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve, our family has its own message about Christmas that I share with the family and at the end of this discussion time we have communion together. BTW – we use real communion elements for this. Following our family communion service, it’s time for dinner and dessert featuring my Christmas-only tea cakes.
7. Celebrate Christmas together on Christmas Eve as if it were Christmas.
   Sometimes you have to do what you have to do to make it work out for your family. We learned to make the best of Christmas by executing a plan that would work for our unique yet dynamic family needs. We celebrate Christmas on Christmas eve.
8. Have Christmas breakfast.
   Christmas breakfast has been a big part of our family tradition for quite a while now, over a decade. Breakfast makes life a whole lot easier as most people enjoy breakfast foods which are relatively easy to make. To add to our tradition, each year our family expects me to uphold the tradition my grandmother, Madea, handed down to me of making my special Christmas-only ambrosia.
9. Christmas Day visits.
   Christmas has become the perfect time for us to visit others. Because for us, our Christmas was the day before, Christmas is an open day for other activities. It also allows Tamia, our daughter, to have Christmas with her mom’s family uninterrupted.
10. Relax and reflect.
    We’ve learned to take a deep breath, relax, and reflect on Christmas Day which is the best part of executing our Christmas game plan. It gives us an opportunity to see how well we executed this one and how we can make next Christmas even more special. 

What outcomes are you shooting for?

For a Christmas game plan to work, you must be able to answer this one question, what outcomes are you shooting for? Once you begin executing the game plan, you are on your way to having the Christmas that meets your expectations. This game plan doesn’t have to be perfect, just like any plan, and it doesn’t have to be glamorous. It just needs to be an executable plan. 

We wish to make sure Christmas is special and that we don’t limit the celebration to one day. We want to make sure it’s not about gifts only, but about Christ and family. That’s the goal of our game plan. What’s yours?

Today is Friday (the Friday before Christmas)!
What’s your game plan for Christmas? Don’t have one? Start one today. It’s your Christmas, your life, your business. If you want to have the Christmas you dream of having, then you need to do what it takes to have your Christmas dreams become your reality. Execute your Christmas game plan.

Thanks for joining us at kerryAclark.com. Don’t forget to share this special Christmas message with your family and friends. From my family to yours, Merry Christmas!

Next week, join us as we share a very special New Year’s message; don’t miss it. 

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