Home for the Holidays: Prioritizing love, tolerance and acceptance

Home for the Holidays Series: This year, local reporters and editors are using Thanksgiving week to share our favorite holiday traditions and recipes with you, our readers.

With each passing year, I’ve come to realize my priorities have drastically changed. Much of that can be attributed to growing and maturing as a person. Now, closer to 40 than 20, life experience has taught me many unexpected lessons.

For me, the biggest difference is willingness to live a life of gratitude. Gratitude for the life I have, for the things I have and, most importantly, gratitude for the people in my life.

Truthfully, for many years, I took the time I spent with people I loved for granted. That’s not to say I didn’t love them, I just didn’t fully appreciate the time we had together.

As we head into the holiday season, unlike years past, I’m not especially excited for the presents and sweet treats. This year I’m most excited and grateful for the time I get to spend with my grandparents, parents, brothers, sister-in-laws and nieces and nephews.

The annual Christmas pageant is a yearly tradition at the Metz household. Each pageant consists of music, programs and scripture readings all around the birth of baby Jesus with help from Alana (left) and Avery (right) Metz.
The annual Christmas pageant is a yearly tradition at the Metz household. Each pageant consists of music, programs and scripture readings all around the birth of baby Jesus with help from Alana (left) and Avery (right) Metz.

Maturity has taught me to cherish togetherness with those I love. As I look back on my childhood, I have very little recollection of the presents I received, but I remember the time we all spent together.

For one side of my family, I think back to the ultra-competitive games of Spoons — my aunts and uncles and cousins all huddled around the table, trying desperately not to be the one without a spoon.

There’s a quote in the television sitcom "The Office" where Andy Bernard says, “I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.”

For me, the good old days were the days spent with those I loved. It was the games of Spoons around the holidays and the scavenger hunts my brothers and I would do.

More recently, as my nieces have gotten older, the good old days include the holiday pageants my mom puts on each year. They include elaborate programs, musical numbers, scripture readings, my nieces dressed in costumes and more.

These pageants always make me feel closer to my family.

Each year, Maribeth Metz (center) puts on a holiday Christmas pageant with the help of her grandchildren, Alana Metz (left) and Avery Metz (right).
Each year, Maribeth Metz (center) puts on a holiday Christmas pageant with the help of her grandchildren, Alana Metz (left) and Avery Metz (right).

I don’t know about you, but as I look around our society, the most glaring weakness I see is division. One only needs to look as far as the most recent election to see the deep divide that resides in our world.

Topics like religion, abortion and sexuality have ripped our society apart and made us all pick sides in a battle that can never be won. The truth is, we're never going to agree on everything.

But you want to know something crazy? We don’t have to agree on everything to get along. Who would've thought?

With age and experience comes maturity and wisdom, and there are two things I’ve learned that have changed my life. The first is the idea of acceptance.

Acceptance that people are going to have different outlooks on life. Acceptance that it’s OK to have different opinions on controversial topics.

In life, we're going to have things thrown at us that we don’t like. It could be someone disagreeing with something we're passionate about or it could be getting cut off in traffic. Acceptance, though extremely hard to practice on a daily basis, can be the answer to our problems.

The other concept that's forever changed my life is the idea of love and tolerance. Could you imagine how different our lives would be if we centered them around these things?

I think back to family holiday parties and I don’t remember that division being present. Did we all have similar outlooks on religion? Not everyone. What about politics? There were Democrats and Republicans in the room.

And yet, for the time we spent together, we all got along.

Maybe it’s easier to practice acceptance, love and tolerance when it’s your family. Maybe it’s easier around the holiday season. But couldn’t we take those principles and apply them to our daily lives?

And before you say it’s simply not possible, doesn’t it happen every Saturday and Sunday during football season?

I’m not asking for perfection — but could you imagine a holiday season where acceptance and love and tolerance are our guiding principles?

I think it’s worth a shot.

— Contact freelancer Austin Metz at ametz@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: Home for the Holidays: Prioritizing love, tolerance and acceptance