Mary Lourdes Bonnici MBA

  🎄 DAY 93 • 93 DAYS TO CHRISTMAS Christmas Memories — Moments That Stay in Our Hearts Christmas Traditions, Stories & Festive Living “The decorations are eventually packed away, but the memories created around them can remain with us for a lifetime.” Yesterday, on Day 94 , we explored The Christmas Card — a tradition that carries greetings, affection and remembrance from one person to another. Today, we move from the messages we send to something even more personal: the memories we keep . Christmas is unusual because it is not experienced only in the present. A familiar carol can remind us of childhood. An ornament can recall someone who once placed it on the tree. A recipe can carry the memory of a grandparent. A photograph can return us, for a moment, to a Christmas celebrated decades earlier. Research on family rituals and Christmas traditions helps explain why these apparently ordinary details can become so meaningful. Rituals, sensory experiences, objects and repeated f...

  🎄 99 Days to Christmas Why Christmas Feels So Special: The Psychology of Christmas Nostalgia By Mary Lourdes Bonnici Christmas Traditions, Stories & Festive Living — Day 99 Sometimes Christmas seems to arrive before the decorations are even taken out of their boxes. We hear the opening notes of a familiar Christmas song. We smell cinnamon, cloves, oranges or something baking. We see an ornament that has been in the family for years. And suddenly, we are somewhere else. Perhaps we remember Christmas mornings from childhood. A grandparent's home. A family gathering. A particular meal. Someone we love. Or simply the feeling of waiting excitedly for Christmas to arrive. That experience has a name: nostalgia . And it is the perfect place to begin our official journey through Christmas Traditions, Stories & Festive Living . What Is Nostalgia? Nostalgia is much more complex than simply remembering the past. Researchers at the University of Southampton describe it as ...