Following Stars into Humble Rooms

When I was a kid, my family had a peculiar Christmas tradition. The tree never appeared until Christmas Eve after all the kids were tucked in bed. Santa, apparently moonlighting as an interior decorator, did all the heavy lifting overnight. The catch? We were banished to bed at an unreasonably early hour—practically before the sun had finished setting—and heaven forbid we stumbled downstairs and spooked Santa mid‑tinsel toss.

By morning, the house had undergone a full HGTV holiday makeover. A towering tree glittered with tinsel icicles (the kind made of lead, because nothing says “Merry Christmas” like mild poisoning). Beneath it sprawled an American farm village, heroically encircled by my grandfather’s 1940s Lionel train, which ran endless laps like it was training for the Polar Express Olympics.

And then there was the creche. An antique even back then, it featured the usual suspects: angel, shepherd, cow, donkey… plus, for reasons never explained, a World War II GI accompanied by a German shepherd. (Apparently Bethlehem had a draft.)

The three magi, however, were always late to the party. On Christmas morning, they started out across the room, looking like they’d taken a wrong turn at Albuquerque. Each day they shuffled a little closer, inching their way to Bethlehem like they were following GPS with bad reception.  They finally arrivid at the manger on January 6^th, just in time for the Feast of the Epiphany and for the whole display to be packed away. Timing is everything.

Of course, the actual magi didn’t exactly have a smooth trip either.  They followed a star expecting splendor: a prince in a palace, courtiers at his side, servants ready to anticipate his every need, and maybe a buffet spread.  But the star led them elsewhere—to a backwater town of farmers and shepherds where the soil was stubborn and meadows few, to a carpenter’s fixer-upper in a land where trees were scarce.  Instead of a prince kept warm in velvet, they found a poor child cradled by a young mom juggling the hard chores of survival, a child who looked like he needed diapers more than incense.  Not quite the Ritz.  I picture the magi standing there, gifts in hand, glancing at one another, and thinking, “Well, this is awkward.  Should we just Venmo them a few gold coins and call it a day?”

But wisdom is more than foresight.  And the magi were wise.  They had the ability to see meaning in the commonplace, in the unexpected, in the awkwardness.  And generosity is more than wealth.  It is the courage to give as if the recipient were worthy of a crown.

So, they offered their treasures anyway.

Christmas is as Christmas Does

Remember Forrest Gump’s mama? She had a way of boiling wisdom down to bumper-sticker brilliance: “Stupid is as stupid does.”  Turns out Thomas Merton, the monk-poet with a knack for solemnity, may have been humming the same tune back in 1939. In a poem attributed to him, Christmas as to People (although there is no sure evidence that he actually wrote it), he declared: "Christmas is as Christmas does." Given the world stage in 1939, the poem isn't exactly decked with candy canes and carols. It opens with:

Christmas is as Christmas does.
And the wide world shudders now with woes.

From there, the sleigh ride heads downhill fast. Me? I prefer my Christmas poetry to have a little more sparkle: holly and evergreen, jingling bells, and enough tinsel to make Clark Griswold proud.

Still, Mama Gump and the apocryphal Brother Merton were onto something. Their words remind us of a timeless truth: we become what we do.

In ancient Greece, when philosophy and psychology still shared the same cradle, Aristotle reminded his students that character is not a gift—it’s a habit. Do something often enough, and it becomes who you are. Tell the truth repeatedly, and honesty takes root until it feels effortless. Practice friendliness, generosity, and consideration, and kindness will become second nature. Live “as if” you were already the person you aspire to be, and you’ll find yourself becoming that person. In that sense, the spirit of Christmas—generosity, peace, compassion—isn’t a seasonal costume we put on once a year. It’s a way of being that grows stronger each time we choose it.

But Aristotle also knew the shadow side of this truth. Habits don’t discriminate between virtue and vice. As Jungian analyst John A. Sanford observed in Meeting the Shadow, Robert Louis Stevenson’s tale of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a chilling parable of this dynamic. Jekyll believed he could dabble in darkness without consequence, slipping in and out of Hyde at will. Yet each indulgence gave Hyde more power, until the mask became the man. His actions reshaped his very core.

And so, whether in the glow of Christmas lights or the gloom of Hyde’s London streets, the lesson is the same: we become what we do. Mama Gump said it plain, Merton said it solemn (maybe), Aristotle said it wise. The choices we make—bright or bleak—are the brushstrokes that paint the portrait of our lives. If Christmas is as Christmas does, then perhaps the best gift we can give is to live each day “as if” we were already the generous, peaceful, compassionate people we long to be.