>>49238
The holidays are a rough time for a lot us, it forces us to acknowledge family/friends and whether they're with us or not, or to think about what made us separate. Whatever your situation may be, I hope you're comforted in where you're at now. The positive side is it seems like you're able to make a choice to not be around them, rather than forced into a situation you don't want to be in.

>The west is increasingly losing it's religion, which robs Christmas of a large part of it's meaning
Christianity sort of fit itself into "Christmas". Jesus was not born on December 25th, it's said he was supposedly born in late September or early October. The Christmas tree we put up was only a tradition that evolved from and was brought over from the Romans, Egyptians, and Pagans. They would decorate with greenery in order to celebrate the Ra, Saturnalia, Yule, essentially the winter solstice. Christmas is sort of an amalgamation of different ideas put together, and the result is what we have today. It seems to really originate from the winter solstice celebration. Found an article (https://www.ffungi.org/blog/the-influence-of-hallucinogenic-mushrooms-on-christmas) that sums up an interesting take on possible Christmas origins:

"In the ancestral communities of the Arctic, the winter solstice, which occurs on December 21st, was a ceremonial and festive date. Rituals were conducted that were guided by shamans who collected the Amanita muscaria mushroom, also called fly agaric, which has powerful hallucinogenic properties."

You can find the origins of common Christmas traits to be linked to these rituals. Amanita muscaria was an important part of this winter solstice celebration, and the mushroom has the classic Christmas colors, red and white. The article points out that this mushroom has a red cap sprinkled with white, just like Santa's cap. This quote explains the use of stockings being placed by fire/chimneys: "The toxicity of the Amanita muscaria when ingested is high, so before taking it they had to dehydrate them on the branches of the pines. A second possibility was to put them in socks and spread them over the fire, an image that closely resembles the Christmas tradition of hanging Christmas boots over chimneys."

Here's the possible origins of Christmas reindeer: "Additionally, the reindeer were of great help in reducing the toxicity of the mushroom, since they can eat Amanita muscaria without suffering the effects of its venom. Thus, the urine of the animals was used, since they had already filtered the harmful components of the mushroom, but which still maintained its hallucinogenic effects."

Santa Clause appearance may originate from these shaman, "Clothing is another similarity, since to honor Amanita muscaria the shamans dressed in red and white clothes, and to protect themselves from the snow they used large reindeer leather boots that over time turned black."

It seems we've lost the meaning of "Christmas" long ago. It's just been deeply rebranded and had Christianity slapped on top of a celebration with completely different origins. I always thought it was odd that Santa is an anagram for "Satan", especially for what's promoted as a Christian holiday. The winter solstice celebrates Saturn, and the occult is deeply intertwined with Saturn. Makes you wonder if celebrating the winter solstice (which is celebrating Saturn), is essentially occult worship? Hence the anagram, "Satan"? Just an odd thought.