Why Your Thanksgiving Feels Like Work (And How to Fix It)

Inside: Stop trying to win Thanksgiving. It’s a celebration of thanks, not a hostess contest. Here’s how to host (or attend) without the stress, comparison, or burnout. And as a bonus, you’ll actually enjoy yourself.

1. Make something (but not everything) from scratch

Cooking from scratch forces you to slow down, stay home, and do something relaxing. Oh, everyone wants to go wait at the electronics store to fight over giant TVs? Sorry, we have a pie to make.

But this does not mean you should make everything and you absolutely shouldn’t do it yourself. There’s no need to make absolutely everything yourself! The goal is to create that warm, busy, “something good is happening here” feeling that only comes when real cooking is happening in your kitchen.

One homemade thing fills your house with love. Seventeen homemade things fill your day with stress.

And with that in mind…

2. Have everyone pitch in

There’s seems to be a strange modern idea that Thanksgiving is the job of the hostess of the family and that everyone should be sitting down to a perfectly set table with a prepared meal that she alone has worked on. But honestly, if this idea is selfish. Not just for the spectators but for the performer.

I know that sounds harsh. But when you insist on making every dish, setting every place, washing every pot while your family sits around scrolling their phones, what are you really doing? You’re robbing them of the chance to contribute. You’re teaching your kids that love looks like one person working themselves to exhaustion while everyone else watches. And honestly? You’re probably doing it because it makes you feel needed and important.

When guests offer to bring something, they’re not being polite. They want to feel useful. They want to be part of creating something beautiful together. When you say “Oh no, I’ve got it all covered,” you’re actually shutting them out of the joy.

Let the kids set the table, sweep the floor, and do things that are actually helpful to you, not just pretend-helping.

Stop trying to prove you can do it all. I’m sure you can, but you shouldn’t.

3. Plan ahead

A from-scratch, community-effort Thanksgiving dinner does not appear without a little planning, and your slow Thanksgiving will go smoother if you plan ahead.

Take the time weeks and days before the holiday to make sure you have what you need and time to do it all. If there is anything you need in the way of kitchen essentials, table linens, things for overnight guests, get them before you feel like you’re in a hurry.

Take a few minutes to write down what needs to be done the day of, what time you need to do certain tasks (like get the turkey in the oven!), and what can be done beforehand. Nothing is more panic-inducing than feeling like you’re behind schedule. When you know what needs to be done, and you do it, you’ll stay calm and in control.

If you need a little help visualizing what you need to plan for ahead of time, grab your free Thanksgiving planning worksheet here:

4. DEcorate with what you already have

We’ve convinced ourselves that gratitude requires a turkey centerpiece from Pottery Barn and matching fall placemats. But real gratitude notices what’s already abundant around us.

November is rich with beauty if you actually look. The bare branches outside your window. The last stubborn leaves clinging to the oak tree. Pumpkins selling for a dollar at the farm stand because Halloween is over. Pinecones scattered in your yard that cost exactly nothing.

And when you fill your table with things you found, picked, or gathered instead of things you ordered, you’re actually practicing gratitude. You’re saying “look what’s been provided for us” instead of “look what I could afford to buy.”

If you don’t have a giant fall wreath, autumn salt and pepper shakers, or a set of Thanksgiving dishes, no one will think any less of you. Promise.

5. Don’t shop and don’t even plan your shopping

Let’s talk about the most ridiculous thing we do as a culture: we spend one day being grateful for what we have, then immediately start a frenzied hunt for more stuff.

And it’s not just Christmas gift shopping! A lot of these things we want to get, if we are completely honest, are things are just for ourselves.

Yes, there are some good deals to be had, but that can wait until tomorrow. Of course, it is tempting to start your Christmas shopping, or at least plan what you want to get.

But take a minute and think about this… the one day of the year set aside specifically for giving thanks, we are expected to start the shopping season. Let’s allow gratitude to have its day in the sun.

6. Embrace the season (instead of rushing past it)

November gets no respect. We treat it like Christmas’s awkward younger sibling: something to endure until the “real” celebration begins.

But there’s something deeply peaceful about bare trees against gray skies, about the way the light slants low through windows, about the permission to stay inside and light candles at 4 PM.

Yet we’re so busy rushing toward Christmas that we miss it entirely. We put up Christmas decorations before we’ve even carved the turkey. We’re already planning December parties while November is still happening around us.

But gratitude requires presence. It requires actually being where you are instead of always leaning toward where you’re going next.

Thanksgiving belongs to November. Let it have its moment. Let yourself sink into the slower rhythm of late fall instead of jumping ahead to tinsel and shopping lists. The evergreens and red bows will still be there in three weeks.

(And when the time comes to prepare for Christmas, let’s chilll out a little about that too!)

7. Give thanks

Real gratitude can’t coexist with comparison. When you’re scrolling through other people’s ‘perfect’ Thanksgiving posts while sitting at your own table, you’re literally choosing to focus on what you don’t have instead of what you do. Those phones are gratitude killers: windows into endless ‘better’ tables, better food, better families.

But gratitude lives in the present moment, with the people actually sitting in front of you, eating the food you actually made. Not with a daily update for one hundred of your closest friends on Instagram. Just a real, true attitude of thankfulness between you and your heart and whatever else you answer to.

You can make this change, this year

We’ve turned Thanksgiving into a show: complete with perfect tables, exhausted hosts, and audience approval.  But you don’t have to.

This year, I hope you choose to be grateful instead of coveting. I hope you let people help you and stop trying to do it all. I hope you notice the good that’s already around you and stop performing for an audience that doesn’t matter.

Happy Thanksgiving. Really.