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Charlie Brown Tree & Christmas Grace · HAVE FAITH LET IT BEGIN®

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  It's monday and you know what that means welcome
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  to have faith let it begin podcast
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  of inspiration it's a podcast
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  of hope it's a podcast of faith and it's a podcast of friendship here is your
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  host angel santana and special co-host dr e we're a three five five that's it
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  man let's rock and roll in three two one,
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  Hello, everyone, and welcome to Have Faith, Let It Begin.
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  Welcome to another Monday episode where Angel and Dr. E are back.
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  And let me tell you something, this is going to be fun.
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  And it's meant to be fun. You know why it's meant to be fun?
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  Because I love going back to nostalgia.
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  And with Dr. E being here and Citizens Reunited to Overcome Cancer,
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  Today's conversation is a little lighter.
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  It's about nostalgic, but it's still full of meaning, especially during the
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  Christmas season. What does that mean?
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  Well, I want to start by taking us back, way back, as I say hi to Dr. E, to Christmas as a kid.
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  And let's start off with Dr. E. Welcome back, my friend. How are you?
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  Oh my God. Happy Christmas season, my friend. How are you?
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  I saw the pictures of your beautiful daughter doing her recital.
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  And I'll tell you, if you didn't cry like a baby, then you have a dark heart, man.
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  Oh, big shout outs to the Conservatory, the Rosemont Theater.
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  They did an amazing job with the Christmas Charlie Brown. It was a phenomenal
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  show. And yes, I teared up. I had that in the throat.
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  And that's why I said tonight we're going to have to make this a little bit
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  special. So let's get right into it.
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  Growing up for me in the 1980s, Christmas just felt different, right?
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  There were no cell phones. There was no social media, no online wish lists.
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  We waited for catalogs, the big Sears catalog to arrive in the mail.
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  Then we go all the way to the back because we were kids, circled all the toys
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  with a pen and hope for the best.
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  What was Christmas like for you? You're a little bit younger than me,
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  so I'm assuming it's the 70s.
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  How was Christmas for you?
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  Share some of that with us. Yeah, no, I'm so glad this is a great subject.
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  So you grew up in the Christmas in the 80s, which was simple,
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  but I grew up Christmas in the 60s.
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  So growing up in the 60s was very interesting because it was one of those decades
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  that was sort of a transition decade, right?
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  So you had the pre-war, you know, post-depression stuff, and then World War
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  II kind of changed our country, right?
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  We were incredibly elated. We were instrumental in saving the world from,
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  you know, from this horrible, you know, Nazism and, you know, all that kind of stuff.
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  And I want to go so far as saying sort of saved the world, you know,
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  or at least the world is, as it was known at that point from,
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  from, from utter, you know,
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  terrible dictatorship and all that kind of stuff and hatred and genocide and all this stuff.
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  And, and it did trickle down to, to, you know,
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  to our country and our country had pride in our country, you know,
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  had optimism and our country, you know, was simple, but there was this simplicity,
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  but there was this sort of this great sort of.
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  Great sense of feeling. And that really portrayed itself in the 1950s where, you know,
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  I think the United States in the 1950s was probably as good a time to be anywhere
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  in any country at any time in history.
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  And then 1960s rocked. And, you know, it started with the assassination of JFK and the Vietnam War.
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  So that 1960s was a transition. And then you were a transition decade because
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  it was right before the technology came in and all of this, you know,
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  social media and internet and all this other stuff.
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  But to answer your question in my long-winded way, you know,
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  1960s coming from a family of not having, you know, really much in the way of.
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  Materialistic opportunities.
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  And, you know, where, you know, all of our Christmases were extraordinarily
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  simple and filled with love and filled with food, the Italian way and filled with family.
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  And, and I'll tell you a quick Charlie Brown story to sort of take your daughter's recital full circle.
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  So one year my mom and I were living in a little sort of cold water flat and,
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  you know, in the tenements in Patterson, New Jersey.
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  And, you know, we had, you know, this galley kitchen and my mom slept on the
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  couch and I had this bed and it was as simple as simple can be and we didn't
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  have any money for a tree that year and
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  We were just kind of walking down the street, you know, in the tenement.
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  And we had noticed that someone had thrown this little artificial Christmas tree.
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  It might have been maybe two feet tall or something. Very small Christmas tree
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  that looked as Charlie Brown tree as you could possibly get.
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  And, you know, it had this like, you know, it had the bulbs,
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  you know, it had the sockets to put in these little. Oh, yeah.
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  And what we did was we just kind of picked it up, this poor thing that was in
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  the garbage heap, and we took it home and we kind of cleaned it up.
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  And we went to the hardware store and we bought, you know, a couple of packets
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  of the lights and we put the lights in and we crossed our fingers and we plugged it in.
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  And lo and behold, that light, those lights worked.
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  And then we bought a little bit of garland and a little bit of tinsel and put
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  a couple of things in. And I'm going to tell you something very,
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  very moving. I hope you feel it's moving.
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  When we moved then to my grandmother's house, so we left the tenements,
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  my grandmother's house and this tree was like pretty much everything to us, right?
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  Because this tree, even when we had the money, we never bought a tree.
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  This was our tree, right? Forever and ever and ever.
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  And my grandmother had this picture window where people would like,
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  you know, and they They were on a corner of a side street and a main street.
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  And when a car would pass the street, they would look into our window.
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  And the way it was set up is when we put the Charlie Brown tree up, they thought...
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  That this was like a 17-foot tree because all they could see is like the top of the tree.
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  What they didn't know was the Charlie Brown tree like sort of stopped like right
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  at where they couldn't see.
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  So they thought that we had the greatest tree in the world, but we just had
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  this Charlie Brown tree.
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  Now, Angel, I'm going to tell you another thing that's going to choke you up
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  is that when you do go home tomorrow, if you happen to pass my office.
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  So every Christmas season, I bring my Charlie Brown tree to work and I put it
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  on top of my copy machine and you will see this Charlie Brown tree in the window of my office.
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  So that Charlie Brown tree, you know, so to me, that Charlie Brown tree to me
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  is what Christmas is all about.
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  That's a great story. You know, and I was just thinking about waking up on Christmas
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  morning and how it felt magical. You run down to the tree, you see the lights,
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  the wrapping paper, and then the one gift you hoped was there.
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  You know, it honestly, it didn't matter. It really didn't matter to me.
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  I could have been an action figure, which I wanted those WWE action figures,
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  a board game or something simple.
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  What mattered was how it made me feel, right? So let me close with this. This is a fun debate.
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  Back then, gifts weren't about costs. They were about joy, right?
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  Now as adults, especially those of us who are facing hardship,
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  illness, or loss, our perspectives change, right?
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  And as you know, Dr. E, you've seen this firsthand through your work by helping people fight cancer.
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  When life humbles you, when you realize something important,
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  it's not the gift that matters. It's the love behind it.
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  I love to hear from you, Dr. E, about this is a funny debate.
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  I'm going to turn this into a funny debate.
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  It's called the christmas gift debate. What do you do when someone gives you
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  a gift and you know deep down?
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  You're never going to use it. Do you re-gift it or do you tell the person you
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  don't like it? I'll be honest.
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  This is a tricky one for me It's always comes back to in to the intention If
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  someone thought about me took the time to choose something and gave it with
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  love Then gratitude comes first always right Right.
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  And re-gifting, well, I can't say I've never done that, you know,
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  but I'm always afraid that I forget who gave it to me and I re-gift it back
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  to the person who gave it to me.
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  That's a famous story, right? Yes.
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  You're right, though, the gratitude. If someone thinks enough of us,
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  you know, to give us something, you know, of course, gratitude is the number one thing.
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  And the way I look at it, you know, my mother, again, growing up the way I grew
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  up, you know, life was practical. You know, if there's something that you can
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  use and enjoy or whatever, you use it.
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  And if not, you want to try to make sure that it can get into the hands of someone,
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  you know, who could enjoy it or whatever.
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  And, and I, I, I got to tell you, my mother also taught me brutal honesty. I'm not a diplomat.
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  So in answer to your question, if someone gave me something,
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  I'm going to say, you know what? I love this, but you know what?
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  I'm never going to be able to use this. I'm going to tell you,
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  it's going to go to a great cause.
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  It's going to go, I'm going to donate it to charity or it's going to go to someone who has nothing.
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  And when I do give it, I say the same thing. This gift is not from me.
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  It's from Joe Smith or whoever it happens to be. So I've never had a problem
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  with it and no one has ever, you know, whatever.
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  And the other thing is we get older, Angel. And again, back to our analogy of
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  that 20 year difference.
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  And 20 years from now, you're going to have so much crap
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  that you're not going to know what to do with. You're going to probably be regifting
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  pretty much everything.
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  So just to let you know, it's a common thing. But I really thank you for letting
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  me share that Charlie Brown Christmas tree story.
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  It's perfect because, you know, I did an episode.
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  I mean, excuse me, I did a sermon about the peace within us and the joy.
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  You just did an episode on your podcast with me about giving bad news.
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  So this is what I want to talk about.
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  This is how we're going to close. It won't be a formal prayer.
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  It'll be more of, I'm going to take a chapter, a page out of the Kroc podcast.
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  We're going to motivate you as we leave.
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  And if you haven't listened to the Kroc podcast, this episode was really,
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  really profound. And it was really inspiring.
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  It's about dealing with breaking bad news. And it doesn't have to be a certain
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  way. You just got to check out the episode.
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  So let's close this way.
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  Telling someone and being honest, kindness will always win, especially when
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  we remember that so many people this Christmas aren't worried about gifts at all.
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  Some are fighting cancer. Some are dealing with bad news.
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  Some are missing loved ones at the table.
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  For them, a gift isn't an item. It's a moment, a call, a hug,
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  a simple knowing someone cares.
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  That perspective matters.
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  And that's what this season reminds me of. It's gratitude, not perfection,
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  not money, not having everything figured out, just gratitude for being here
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  for one another and for the moments we still get to share.
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  So let me close by saying, as we continue the countdown of Christmas,
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  I wanna encourage our Half Faith Let It Begin family, the Croc Nation,
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  I want to encourage you to give grace to others and to yourself.
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  And if you're listening today and you're struggling physically,
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  emotionally, spiritually, please know this.
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  You are not alone and your story is not even over.
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  Thank you for spending the Monday with us. Thank you for being a part of both
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  of our podcasts and never, ever forget.
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  Have faith, let it begin, baby. We'll see you and we'll talk to you after Christmas
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  as we do the countdown on the Monday after for the new year.
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  Dr. E, I'll see you soon. Yep. Thank you.