Keller @ Large: How Human Kindness Can Make Holidays Happy

BOSTON (CBS) - Roseanne Thomas is a lovely lady who founded a Boston-based company called Protocol Advisors that provides business etiquette training to companies. I have had the pleasure of interviewing her several times over the years about manners and have always found her to be upbeat and optimistic.

So I was surprised to see a recent blog posting from her entitled: "The year they tried to steal Christmas."

"I have always looked forward to the holidays with family and friends," she writes. "But summoning the spirit of the season requires more from us in 2015. It requires we drown out the uncivil political discourse that confronts us nearly every waking hour…[and] show respect for the viewpoints of others with whom we strongly disagree…. And it means smiling through it all when we feel like doing anything but."

The holidays have always had their stress factors, but as Roseanne points out, this is something new and different:

"Gone is the pretense that others' opinions, reputations, feelings or welfare matter. Lost are human kindness, generosity of spirit and forgiveness. Absent are patience, unselfishness and gratitude."

I'm sorry to say I agree with her, and the question is, what do we do about it?

Her advice: "refuse to accept" anything less than "respectful discourse…choose our words extremely carefully…give others the benefit of the doubt…[and] listen more than we talk."

Easier said than done?

Maybe.

But if we all give it a try, maybe these will be happy holidays after all.

Listen to Jon's commentary: