Loretta LaRoche, author of 'Life is Short, Wear Your Party Pants' recently spoke to Jillian St. Charles of AOL Coaches. Here are excerpts of the interview:

Jillian St. Charles: We're staring down the barrel of another holiday season, and I'm not feeling any holiday cheer. Why is that?

Loretta LaRoche: I think we've had a major paradigm shift in how we perceive the holidays, because of the incessant need to be doing something all the time that seems to be more fulfilling -- in other words, things at work, things around the house, constantly being on the cell phone, emailing, and paging. We've started to look at the holidays as an interruption to doing things. It gets in the way of our routine. On top of it all, it's become less simple than it used to be. It used to be that the major portion of the holiday was spent with your family and now it's become a retail frenzy. Its more 'cha-ching' than it is 'joy to the world.' It's a mall activity. And people keep thinking they have to buy people all of this stuff and make people happy.

Jillian St. Charles: With all of that in mind, how can I save money during the holidays without feeling like the family Scrooge?

Loreta LaRoche: I have shifted into 'experiences' with my family. I really don't think that most of my relatives -- including my grandchildren really need anything. I think that's what you have to look at. If you're in a family where somebody is suffering from poverty or distress or tragedy or illness, then yes, they might need something that you buy. So what I've said is, 'I'm going to give you experiences, because that's a memory that you're going to hold dear, and you'll be able to speak about it to others when you get older.' So what I do is I ask each grandchild -- or even my son or daughter -- what is it that you'd like to do? Would you like to go see a show? Would you like to go out to dinner? How about a massage?

Jillian St. Charles: What are some good things that you can do for children?

Loreta LaRoche: I live in the New England area, and every year there's 'The Nutcracker.' I think every child needs to see 'The Nutcracker.' Or I've taken them to see the Rockettes. We go out as a group -- maybe three or four of them, and then we have a small dinner or something, and then we go home and we have a heck of a lot of fun just recalling the high kicks. Or we go to a movie. There's nothing wrong with taking kids to a movie -- say 'Harry Potter' or whatever else they might like -- and then going out and having a hamburger or something. It doesn't have to be a daunting thing.

Jillian St. Charles: It seems like kids go crazy over the holidays. Are kids experiencing holiday stress too?

Loreta LaRoche: I think children will reflect the mood of the household and the ideas and values of the family. So if you see your mother and father acting like gerbils on a wheel, you're going to want to jump on. Even if your children think that, intuitively, this doesn't make sense, they'll justify it by saying 'Mommy and Daddy are doing this, so why not me?' We have a lot of influence on our kids as role models. People don't really understand that. When you're driving around like a maniac dropping kids off from one activity to another or even dialoguing with them about the latest toy or the latest Game Boy or whatever, you're giving them the impression that they need this stuff too. There's an awful lot of stressed out kids today, and the thing that they're all missing is fun. Kids aren't having any fun anymore. And neither are the adults!

Jillian St. Charles: How can we help our kids de-stress?

Loreta LaRoche: I think the first thing that parents have to do is create a mission statement for the family. 'Who are we? What are we about and what do we believe in?' You've got to start that pretty young. You have to create a value system that makes sense, and show children that who they are is not personified by what they have. Give them some altruistic concepts to really hang their hats on; we have an awful lot of entitlement right now -- everything's about 'me, me, me, what do I have?' The eminent Dr. Spock who wrote the quintessential tome for child-rearing told me that if he had to re-write his history, the first thing he would recommend to parents is to create an altruistic child: one that looks at the 'we' rather than the 'me'. I think we would have so much more peace in the world and in our communities and our homes if we stop focusing on 'me, me, me'.

Jillian St. Charles: Let me ask you a little bit about the grown ups now. Holidays are also the time of year that you see family that you don't normally see, you do a lot of traveling, you have a lot of stressful events to manage. How do you get off on a good start?

Loreta LaRoche: First of all, you have to put everything in life in perspective. I would recommend you write a list of the 10 worst things that could happen to you or your family, and keep them handy every time you begin to 'catastro-phize' or 'awful-ize' about simply getting on a plane and going to visit your relatives. If you look at your list, I would think that the fear of getting cancer or getting a child abducted or other major, life-changing events are far more tragic than simply going to visit a relative that you don't get along with. It's fleeting in the whole concept of time. You have to minimize things instead of maximizing them.

Jillian St. Charles: What happens if the relative is coming to my house? How do I help my guest feel at ease if I'm on the receiving end of the visit?

Loreta LaRoche: I think the best thing to do is always realize they're going to go home. They're not moving in. You don't have to take care of them for the rest of their lives. It's just a moment in time, once again. I think we forget that people who behave in dysfunctional ways or try to push our buttons are riddled with fear. If you can take deep breaths and try to be more compassionate and more empathic, you will not fall prey to their fear. Fear is contagious. I would try to create an atmosphere of fun and laughter and integrate some other people into the scenario who are upbeat. Try to create an aura of optimism around this negative individual. Who knows? They might actually make some shifts.

Jillian St. Charles: So laughter is contagious as well?

Loreta LaRoche: Oh god yes. It's the antidote to fear. It's one of the antidotes. Love is the biggest antidote. It's very hard to be afraid when you're held in the light of love. You just feel a whole different way of being.

Jillian St. Charles: So you can embrace that, and you can extend that to your family.

Loreta LaRoche: That's exactly right. I know these things may sound esoteric, but they're all based in science now -- there's fascinating neuroscience that shows our brain chemistry actually changes when we exude positive emotions. We're feeling good. We have less illness. All of the research on exercise and eating well is not as amazing as being in a state of love and community with those you love.

Jillian St. Charles: I was just reading an article of yours where you were saying that stress is just about the leading cause of every health problem.

Loreta LaRoche: That's because people are almost warrior-like in their need to be stressed. It's like we're all stress-warriors now. We walk around and say, 'Oh my god, I'm so stressed.'

Jillian St. Charles: What's behind that? How did we get to the place where we're proud to say, 'I'm exhausted, I'm stressed out, I'm working so hard?'

Loreta LaRoche: I think it's an inner desire to be noticed. The lack of community, the lack of family gatherings... all of this has left us feeling alone and under-nourished. As a child I would come home and my grandmother was always there. My mother worked, but there was always somebody there to have something that I could nosh on or give me someone to talk to. Now, essentially, we're all running around trying to connect with high-tech gadgets, but we never get the warmth and the closeness of being really there with someone who is there to really nurture us. So what am I going to do to get that? I'm going to complain. I'm going to make myself this horrible victim who is going around the earth, feeling overwhelmed and exhausted.

Jillian St. Charles: I know I already feel less stressed for having talked to you. I really appreciate your wisdom and your input. Do you have any final parting advice for the upcoming holidays?

Loreta LaRoche: I would really take a moment to listen to the lyrics of the holiday songs. One of them is 'Joy to the World.' 'Joy to the world', 'merry hearts' and all of that good news. Let's share good news. Let's do what the holiday is supposed to be about.

Jillian St. Charles: That sounds like great advice. I hope that you have a joyful and happy holiday -- it sounds like you will.

Loreta LaRoche: I'm going to have fun because, you know what? You're only on this planet for a short time -- you're here to distract yourself until you die -- do you want to do it with misery or do you want to do it with mirth?

Jillian St. Charles: Excellent point. There's really no arguing with that, is there?