Writing is about telling stories, and stories are about people. And so are the holidays.

Whether or not you get into the Christmas thing, it can be hard to write during the holiday season.

You’re busy, people around you are busy. Expectations of having everything just so are through the roof. If you find yourself unable to get to the page on the holidays, don’t worry.

You can still practice being a writer.

Writing is about telling stories, and stories are about people. And so are the holidays.

Look around you.

Your family, your colleagues and co-workers, the billions of people in the shops, the tired cashier, and the person giving them grief and holding up the line. The man inside the Santa suit. The mother doing her best to keep it together with the brood of kids trailing behind her, each of them drunk on the bliss of Christmas anticipation. Yourself.

They’re all people, all of them stories playing out in front of you in real-time.

All you have to do is watch them closely.