As soon as Halloween is over, the excitement for Christmas begins. Retail stores and malls begin decorating for Christmas and they put on an endless loop of Christmas music.

I love the holidays. Baking cookies with my family is one of my favorite holiday traditions, and I love watching cheesy Christmas movies throughout the month of December. 

I just can’t stand Christmas music.

I used to work retail, and I still do during the winter months when I’m not at school. I’ve heard my fair share of holiday songs— rather, I’ve heard my fair share of the six holiday songs my store would play on loop until February. 

Apparently, hearing the same songs over and over again (especially when you don’t want to hear them in the first place) can make it harder to focus.

Mariah Carey’s classic Christmas song “All I Want For Christmas Is You” has nearly 950 million streams on Spotify, with millions of streams undoubtedly coming after the holiday season last year or from those who wanted to celebrate Christmas early this year. The song’s streaming numbers were just under 900 million by the end of the holiday season last year. 

Michael Bublé’s “It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas” has just under 500 million Spotify streams.

These songs are ubiquitous with the holiday season; they’re everywhere. Especially working retail, it’s impossible to tune out these songs for an entire season.

Working retail did not start my disdain for holiday music; it just made my aversion to it stronger. Instead of hearing the smooth, fatherly voice of Bublé, or the impressive, powerful voice of Mariah Carey, I hear grating jingle bells and annoying lyrics. 

Music and trauma are associated, and positive and negative associations seep into holiday classics, too. For some, Christmas music may be associated with negative holiday experiences during childhood.

That’s not the case for me. As a kid, the whole build-up to Christmas was a magical time, not to mention waiting for Santa to come and leave presents. I loved Christmas then, and I still do now.

My aversion to Christmas music is not because of retail, and it’s not due to childhood trauma. I simply don’t like it, and it doesn’t help that the Christmas season seems to start earlier every year. 

I’ve also never been the type of person who can listen to songs on loop, yet all winter long, radio stations and mall intercoms play and replay the same set of songs. Christmas music just isn’t for me.