"But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world . . ." – The Little Prince
Some say that winter’s days are too short, too dark.
I say, they are perfect harmony, for what my body and soul require.
Enough time to wander, to play in the Light.
To greet the morning deer, and howl with the coyotes welcoming night.
Enough time to rest, to read, to contemplate and write.
To whisper and twinkle with the stars and praise the moonlight. Remark in the contrast, the highlight of the white snow, against the navy sky.
Winter invites me in. My soul, grateful for the reflection. I bury myself in books and imagination while the rabbits burrow in their holes.
I feel alive in the sharp chill of the air and in the comfort of the fire.
Winter both calls me under the covers and to the window, to be a witness to the beauty of stillness, as Mother Earth rests under her own blanket, a gift from Father Sky.
Pacer, the blur shown, was one very excited puppy to be running in the moonlit snow.
On December 21st, we celebrated the first day of winter with the Winter Solstice. Unlike the Fall Equinox, where we shed our layers and leave old parts of us behind as we step into the darkness, winter is about the rebirth of the sun, or our inner light. Yes, it’s still ghastly dark for long periods each day and we often feel lost, like we’re aimlessly wandering around in a dark forest at night without a headlamp or compass, but slowly, minute by minute, the light is growing. Even before the promise of sunrise, if we can find our North Star, we have a flame to guide us.
We’ll get to the light, we always do. For now I’ll ask for patience as we accept the invitation of winter and immerse ourselves in the dark.
Did you ever wonder what would happen if we all just skipped winter? Well sure, we could all just go migrate to Florida for a few months. (The beach does sound nice right about now, doesn’t it?) Still, even Florida experiences darker days. The weather changes, as do the plants and habits of the wildlife. In Estes Park, we’re blessed to experience the full depth of winter. The harsh winds, cold nights, and bare trees. To the naked eye, not much is happening outside in the plant world. Everything looks dead. Yet healing is happening in this restful state, deep at the roots, under the soft blanket of snow provided by Mother Nature. Sadly, I actually don’t have to tell any Estes Park resident what happens when winter is skipped or only partially experienced. We’ve already seen the fires burn through. We need winter, just as spring needs winter, and all the other seasons.
Honoring and giving ourselves the space for our own Inner Winter is equally important. It includes several components, with rest, space for deep thinking and creativity more obvious pieces. In therapy, this is the time to do the underground work, the trauma work and the shadow work, when we start working at the root of deep wounds and begin the healing process. I won’t lie here either, this process can feel scary. It’s courageous work. What is important to remember is that we are never alone. Just as spring needs winter and each season needs the others, we all need each other too. Asking for help from friends, family, or a psychotherapist, is not only okay, it’s part of the healing process. Again, remember that healing deep wounds often happens slowly, much of it under the surface, wrapped under a blanket, and invisible to the naked eye.
In short, we’re shining a light to the dark corners of ourselves and our lives so they too can become part of the light. Shadow work, in short, is about acknowledging and accepting the parts of us that have been rejected or deemed unacceptable in the past. Truly, those are important parts of us. I’ll give you a few examples. I’ve met a lot of people who grew up in homes where it was not okay to express emotions. They were sent to their rooms when they were angry, or told to “stop crying” (or worse, to “toughen up”) when tears escaped their eyes. The issue is that we are all emotional beings, some of us even more tuned in to emotions than others. Often, when we are taught our emotions are not okay, we lose a part of ourselves. The only choice we have is to shut them down, go numb, or become depressed. Another common example is when I see adults who, as kids, weren’t allowed to reveal the masculine or feminine parts of themselves in order to fit societal standards. While I am thinking about the LGBTQ+ community, I’m really talking about all of us. We all have masculine and feminine parts to us, regardless of our gender identity. A few issues that I see when these parts of us are rejected include toxic masculinity and eating disorders, as well as anxiety and depression. The only way to heal is to acknowledge these shadow parts and accept them as essential to our beings.
And finally, the light. The rebirth of our own inner suns, slowly rising in us a little more each day.
What is the light? I hate to box it by defining it, but I would give it a few names: hope, love, meaning, purpose. Paradoxically, the more willingly we step into the darkness, the brighter our lights shine, even sparking the lights of others. This winter, we can utilize the light by setting an intention. What do we want to explore during winter? What changes/growth might we want to start preparing for in the spring? In less metaphorical terms, intentions are about how we want to feel and who we want to be in the world (which I would argue is already our true, authentic selves). If you get stuck there, examine your values and narrow them down to about five or so. Values are at the core of who we are as humans and help us make choices to keep us on our path. With values in our pocket, intentions as our map, and our personal North Stars to guide the way, I think we all might just be okay in whatever adventures 2022 brings. May your light, and the light of others, guide you through the dark. Know that the light is always there, even if you can’t see it at the moment.
Did I catch you with my title? Good. Now that I’ve got you hooked, I’ll admit it’s a bit misleading. That’s not to say I won’t give you some solid mental health tips, but we’re going to dive a bit deeper than that.
As a therapist, my job is not that of a fixer. I’m a healer. I don’t fix things that are broken; I help wounded people heal. Essentially, I use my curiosity to help my clients uncover what the root of their troubles are. And we heal from the ground up.
With that being said, what I want to explore with you in this article is what is at the root of winter blues, or what some people call seasonal affective disorder (SAD).
Until recently, most people thought that SAD was related directly to the amount of light, or rather lack thereof, each day. I’m sure anyone who’s moved to Estes Park from the midwest will tell you that they don’t miss the 3 straight months of grey skies and no sun. While I don’t discount the influence of light and think a supplement of Vitamin D would be beneficial for most people, that wouldn’t explain why the people of Tromso, Norway, where inhabitants receive only 2-3 hours of indirect sunlight November through January, see little difference in their mental health in the winter. Or why my own experience with SAD changed in my early twenties. Or why some people in Estes Park have SAD, and others don’t. To go one step deeper, I wonder if YOU have experienced SAD every year of your life, or only some years? And finally, why did the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Health Disorders (DSM-5) decide to leave out SAD in their latest edition, and instead list it as a specifier (“with seasonal pattern”) to major depressive disorder?
Is it possible that in the winter something else changes besides how long the sun appears in the sky?
A quick side note on depression: To date in my career as a therapist, I have never met anyone who is depressed for no reason. There is ALWAYS a reason.
When I was an intern at Harmony Foundation, my supervisor theorized that SAD had to do more with lack of getting outside, rather than sunlight. That seemed like a pretty valid theory. Personally, I know that my own experience with SAD diminished when I started trail running outside in the winter rather than always being inside a gym (not to discredit the gym as research shows there are substantial mental health benefits to exercise). Plus, have you ever met one of the skiers or snowboarders in town? They are STOKED when the first big snowfall hits.
One other theory that I’ve read in various sources is that our social habits tend to change in the winter. Besides major holidays, people tend to gather less in the winter, and even that option wasn’t considered a possibility for many this past year. In his book “Lost Connections” Johann Hari theorized that most cases of depression and anxiety are due to disconnection in relationships. When I worked with people with alcohol addictions, I can’t recall any instance of a client saying they were an alcoholic and went to the bar everyday. Maybe that’s where the drinking started, but it didn’t become a problem until they started drinking at home every night, alone.
While I won’t claim here that I have THE answer to seasonal affective disorder or winter blues, I will say that lack of connection to Nature, to other people, and to ourselves might be at the root. However, I do want to clarify that connection is different from being at work or in a store and saying “hi” to people. Real connection means that when we are together, we have the space to truly be ourselves and allow for the others to truly be themselves as well. We can speak freely about our emotions and thoughts. It ensures empathy and an allowance for each person, animal, tree to be amazing just as they are. We connect, meaningfully, at our cores.
Before I move into ways to stay mentally healthy, or even improve mental health this winter, I won’t pretend that in the COVID era, things are tougher. Much tougher. As I wrote in an article last year for the EP Trail Gazette, it’s okay to grieve, to just allow the tears. Once we find that release, it creates space for other possibilities. For instance, re-reading what connection is, you may already be able to come up with different, creative ways to gather and connect with others.
Mental Health Tips for Winter (in the Covid Era)
Mindset: To Dread or To Find Opportunity this Winter?
One other thing I learned when reading about the people of Tromso, Norway, is that they use a mindset tip similar to what I use with the athletes I work with. When a race, or winter, is on the horizon, do you view it as a threat or a challenge? When we view things as a challenge, we also tend to see opportunities for play and for growth while a threat is scary and we either want to fight it, flee, or shut down (depression)…and good luck fighting snowflakes.
List Out Things You Are Looking Forward To
Remember that big snow storm we had in March? I deemed it “The Great Snuggle Weekend of 2021” and wrote a list of all the things I planned to do: play on my neighborhood hill, bake banana bread, read a book, and snuggle with my pup. Even if you are more like me, a summer person, there’s so much to look forward to in winter, especially in Estes Park. I’ll list a few below in more detail, but for starters, I’m looking forward to hot drinks at my favorite coffee shops in town and being able to walk into a restaurant without an hour wait!
Getting outside
In the mental health world, recent years have seen a boom of research and articles on the effect of nature and mental health. In short, nature has been shown to reduce stress, calm our buzzing brains, and boost mood, not unlike an antidepressant. You don’t have to be a skier or snowboarder to enjoy outdoor activities either. In town, there are still plenty of opportunities to hike, but just a simple walk around your neighborhood or bird watching from your deck will have benefits. The key is to see the beauty that is around you. If you can hike, you can also probably snowshoe. If you don’t want to invest in a pair, you can rent a pair for a whopping $5 at Estes Park Mountain Shop. If that’s not your speed, Trout Haven and the YMCA offer ice skating. Then there’s my personal favorite: good ol’ sledding, great for kids of all ages! And that leads to my next tip…
Snuggling
Perhaps my favorite part of winter is that it offers constant opportunities for warm drinks, either made at home or stopping at a coffee shop on the way home from an outing. I’m already day dreaming of finding a cozy spot upstairs at Inkwell & Brew and gazing out their large windows. Then there’s getting to wear oversized sweaters to work and calling it “fashion”, wrapping myself under blankets (or my dog, who sometimes pretends she is a weighted blanket), and fuzzy socks. Truly, all these things are a form of self-soothing. Still, if you have a partner, child, or fur-kid around, research suggests two is better than one. When we cuddle with someone we care about, we release what are known as the “feel good hormones” (serotonin, oxytocin, dopamine).
Connecting with Others
This, I believe, is the biggest one. Save for last year, I considered winter to be my favorite time to be a local in Estes Park because I could truly get the sense of being part of a small, mountain community. While nothing can fully replace in-person interactions or hugs, virtual interfaces did help many of us stay in touch with loved ones and I would heavily encourage anyone to use it who for various reasons can’t see loved ones in person. On the red-nosed reindeer side, I think there’s more hope this year with more education on the virus and treatment. Regardless, we beautiful humans in town have adapted as best we could, and when I simply asked in a locals online forum what community gathering opportunities were available, I received much more feedback than I expected. From trivia at Rock Cut Brewing to locals night at Chippers Lane and Dine Around Town in March, there was something for all ages and interests. If necessary, I know we’ll adapt and change again. The key is that we maintain and strengthen our ties to one another through whatever means necessary. We thrive in community through compassion, cooperation, and connection.
Each inspires me and grants me glimpses wonders and wisdom.
But, dare I say, your beauty impresses and stuns me the most when you lie asleep.
With a blanket of white covering your curves, snow dancing down like sleep dust on all of your children. Hibernating, resting in preparation for our own blossoming.
As you exhale and the wind sweeps snowflakes over your frozen lakes and napping trees, it’s as if I can see all dreams. Past, present, and future. They sparkle and shine as they reflect the light from the sun and moon. Magic. Living and breaking in your dreams.
Sometimes I walk through your reveries, the wind kicking up and snow fluttering around me, gently kissing my cheeks.
Am I part of your dream? Or am I living your dream?
Mother Nature, I bid you a goodnight and the sweetest of dreams.
A Dog and Her Girl 