Wintering Well: From Seasonal Depression to Spiritual Renewal

Here on the Front Range, winter hasn’t felt so wintery this year. The sun has been out, we’ve barely seen a lick of snow, and there’s been an uncomfortable number of days of t-shirt weather this month. After thirteen years in the Denver area, I’ve gotten used to mild winters. But the deep winters of Northern Idaho are still etched like ice sculptures in my memory.

I attended college at the University of Idaho. Choir rehearsal started at 3:30pm; in the winter, the sun would already be hanging low and reddening in the sky as I crossed the Admin lawn on my way to the Lionel Hampton School of Music. By the time choir let out at 4:30pm, it would already be twilight. Once the first snow fell in Idaho, that base layer of dirty ice wouldn’t melt until spring. The town was small enough that I never needed a car, and didn’t have one until my senior year. I would skate to school on ice-covered sidewalks, sliding my boots over rough ice with my toes pointed out to keep from falling. My hair—long back then—would freeze in clumps of curls, splayed out around the rim of my hood from the wind; I had to make sure I made it to campus with enough time to thaw my hair in the bathroom before class. One year, I lived in a house so tiny that three of us slept across two twin beds pushed together (at least rent was only $143 per month!). It may have been cramped, but this arrangement helped us stay warm on nights when ice formed on the insides of the windows.

This year more than years past, I have been noticing the impact of winter on our bodies.

Around mid-November, I started hearing two-thirds of my caseload describe a significant increase in depressive symptoms. I began asking clients, “Did this by any chance start about twelve days ago?” And when they asked, “How did you know?” I would remind them that, twelve days ago, we’d turned our clocks back and lost an hour of daylight.

Seasonal depression feels like a glum mood, low energy, feelings of apathy toward work and life and everything on your to-do lists, a desire to just curl up in bed with the covers over your head and not come out until spring. Everything just feels too hard. You live on the brink of tears. It’s bleak weather of the soul. Most people who come to me with seasonal depression express the feeling that there is something wrong with them, that they just can’t cope like they should, that they’re broken somehow. But this year, for the first time, I’ve started viewing seasonal depression differently.

What if seasonal depression isn’t a disease? What if seasonal depression is simply the feeling you get when your body’s natural rhythms come into conflict with our fast-paced, high-demand culture that is built on a foundation of body-denial? Think about it. We tell ourselves not to eat when we’re hungry, because we don’t want to gain weight. We force ourselves to go to the gym when we’re tired, because we don’t want to be quitters. We work when we’re sick. We spend money on beauty products to fend off natural aging. We set our alarms and get up earlier than our bodies want to, and then we pour coffee down the hatch to get ourselves going. Our entire culture is hell-bent on denying that we have bodies, that our bodies have needs, and that leaving those needs unmet always has consequences. 

No matter how much caffeine or artificial light you use, it will never be enough to overcome the sheer bodyness of your body.

Your body’s rhythms are based on tens of thousands of years of precedent. Up until extremely recently in history, humans didn’t have technology that allowed them to ignore the seasons—air conditioning that lets us hide from the heat of August, or controlled atmosphere storage that gives us fresh grapes in January. Back in the day, humans had no choice but to bow before winter. Less light meant fewer work hours. Sleeping more conserved energy and allowed food stores to last longer. Winter altered circadian rhythms; life slowed down, and for our ancestors, who lived (for 300,000 years) by hunting and gathering or (in the most recent 10,000 years) by agriculture, it was a season that allowed them to rest. There wasn’t much else to do, and there was no point in fighting it; nature always wins. So they slept, they told stories to pass the time, and they waited for spring.

Part of wintering well is befriending your body, learning to view your winter instincts with compassion and understanding. You’re gobbling up sweets because your body’s ancient wisdom is to accumulate more fat to keep you warm and sustain you when rations begin to thin. You want to stay in bed because the dark is telling your body it’s time to hibernate. You feel down because you’re constantly having to deny your body what it’s begging you for. We only call it “seasonal depression” because it gets in the way of 40-hour work weeks and busy holiday schedules. The problem is not your body. The problem is not you. The problem is that we have forgotten how to do winter as it was meant to be done.

My acupuncturist gave out a little Christmas gift--a set of cards for the five seasons (spring, summer, autumn, fall, and winter) and the corresponding five elements (wood, fire, earth, metal, and water) of Wuxing, Chinese philosophy. It was a beautiful reminder of the yearly cycle for which our bodies and our hearts were built. The water card offers this winter wisdom: “The water of winter invites you inward—toward rest, reflection, and the wisdom that emerges from stillness. Honoring the nature of this season restores balance and prepares you for the year ahead.” The words bring to mind the quietness of falling snow, the stillness of a frozen pond, the way trees pull their life-force inward and downward, draining the sap to their roots as they enter dormancy. Winter is sleep. Winter is repose.

Our lives are full of winter seasons—not just the winter that comes around every year, but also wintry seasons of the soul.

In a winter of the soul, life is cold and dormant, and something new is germinating in the dark recesses of your spirit. Winter seasons are not known for being fun; even if you love winter sports, you can’t escape the drudgery of scraping your car in the morning, the playgrounds stand empty, and travel can be dicey. When you’re wintering, it’s often hard—there’s hunger, loneliness, a gnawing emptiness, a fear that it will never end. I think of my wintering ancestors, huddled in their skins and blankets, eyeing their dwindling supplies; without a calendar or a meteorologist on the morning news, they would not have known how long winter was going to last. Spring wasn’t a certain day in March. Spring was whenever the snow melted and the rivers ran and the trees began to bud. Some winters were short, and others were devastatingly long. Winter required blind faith and tenacious hope.

So it is with winters of the soul. You close in on yourself and you wait, wondering if the end will ever come, wondering what pieces of you will die in the cold. Nothing seems to be happening; your heart is frozen over, your life is at a standstill, and it can all feel so pointless. Hope is hard to hang onto. But if you’re wintering right now, remember this: spring always comes. There has never, in the history of the world, been a year when spring didn’t happen.

You will emerge from winter.

I’ve just emerged from my own winter season, months of a disabling chronic illness flare that forced me into stillness and waiting. In the midst of it, I had no idea how long it would last. It stretched my resources and challenged my faith. The days felt endless, lying on the couch, watching my daughter play and waiting for my body to recover. Life felt frozen; nothing happened—no work, no dancing, no socializing, no big events. Just day after day of rest and reflection. At times, I was able to sink into the stillness, embrace the helplessness. But a lot of the time, I was impatient, frustrated, stressed out, and sad.

And yet this wintering experience was also a powerful, transformative season for me. There was so much going on deep in the soil of my heart, so much preparation, so much softening and opening. And now, as my body has recovered and I’ve begun to leave winter behind me, I am awestruck by all that’s starting to blossom, by the promise of an abundant, fruitful summer season to come when the quiet growth that began in my harsh winter ripens and matures. I’ve realigned my priorities. I’ve deepened my spiritual practices. I’ve signed up for an advanced training program in Somatic Experiencing®. I’ve crafted a new vision for my future, both personally and professionally. My dreams are wild, vivid, potent, an internal mythology of symbols and promises; I write them down most mornings, so I have a record to look back on when they come true. Some of them already have.

My favorite Christmas carol is O Come, O Come Emmanuel. While most Christmas carols are bright and cheerful, full of angels singing and joy to the world, O Come, O Come Emmanuel is a haunting melody in a minor key, a somber Gregorian chant, full of pain and longing. It speaks of exile, mourning, and loneliness, of tyranny and the grave, of gloomy clouds, death’s dark shadows, paths of misery, and sad divisions among the nations. It’s a song that aches, that throbs with human suffering. But it’s a prophetic song, a wild wail of relentless hope. Emmanuel is coming. God is with us. Rejoice. Rejoice. Even in your pain. Even in the dark. Through this long, long winter, hold onto the promise. Emmanuel (“God with us”) shall come to thee, O Israel (“one who struggles”).

So how do we winter well? I think what I’d offer you, for a literal winter or a winter of the soul, is mostly the same.

Here are some practices I’ve developed for wintering well—practices I’ve honed, as well as practices I’m still learning to use:

1. Listen to the rhythms of your body.

Don’t punish your body for being a body. Eat when you’re hungry. Sleep when you’re sleepy. Rest when you’re tired. Drink lots of water. Breathe fresh air before noon, at least for a few minutes. Fill the dark evenings with candlelight instead of screens. Do one thing at a time: if you are eating, just eat, and let the smells, tastes, and textures fill your awareness; if you are watching a movie, just watch a movie, and set down your phone so you can fully enjoy the story hundreds of people created for you.

2. Engage in reflection and gratitude.

Use the quietness and inward-turning nature of winter seasons to your advantage. If you enjoy journaling, this will come easily to you. If you hate writing, create some art, record some voice memos of your thoughts, or have long conversations with close friends.

Reflection: A lot has happened in your life leading up to this winter season. It’s time to process it, digest it slowly, suck all the nutrients and lessons out of it like marrow from a bone. Experience does not become wisdom on its own. Unexamined experience is like unchewed food; it doesn’t nourish you, and even creates some pain. But reflection feeds your soul well, and shows you the path forward.

Gratitude: It’s easy to spend the majority of our reflection time mulling over the hard things, the hurts and harms we’ve suffered, and the anger, grief, bitterness, or fear we’re holding. You must be intentional to make room for gratitude, to hold the good things in your mind for fifteen seconds, long enough to leave a neurological imprint and remind your body that life is also beautiful.

3. Write down your dreams (both literal and figurative).

This has been one of the most transformative practices of my year. In writing down my dreams every morning (usually just a few sentences in my phone, until I have a chance to transcribe them in more detail), I’ve created a detailed written record of what’s going on in my heart that might otherwise have escaped my awareness. I’ve become so much closer to myself, and had a chance to marvel at both the creativity of my unconscious and the vitality of my spirit.

If you’re not much of a night-dreamer, write down your daydreams. We all have them—wishes for more money, a happier marriage, a more fulfilling career. Write them down. And, in the writing, see if you can get a glimpse of what’s beneath the daydream. I’d guess that what you’re really longing for is a more beautiful world. Holding your dreams close and letting them stir your longing is crucial; without them, you won’t have the drive to do the work it takes to create a more beautiful world.

4. Since we don’t have the luxury of wintering as we ought, move your body to stay warm.

While it would be nice to have a yearly season of retreat and hibernation built into our lives, the reality is, most of us have to go to work, pick up the kids from school, make dinner, buy presents, attend end-of-semester plays and concerts, and keep up with the busy pace of life. Even in my own recent winter season of illness, I still had to feed my kiddo, do my laundry, and pay my bills. Life no longer pauses for us. So we need more coping skills.

Move your body every day—but if you’re wintering, it’s important that your movement is joyful. Some people get joy out of going to the gym and lifting weights or pounding on a treadmill. But many of us don’t. If the gym isn’t your thing (and this ties back to listening to your body), find a more enjoyable way to move. Have a dance party in your kitchen as you cook dinner. Go for a walk. Try a class to learn a new kind of movement—yoga, judo, Zumba, pole-dancing, whatever you want. If you struggle with seasonal depression, this is absolutely critical; you are prone to emotional cold, and you need to move to generate heat.

5. Be with the people you love.

Nothing makes winter more bearable than snuggling under a blanket with someone you love. Hold your loved ones close. Text them to check in on them, or call them for a long chat. Have people over for dinner. Go to church, mosque, or temple. Give thirty-second hugs, even if it makes you want to squirm a little. Dwell in community, and generate abundance among you.

6. Conserve your resources—but make sure you’re using them.

Money, time, energy, relationships—these are all important resources (particularly that last one). Hopefully, you’ve had a chance to store them up during seasons of plenty, so you have enough to get you through your winter. If not, use the leanness of this winter as a reminder to be more intentional about preparing for the next one. Invest your resources so they multiply—but then, don’t be afraid to use them when it’s time. Spend what’s in the emergency fund. Eat the meals in the freezer. Call on your friends for help. That’s what they’re there for.

In the olden days, farmers had to be careful at the juncture between winter and spring. If you plant your crops too early, before winter has truly ended, you won’t get much of a harvest. If you’re in a season of winter, don’t rush to leave it. It’s okay to be here for a while. If you’re sitting with heavy decisions, just wait; most things can wait a little. Spring is hard to miss. If you’re watching for a glimpse of green, or listening for the first sound of running water when the ice inside you melts, you’ll know when you’re ready.

7. And finally, never stop hoping.

In some ways, the whole of 2025 has felt like a winter season for our entire nation: the horror, the grieving, the waiting. I’m sure most of us have experienced twinges of economic scarcity (or fear of scarcity to come). At times, I’ve felt a scarcity of kindness, of empathy, of humanity—certainly, a scarcity of justice. Minority populations, including immigrants and the transgender community, have experienced violation after violation, the demons of winter howling at their doors. Some days, I feel like we’re hunched in an uninsulated hut, enclosed in winter’s cruel fist; wind is coming through the shutters, snow is piling up at the door, and I’m not sure how much more we can all take.

This year has been a lesson in hope for me. Hope is not for the faint of heart. Hope takes tremendous, audacious courage. Hope can look like utter foolishness. Sometimes, my hope feels bony, frail, and half-starved. But I refuse to stop believing in spring.

Go out into the storm and bring food to your neighbors. Share blankets. Throw a few more logs on the fire and sing into the darkness together. And keep your seeds in store. The time will come to plant them.