Beating the Winter Blues

Daylight Savings Time is truly a curse for so many of us. Even though we don’t always realize it (until it’s gone, of course), we all need sunshine. It becomes extremely difficult to maintain our mood and overall well-being, consciously and unconsciously, when it feels like it’s always dark outside. Here are some tips to combat the lack of sunlight during the winter months.

To Buy:

• Lack of natural light exposure tends to be the thing that affects us most, even if we’re not realizing it. The sun, even in winter, is such an important part of how we feel and how we’re able to function. Here are a few products that provide some similar effects to that of natural sunlight.

  • From most inexpensive, to most expensive:

    • The Verilux HappyLight Luxe

    • The Circadian Optics Light Therapy Lamp

    • The Verilux HappyLight Halo

    • The Northern Light Technology Travelite

The recommendation is generally that these light fixtures should not be used within your direct line of sight — however, they have the benefit of not emitting any harmful UV rays! These types of high-intensity light fixtures have shown improvements for lots of people, and could be very beneficial in combatting typical downfalls of mood resulting from winter weather.

• Sunset lamps can also help with the lack of natural light exposure. These are often used more for aesthetics rather than function, but they can provide much-needed warm light, in a visual and emotional sense. A few inexpensive options here:

  • Bavcieu Sunset Lamp, with color-changing capabilities and a remote control

  • Not a sunset lamp, but rather a sunrise one: a clock that helps mimic the sunrise

  • ONEWISH, for a floor lamp with a softer golden hour-esque hue

To Do:

• Get outside with the sun. It can be so helpful for our bodily rhythm and well-being to get outside as one of the first activities of the morning. In the wintertime, it’s especially important to try and make this happen earlier in the day, since the sun sets so early. Getting fresh air and sunlight as part of your morning routine, if you can, makes a huge difference.

• Provide extra warmth, whether that be physical or emotional. Physically, your body might tense up due to constantly feeling just-ever-so-slightly too cold, and heating pads, glove warmers, leg warmers, slippers, and thick sweatshirts, even at home, can help provide that comforting warmth to help soothe. Emotionally, warmth can be particularly helpful when the seasonal blues start to hit hard. Reaching out to the people who make us feel warm inside becomes important when it’s easy to isolate and everyone tends to get stuck at home.