How Can I Boost My Mood in Winter?
By Nancy Pletcher, MSN, PMHNP-BC
Most of us have a favorite season, which is usually the one that keeps us in a good mood. It’s easier to feel motivated and to take good care of ourselves. We could also be more inclined to see friends and engage in our hobbies. Our energy feels naturally better, and a big part of this has to do with spending time in good weather. Natural light helps regulate our body’s internal clock, or our circadian rhythm.
Our circadian rhythm involves natural biological processes that regulate our sleep-wake cycle. It involves hormone release and timing, body temperature, digestion, and sleep. Factors that play a role in our circadian rhythm include:
Sleep habits
Diet and eating patterns
Level of physical activity
Screen time
Travel
Daily routines and habits
Sunlight
Experts in mood disorders see our alignment with the 24-hour cycle of day and night as particularly important. Mood disorders include bipolar disorders, depressive disorders, and seasonal affective disorders, among others. As clinicians treating these conditions, it can be useful to consider them as health matters related to energy balance instead of emotion. Even for those of us who don’t have mood disorders, energy balance, alignment with nature’s patterns, and mood regulation are important factors in our well-being.
The reason behavioral therapies for mood focus more on energy than emotions is because energy is easier to change than emotion. Emotional shifts are spontaneous, inevitable, and perhaps most importantly, transient. Staying calm is a testament to our tolerance of our emotions rather than the absence of them. Managing our energy can help us stay composed despite our ongoing emotional shifts.
As we enter the colder and darker season, it’s important to consider how we can stay motivated and support our energy and well-being despite the gloom of winter. We can do this simply by paying attention to how well our daily activities sync up with the patterns of day and night.
Where to Begin
There is a lot we can do with lifestyle alone to combat the effects of changing seasons on our mood and energy. A good starting point for a new routine starts with data collection. Many clients wonder why they don’t feel great but when I ask them to take me through a day in their life, the answer is often something like this:
“I wake up at 7:45, brush my teeth, make a cup of coffee and sit down at my computer to work at 8. I often don’t eat breakfast and sometimes don’t remember to, or have time to eat until the afternoon, at which point I may have some chips between meetings. I finish work by 6 and by then I am starving. I usually order takeout, scroll on Instagram for a while, shower, and go to bed while scrolling some more.”
No one has ever told me they’re thriving and that they attribute it to all the scrolling they’ve been doing. This, in addition to all the spontaneous notifications we must sift through on various devices to keep up with our professional and personal lives is very taxing on our brains. The screens themselves throw off our sleep-wake cues, and the constant content-switching costs our brains a lot of energy. In short, scrolling can keep us awake and make us tired.
Once clients start documenting these patterns, it becomes clear that a sense of well-being can’t be expected if their lives lack the luster that movement, social engagement, and basic lifestyle changes can give us. Lifestyle changes can include regular movement, energy-supporting eating habits, getting sufficient sleep, and having little to no substance use.
When You Need Extra Support
As psychiatric nurse practitioners, we are qualified to treat mood disorders and other mental health conditions. Sometimes, a combination of approaches, like talk therapy and medication, can provide the best support when it comes to lifestyle changes. If you’re feeling like you could use a bit more support as the seasons shift, we’re just a few clicks away!