Leaning Into the Season: How to Embrace Rest in Winter

Do you feel a bit at odds with yourself during winter?

In a world that prioritizes productivity above all else, the natural rhythm of winter can feel at odds with our cultural expectations. While there are of course the serious concerns of seasonal affective disorder and managing the ways in which that impacts our daily wellness, but winter can often feel like a challenge because it’s asking us to remember that we’re beings of nature, not machines who can work at an endless pace. Winter demands we slow down and rest, and we struggle the most when we’re not able to engage with those needs.  

What if winter isn’t a time to push through, but an invitation to slow down? Even if we can’t get there fully, like bears hibernating until spring, can we meet our need for slowness and rest this season halfway? Can we learn to welcome a season of rest? Embracing rest during this season can be a radical act of self-care and healing.

What are the Barriers to Rest?

Our relationship to rest is shaped in part by the social and cultural norms we’ve internalized, by observing them in action in those around us. In a society reliant on white supremacist capitalist ideals, we’ve learned that we earn worth through productivity and accomplishment. The extension of that thought, is that instead of deserving rest because we exist and all beings need rest, we must earn it. We are praised for being busy, for hustling, and idealize those who  “push through” adversity, when in reality many folks cannot push through the obstacles in their path because they are systemic inequalities that only compound any obstacles encountered. 

The function of this is to keep us tired, lacking self esteem, not knowing how to take care of ourselves because it has never been a priority, and constantly feeling as though we need to prove our worthiness through running ourselves ragged. (If you’re interested in exploring the connection between capitalist culture and white supremacy, Tricia Hersey, founder of the Nap Ministry, explores just that in her book Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto.) 

This cultural relationship to rest is only one part, but often our personal and family histories only reinforce this toxic imbalance. Think of the environment you grew up in, did those in a caretaking role prioritize rest for themselves? Was rest viewed as a reward, or something that was nice when you were able to do it, but not a necessity? 

We’re often getting the same anti-rest messages on a micro level in our families and communities as we are from our culture at large. It may not be on purpose–while there is a larger function to keeping folks exhausted within capitalism, the lack of rest, or the inability to prioritize rest on a micro level is often due to the constraints of capitalism, where people are struggling to pay their bills, while working more than ever. 

Recognizing these patterns can help us understand why leaning into rest feels so difficult. Therapy can provide a supportive space to explore these histories and begin rewriting the narratives that no longer serve us.

The Challenges of a Slower Season

While it can be a calling to slow down and embrace rest, winter presents its own set of obstacles to navigate. The shorter, darker days make it hard to maintain energy and motivation through the day, while Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) can negatively impact mood, sleep, and daily health. Because of this–and our toxic relationship to rest–winter often becomes a season of struggle. We push ourselves to maintain the rhythms of our usual lives, even when our bodies,our minds, and our environment are all signaling the need to slow down.

But humans aren’t machines, and we can’t try to operate as though we are. We’re beings of nature, and just like everything in nature, we need seasons to rest. Nothing in nature grows or blooms all year long, so how could we?. This season of rest lays the foundation for growth and renewal in the spring. What if we allowed ourselves the same grace?

Unpacking the roots of our discomfort with rest is a powerful act of healing. 

Tips for Embracing Rest in Winter:

Give yourself grace if these practices don’t come naturally to you–we’re all unlearning and remaking our relationship with rest the best way we’re able to. Don’t give up on them if they’re hard. Give yourself permission to let go of the need to achieve:

1. Honor Your Natural Rhythms: Listen to your body and mind, and notice when they’re asking for rest. Try to take note of what your body’s patterns are. When do you have the most energy? Can you embrace that as your “productivity” time, and allow yourself moments of rest and ease in the times your energy wanes or struggles to show up? Can you shift your daily routine for a season to make room for these needs? 

2. Create Rest Rituals: Build small moments of rest into your day. They can be small things like lighting a candle, brewing a cup of tea, or spending a few minutes in quiet reflection. Try to keep a list of small ways you find rest through your days that you can turn to when you mind itself is too tired to come up with one. You can also use these small moments to signal to your body that it’s time to transition into resting mode.

3. Remember rest serves a function: We are socialized to see rest as a luxury, or even a waste of time. But without rest, we cannot fully show up in other areas of our lives. Rest allows our mind to wander, strengthening our creativity and sense of self, and allows us time to tend to our body, which has needs that can’t be met when we’re productive. Remember rest nourishes you and enables you to show up more fully in other areas of your life.

4. Seek Connection: You are not alone in your need for rest. Can you give a friend or loved one permission to rest with you, and in turn be granted permission from them to rest? Winter can feel isolating, and that isolation can make it hard to treat ourselves with the kindness we deserve. Relying on loved ones can be mutually beneficial as you start to rework your relationship with rest. 

Embrace the Gift of Winter

Winter invites us to pause, reflect, and restore. By leaning into this season and embracing rest, we can learn to honor the natural rhythms of our lives, and feel more assured in ourselves and our self worth. 

Are you struggling to keep up with the demands of everyday life during the winter? You’re not alone, and working with a therapist can help give you an outlet and find ways to cope in the winter months. Reach out to our office today for more information or to schedule an appointment with one of our clinicians. 

How Therapy Can Help Entrepreneurs Thrive Instead of Survive

Entrepreneurship can feel like a thrilling adventure, but let's be honest—it can also be incredibly lonely, high-pressure, and exhausting. 

If you're a business owner, you're likely juggling an endless to-do list, constantly making decisions, and facing uncertainty on a daily basis. It’s a lot of pressure to have the livelihoods of people rest on your shoulders! Starting a business is a ton of work, any way you slice it. It can be hard for non business owners to relate to what you’re going through, so working on your own business can be a lonely prospect, even when you’re passionate about it. While the excitement of building something from the ground up is undeniable, the weight of that responsibility can take a toll on your mental health. This is where therapy can be a game-changer. 

Working with a therapist doesn’t just help you survive as an entrepreneur—it helps you thrive. 

As an entrepreneur, therapy can make a real difference in your business and personal life, while meeting you right where you are. Here’s how:

Improve Work-Life Balance 

Entrepreneurs often blur the lines between work and life, especially when starting a business. It can seem like there aren’t enough hours in the day when you’re running your own business, and it can be hard to know when to stop when you still have so much to do. Pouring everything you have into your business can come at a steep cost to your health and your relationships. 

Therapy can help you step back, re-evaluate how you're balancing your time, and find ways to create more joy, meaning, and fulfillment across all areas of your life. A therapist helps you ensure that you're thriving not just professionally but also personally.

Take Creative Risks and Develop Business Instincts

Being an entrepreneur often requires taking risks, and that can be terrifying. Therapy offers a safe space to explore the fears and insecurities that might hold you back from reaching your full creative potential. Working with a therapist can help you learn more about your strengths and help you tune in to your sense of intuition, so you can trust yourself more and take those big leaps with confidence in your business. 

Freedom from Anxiety, Stress, and Depression

The weight of entrepreneurship can sometimes lead to anxiety, depression, or burnout. Stress is often a daily experience when you’re running your own business. Working with a therapist can give you the tools to navigate the mental health challenges that often accompany running a business, helping you gain freedom from the constant stress and pressure. When you're feeling overwhelmed, a therapist helps you ground yourself and find ways to ease the emotional burden, while giving you a safe space to discuss what’s going on. 

Find Your Voice as a Leader

You are the driving force behind your business, but do you feel confident in your leadership? Therapy can help you discover and develop your unique voice as a leader. Whether it's practice making tough decisions, learning how to build a team, and developing your management skills, therapy helps you refine your communication skills and grow into the kind of leader that inspires trust and connection. 

Connect to Your Core Values

Many entrepreneurs struggle with staying true to themselves amid the demands of running a business. Therapy allows you to understand and connect with your core values, which can help you find your "true north" so you can make decisions from a place of authenticity. Exploring what’s truly important to you can be a powerful guide in both your personal and professional life, because knowing what you value helps you make decisions that feel more aligned with who you are. 

Build a Community

Building a business can feel isolating, but therapy can help you find and connect with your people—whether that's your clients, a supportive community, or a business network. A therapist can also teach you how to communicate in a way that maximizes your impact as a business owner, helping you build relationships that truly matter in and out of work. 

Redefine Failure and Keep a Growth Mindset

All entrepreneurs face failure—it’s inevitable when you’re starting something new, both in big and small ways. Remember that failure doesn’t have to be something that stops you in your tracks. Through therapy, you can reframe how you view setbacks, seeing them as opportunities for growth instead of evidence of your limitations. You can learn from your past without punishing yourself for it, which can help you grow. Maintaining a growth mindset helps you stay adaptable and open to change, no matter what challenges come your way.

Enhance Emotional Intelligence and Leadership Skills

Running a business isn’t just about strategy; it’s about people, but we don’t always have the people skills we need to do things effectively. Developing emotional intelligence through therapy improves your ability to connect, influence, and lead others. You’ll learn how to communicate with empathy and foster an environment where both you and your team can thrive. Therapy can also help you practice emotional regulation, which is essential for effective leaders. 

Practice Stillness and Intuition

In the hustle of entrepreneurship, it’s easy to lose touch with yourself and what you need. Working with a therapist can help you to develop practices of stillness and reflection, allowing you to tune into your intuition. When you cultivate this practice, you’ll notice how it strengthens your decision-making and keeps you grounded, even when the chaos of running a business threatens to overwhelm you. Therapy offers you a chance to learn how to create kind, compassionate space for yourself — and others, which is essential for successful businesses. 

Celebrate Strengths 

As an entrepreneur, it's easy to focus on what’s not working or where you feel inadequate. Our brains naturally focus on the negative, and it takes real practice to notice and celebrate the positive. Therapy offers you a safe place to acknowledge and celebrate your successes and strengths, and build upon them. 

Get Support That Fits Your Schedule

One of the challenges of being a business owner is finding time for everything, including self-care. That’s why online therapy is a perfect fit for entrepreneurs. You can meet with your therapist from anywhere—whether you’re at home, at your office, or even traveling for work. Scheduling therapy sessions around your busy life gives you the flexibility you need, without sacrificing the mental health support that can help you thrive, in your personal life and in your business.

Achieve Alignment in Life and Business

Therapy helps you align your life and your business in a way that feels sustainable and fulfilling. You’ll gain the self-awareness, emotional intelligence, and leadership abilities you need to navigate challenges, seize opportunities, and create a business that supports the life you want to live.

Your journey as a business owner is unique—and you deserve the support that empowers you to keep moving forward. If you’re looking for a safe place to explore everything that comes with being an entrepreneur, working with a therapist can help. Our clinicians are accepting new clients, so reach out to us today to begin. 

Why Being Bored Is Good for Your Mental Health

How often do you allow yourself to be bored? 

Boredom has a reputation for being a negative state of mind, but boredom actually has benefits for your mental health, like improving creativity, curiosity, and self-control. 

Everyone’s brain is different, so boredom can be an individual experience. Some people’s brains (like certain folks with ADHD, for example) crave more stimulation and experiences, and so their threshold for what’s boring will be higher than someone whose brain works differently. What makes you feel bored won’t necessarily make your best friend or sister or coworker or neighbor feel bored. 

Boredom doesn’t mean mindlessly numbing out, like by scrolling through social media. Boredom, without distractions, can make you feel restless or distressed because it forces you to feel your feelings and be in the present moment, both of which are hard to do.  

Feeling bored can feel stressful for a few reasons:

Cultural pressures 

In our capitalist world, we often measure ourselves by our productivity levels, even if we don’t realize we’re doing it. It always seems like there’s something else to do and that taking a break is lazy or selfish. Remember, you don’t exist to be productive. You can do absolutely nothing and you’d still be a person worthy of love, care, and respect. Offer that love, care, and respect to yourself when you feel cultural pressure to always keep busy. 

Unused to being with yourself 

Being present with yourself can be hard, even painful. When we’re in the moment with no distractions, it can be hard to deal with the thoughts, feelings, and urges that come up. Sometimes we stay so busy that we don’t leave enough time to check in with ourselves and process our thoughts and feelings. It can feel scary to slow down enough to be with yourself, especially if it’s been a while. Learning how to be present with yourself takes time, so don’t be too hard on yourself when it’s tricky. 

We are afraid of being boring (vs being bored)

There’s a somewhat common phrase that says “only boring people get bored.” Beliefs like this contribute to people being afraid to be bored, even though boredom is actually good for you. 

Just because you have moments of boredom in your life doesn’t mean that you yourself are boring. It’s impossible for you to be entertained every single minute of every day without being disconnected from yourself and your needs. Figuring out how to take care of yourself requires introspection, or looking inward and feeling our feelings, even when they’re hard. Doing this doesn’t make you boring - it makes you human. 

Unsupportive coping behaviors

Some people fear or resent boredom because of the way they (or their loved ones) cope with  being bored. Coping skills are meant to help us through tough situations, but they don’t always support us long-term. Some people cope with boredom by acting in self destructive ways or by lashing out at others. Some people cope by using substances or engaging in risky behaviors. Not everyone copes this way, but the negative associations you might have with how people cope when they’re bored might contribute to the way you think about boredom. 

How is being bored good for your mental health? 

Even though being bored can bring up some complicated feelings, it’s actually beneficial to your mental health in a few ways. Being bored: 

Gives you time to process

Our brains do a lot in the background, even when we feel bored. When we give ourselves time to rest and do nothing, it gives our brains a chance to process and encode what’s going on. It takes a lot of cognitive power to go through day to day life, and giving your brain a break lets it play catch up. 

When you’re bored, this processing might be done in the background, where you don’t notice it, and sometimes you might process things more mindfully. Thinking through your day, reflecting on things you learned, and even daydreaming can help you process your thoughts and feelings if you give yourself the time to do it. 

Boosts creativity 

Have you ever tried to figure out a problem, and then after taking a long shower or a nap, the answer felt like it was right in front of you? Sometimes giving yourself some space to be bored and to do nothing frees up your brain to find new solutions or make connections that you couldn’t make with so much on your mind. 

Boredom when done right, with no distractions, gives your brain a chance to wander. You might notice new things that you’ve missed before, or reflect on what’s going on. Using your imagination in moments of boredom can help you think in ways you don't normally, which can help boost creativity. 

Allows curiosity

Our brains crave excitement and novelty, and when you’re bored you give yourself a chance to be curious. Curiosity and our search for excitement often lead to important breakthroughs on a personal level and on a cultural level. Being bored can help people think of new solutions to problems, or to take action on something important. Without boredom, we would have fewer opportunities to be curious and explore new things. 

Improves self-control

Learning how to be bored is a skill that many of us have forgotten about, or didn’t learn in the first place. We have screens with us almost constantly now, so it’s really easy to avoid boredom by finding somewhere to scroll. Letting yourself be bored gives you a chance to exercise a little self-control instead of opting for mindless distraction. 

Getting yourself comfortable with the uncomfortable feeling of boredom is an important skill.  There are lots of uncomfortable emotions out there that we can’t avoid. Learning how to regulate yourself emotionally during those moments is a skill that you can rely on in the future, no matter what comes your way. 

Are you looking for more ways to support your mental health? Working with a therapist is a great way to learn more about yourself and what your specific needs are so you can feel more aligned with who you are. Reach out to our office today to get started on your mental health journey.  

How to Unlink Your Self-Worth From Your Job Status

How to Unlink Your Self-Worth From Your Job Status

In the United States, we put a lot of focus on work and productivity. When we meet someone new, we often ask “So, what do you do?” right away. We define ourselves by our jobs, and so it can be damaging to our sense of self-worth when we’re not being productive.

However, in the last year, unemployment has soared due to the covid pandemic, and many people are still out of work. We often hear statistics on unemployment, but we often don’t see the reality behind those numbers. Some people are also feeling conflicted because as jobs open back up, some businesses are having a hard time hiring. After the last year, many people have decided they don’t want to work low paying service jobs where they’re treated terribly. Some people aren’t vaccinated and don’t feel safe going back to work. Some people have realized that the path they were on is no longer the right fit for them and are trying to figure out where to go next.

If you’ve been out of work for any length of time, you know that lots of feelings can come up unexpectedly about your job status. Even if you’re happy with your current situation, the expectations and judgement from other people can be exhausting. 

If you’ve spent most of your life tying your self-worth to your work, you’re certainly not alone. Here are some ideas for how to cope when you feel like your self-worth relies on your productivity or job status. 

Be nice to yourself 

This advice is true for so many things. Lots of us are hard on ourselves without really knowing or understanding why. It’s a habit that we’ve formed, and it can be hard to break. Try to talk to yourself kindly and with compassion. If you’re having a hard time with this, imagine you’re talking to your best friend. How would you talk to them about this? Would you tell them they’re worthless because they’re not working right now? Of course you wouldn’t. Channel that same compassion toward yourself. 

Ask yourself: Who profits when I feel this way? 

Insecurity makes the world go round. It’s how advertisers convince you to buy things. When you notice feelings like “I”m not good enough” or “I’m only worthy when I have regular work”, try to dig a little deeper. Where are these thoughts coming from? Are they true? What is the evidence of their truth? Is this sense of insecurity trying to nudge me toward buying something to soothe my discomfort? Reminding yourself that someone is profiting off of your distress can be a helpful way to remind yourself that there’s nothing wrong with the way you feel, but you don’t have to act on it. 

Use mantras or affirmations to remind yourself you are inherently worthy 

We are reminded from a young age that our work is our identity. We talk about what we want to be when we grow up and focus on careers, instead of on our values or our emotional state. It takes a lot of work to undo that programming. When you notice those old messages coming up, you can remind yourself that they’re not true. It takes practice, so repeating affirmations or mantras to yourself on a regular basis can help counteract the feelings that you’re not good enough. What you say to yourself matters.

Cultivate interests outside of things you can get paid for

Your worth has nothing to do with the value you create monetarily. While everyone deserves to be paid for their labor, there’s also freedom in finding joy in things you don’t get paid for. Not everything has to be monetized. You can start a hobby without turning it into a side hustle. It’s okay to spend time on things that don’t add to your bank statement. 

Participate in mutual aid groups

If you ever need the reminder that we are not alone, there are tons of organizers doing the work to bring together resources to support local folks. Even if you’re not able to donate monetarily right now to mutual aid, it can be a helpful reminder that there is help out there outside of our traditional systems of charity or government aid. We have the ability to help each other. We have this idea that if you’re not in the traditional job sphere, working 9-5, then you can’t get help, but that’s not true. Local organizations do the work every day to keep people from falling through the cracks. Can you donate time to an organization? Can you drop off some food at a local food shelf? Can you share local mutual aid requests with your network? All of these things help. 

If you are not working right now, for whatever reason, know that you are still a worthy, valuable person no matter what. That will always be true, regardless of your employment status. Your worth is not defined by your productivity or the money you can make. It’s a hard lesson to learn, because we spend so much of our lives hearing the opposite is true. Be gentle and try not to judge yourself for whatever feelings come up.

If you’re looking for more support as you deal with the fallout from the pandemic, including unemployment, our clinicians can help you during this tricky time.