A winter re-set: simple shifts to feel balanced and energised again
What if winter could be your season of renewal instead of burnout?
Three simple strategies to create more energy, and nourish your roots as the seasons cool
A lot of women I know dread winter.
The parade of colds and viruses through the family. The gradual increase in social activities as we get closer to the festive season, and associated additions to the mental load! The colder, damper weather and dark mornings and evenings.
It has been a strange year. A long hot summer. War, conflict, flags, polarisation, misinformation as a backdrop to the usual fun, busy-ness, ups and downs of caring for others and ourselves.
I am hearing stories of dread, of gloom, of guilt, in many women I speak to. Wanting more, not wanting to play small, and yet not sure where to find the energy to create an impact on the world.
What if we could focus on shoring up our roots, and letting go of what we don’t need so that we have the energy to flourish?
1. Nourishing ourselves with attention
There’s so much information ‘out there’ we can feel so confused about what we should and shouldn’t be eating for our health and hormones.
But there’s a real gift in just slowing down.
Eating slowly, paying attention, chewing, savouring and choosing.
Eating slowly and by paying attention actually helps us get more nourishment out of our food. By chewing it we support our gut as it doesn’t have to work so hard to break it down further and take out the nutrition. By slowing down we notice when we’ve had enough, and we allow ourselves to savour what we’ve eaten.
We also notice whether we really like that food, whether our body likes it or not, we might notice whether it energises us, or makes us feel sluggish. That can help us make different choices.
For example, I love a slaw and a salad in the summer to add to my lunch, but somehow these feel different in the autumn and winter. I’ll make soups or roasted veg instead to add nourishment in the middle of the day.
If the day is dry I like to wrap up warm and take my soup outside to savour it, and enjoy a dose of daylight and winter skies.
I would also add in some simple strategies - plenty of veg and fruit for fibre and vitamins, planning meals to encourage balance of nutrition across the week, and staying well hydrated.
2. Resting for more energy
Rest can be hard when life feels busy and obligations are never-ending but it’s an incredible tool for our mental and physical wellbeing. An athlete knows they need to rest in order to be at peak fitness. A tree knows it has to slow down growth in the Winter in order to thrive in the Spring.
There are lessons on the power of rest all around us, if we’re open to it.
And yet this is a lesson I have to learn, repeatedly. It’s a lesson my busy high-achieving clients struggle with too.
But when we find that space to calm our over-stimulated nervous systems, to restore ourselves after a busy week, it can create more energy, more resilience.
Lean into the natural inclination to slow down in the winter. Allow weekends to have space for nothing. Notice when you’re feeling run down, or have that sore-throat, aching head foretelling of a cold. AND rest before it hits you.
Responding to high pressure work, or life events is much easier from rest. In our midlife transition points we can feel like all parts of our life are on fire.
Rest doesn’t have to mean long afternoon naps, meditation or endless doing-nothing time.
It can be as simple as eating a meal undistracted by your phone, conversation, or a laptop. It could be a 10 minute walk around the block between meetings. It could be a cup of tea while watching the trees or clouds in the sky. It could be blocking your diary to make sure you use a transition moment (work to home, home to work, travel to arrival) as a moment to take a deep breath and a micro rest.
It can also be saying ‘no’ to the things that deplete your energy. It can be leaving a social gathering early. It can be turning your phone off by 9pm to help you wind down before bed.
I worked with a client a few years ago who introduced a restful morning moment to sit and sip her coffee, and she found that from this calm moment, it made supporting her family to leave the house much less stressful, and helped her to find ways to add more calm moments in her working day.
I’ve got some other ideas for rest in my blog post here https://www.lesleywaldron.co.uk/blog/4-essential-ways-to-rest-for-perimenopause-wellbeing
3. Movement and daylight to help with flow and sleep
Spending time outside and moving my body are my favourite ways to maintain my energy during the day.
It can be harder to fit in exercise when the days are shorter and the weather is colder. And we can also carry a lot of guilt about not doing it.
I think we need a different strategy for movement and exercise in the cooler months.
When getting out to the gym or a class can feel harder (although you know you ALWAYS feel better after!) and an early morning run or walk doesn’t feel as accessible when the streetlights are on or the paths are too dark to see properly.
I find movement is magic for creating focus and energy in the winter. If you’re working from home it can help keep you warm. If you’re struggling with afternoon focus it can get the blood flowing to your brain and generate momentum.
If you combine movement with time outside it can also help send your brain the right signals for your sleep-wake cycle in a time of year when those get overridden by overhead electric light.
Exercise comes with a lot of ‘should’s and often with a perception that it has to be punishing to do any good.
But what I’ve found in the 11 years I’ve been supporting women to create positive and lasting habits of exercise, is to start with what feels easy, feels good, and feels like it’s making a difference, and to build on a solid foundation.
An example of a client who felt like she ‘should’ be doing strength training 3 times a week but had unused gym memberships as well as home equipment gathering dust and strong stories that exercise had to be exhausting to be worth it.
We started tracking movement, instead of exercise, so she could count a weekend of moving furniture around, her daily dog walks, the swim at a spa day into a weekly movement target.
And then she added in some one to one pilates sessions to help her gain the confidence to attend a class. And then she joined a small gym where the staff were friendly and supportive and where there was a pool so she could swim if she was feeling depleted and unsure about strength training. With that confidence came more movement, and the connection with the feel-good feedback of getting stronger and fitter. Even the weights at home get dusted off and used!
I had another client really struggling with afternoon energy slumps. She explored changes to her nutrition but also a lunchtime walk when she was in the office all day. It made a huge difference, even on rainy days! Not only to her energy but also to her mood, especially when there was a big deadline coming.
I wonder if there’s anything in that above list which has resonated, has made you think ‘maybe I coud try that’. If it has, see how small and easy you can make it and try and play with it today, or tomorrow. Put a reminder in your diary or a note on your fridge!
Or, if you’d like to create your own winter reset, let’s chat about how I could make that happen.
Why not a quick call and find out if I’m the right person to guide you into a wildly well midlife.