GET INSPIRED BY WINTER

It’s easy to love the warmer months—bright sunshine to greet you every morning, long evenings spent outdoors—but winter comes with its own special advantages. Embrace them! Recognizing the gifts of this season can help you turn what may be a time you dread into your most empowering months of the whole year.

TAKE ADVANTAGE OF TIME INDOORS

You may feel that you’re “stuck” inside in the winter more than other times of year, but quiet evenings at home can be relished for the free time they provide you. Use it to pick up a hobby you’ve let fall to the wayside, or try something new, like finally putting those Italian language DVDs to good use. Tapping into your creative side is a good place to start: Channel your love of nature into writing a blog, try your hand at watercolors, or experiment with new recipes.

RETHINK OUTDOOR EXERCISE 

Slide into ski boots, strap on a pair of snowshoes, or lace up the ice skates. Winter provides unique opportunities to reinvigorate a stale exercise routine. Not only does mixing things up help prevent boredom and burn out, it works muscles you may be neglecting, if you stick with the same workout all year. Exercising in the snow, in particular, adds extra resistance that can help you tone.

APPRECIATE THE WINTER LANDSCAPE

Snow and ice are cold and wet, but they can also make for gorgeous, peaceful landscapes. Among those gray skies and white hills are evergreens that shout vitality with their strong hues, icicles that glisten like glitter from rooftops, and animals snuggling close to stay warm. The endurance and beauty of nature, even (and perhaps especially) in these harsher winter months, is hard to deny—when you stop and soak it in.

SLEEP MORE SOUNDLY

Winter’s surplus of darkness offers a great opportunity to improve an erratic sleep schedule. Take steps to create an ideal sleeping environment—which is cool, quiet, and dark—and head to bed and wake up at the same time each day (even on weekends). You may also want to take up a relaxing nighttime ritual, like taking a bath, to help you drift off.

ENJOY MOMENTS OF INTROSPECTION

Wintertime may bring fewer demands for your attention. Use this freedom to look within, explore your spiritual connections and cultivate a practice such as meditation, which can help establish more calm in your life