SHARE THIS SHOW:
RELATED CONVERSATIONS:
RECENTLY ON TOL:
The TOL Blog
TAGS:
Winter Depression
It's the time of year when it is impossible to escape the expectation of happiness and joy. Carolers sing It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year. Store clerks, gas attendants, strangers and friends say "Happy Holidays!" But are they happy? Is it the most wonderful time of the year? For many people it is actually the most difficult time of the year — a time when loneliness, failure and sadness are much more prevalent than joy.
A slow economy and a continuing high rate of unemployment leave some people unable to buy gifts and keep up with the commercial expectations of the season. Parents battle how to fulfill their children's desires while balancing their checkbook. Then there are the people for whom loss — by death or divorce or separation of any sort — has taken over their year. For them, grief can trump cheer, no matter how much they do to ignore the empty seat at the table.
For many of these people their depression is closely aligned with their current personal situation. But there are also the many people who routinely suffer from depression during the fall and winter months — a condition commonly know as SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder). Without proper treatment, struggling with feeling happy during the holidays can be a lifelong problem for many of these people.
According to the Mayo Clinic, some ways to combat depression during the holidays include acknowledging your feelings, planning ahead, learning to say no, and taking a breather. But for some people none of these tools will be enough.
Depression — whether mild or major, whether caused by the lack of light, or the loss of a person — sometimes goes unnoticed and even more often goes untreated. People suffer in silence, just hoping for a brighter day. Is that you?
Today we really want to know — how are you? If you're sad, what are you doing to combat your blues?
Tagged as: medicine · mental health
Photo credit: Ani-Bee / Creative Commons
-
Read Stanislaw Lem's Altruizine before you talk about putting Prozac in the water, Jacob. Perhaps we should remove chemicals from our lives, not add them. Your snarcasm is improving my day. Thank you.
-
Snarcasm.
That's a new one and I like it.
-
Ah, jacob, you're the genius of thinking "inside the box"!
Um, if I may be so bold, what if we actually researched the causes of the mental problems and tried to prevent them?
Oh, never mind. That would be "outside the box".
Doh!
If 40% of any population needs drugs to adjust to the current society, it seems to me that we ought to take a really hard look at why that is the case.
Maybe, just maybe, our current society is the problem, and not The People.
-
Tom D,
Sometimes we think we are out-of-the-box thinkers.
But the camera pans back, and reveals we are just a nut that fell out of the nutcase. Ayyup, its medication time.
That neighbor that 9 out of 10 residents think is crazy...surprise, he is crazy.
Mental Illness, like Love, is All Around Us.
-
Wow, the percentage (40%) you give is really frightening... If the young take that much medication at their age, I wonder how much prozac-like drugs they'll take when they become old !
Sylvie - Poker en ligne
-
This comment has been removed by the TOL staff.
-
Today we really want to know — how are you? Are you sad this season? Why? What are you doing to combat your blues?
How am I? I'm pissed! I'm pretty damn disgusted with the whole mess!How about it, Politicians? How about helping the middle class become re-employed? Maybe then we can have HAPPY HOLIDAYS, too! How about helping more than just the wealthy to have a Happy Holiday?!? How about doing something about the U-6 Unemployed, you know, the number that includes those of us who are not drawing unemployment, who are under-employed or unemployed and growing more discouraged by the hour? How about it, Salem? How about it Washington, DC?
I'm tempted to just say "SCREW CHRISTMAS AND ALL THE HORSE HOCKEY THAT GOES WITH IT!" But I'm sure some Pollyanna will try to convince me to cheer up. Pretty damn hard to cheer up when one has been unemployed and looking without any luck for 32 months. Pretty damn hard to be cheerful when the whole holiday season reminds one of the death of a loved one! (Especially one's mother.)
.
You know what?
SCREW CHRISTMAS AND ALL THE HORSE HOCKEY THAT GOES WITH IT!
-
Boy, you sure must have cracked one off, Penny, to get it removed!
-
Way to go Penny!
I read your original message and thought, "Uh oh, that one's going to get the hook." I admire your succinct expression of writing pretty much what I wanted to say. Too bad we can't get away with angry, expletive-laced tirades, but that's okay. We'll just be more creative. So be it. I'll say Happy Holidays to inspire your ire. Heh heh heh.
-
@Tom: Yeah...just replace a couple of words with their "sailor" equivalents and you'll see what caused my original comment to attract the editor's blue pencil!
@trurl9: Ha ha ha...I know you're just trying to give me a bad time trurl and don't intend it in a mean way.
-
I've long stopped participating in pseudo rituals of the Thanksgiving through New Years stretch. Got too stressed out and irritated by forcing myself to go through the motions concealed by my fake smile.
I stopped stressing and feeling guilty about not acquiring gifts for everyone, especially those I don't care for. I feel better.
I'm giving up feeling guilty for myriad shortcomings or things gone wrong yesterday. I feel better yet.
Compassion, sensitivity, caring - the better angels of human nature - require lifelong commitment. Enlightenment requires humans to understand and accept the causes of suffering they experience and create. Once suffering is understood, negative behavior can be improved.
I love Oregon's Winter weather. It's too mild and doesn't rain enough but oh well. It's not gloomy enough. I prefer Transylvania funk. Moss and lichens growing off vampire fangs if you'll allow. I want wolves howling in the fog of Macleay Park and hair standing on end because I think I see things shuffling in shadows. I want those who complain about Oregon's weather to leave. Do yourselves a favor and make more room and silence for those of us who like it here.
Why let weather befoul your mood? You control how you feel and behave if you're emotionally and spiritually healthy.
What's there to be glum about? You're alive! Count your blessings. Every day people are randomly killed by the actions of blind super powers and religious extremists of all persuasions. How did we get here? Is this where we want to be? When will we exchange negative behavior for positive?
Distance yourself from twitchy, needy, damaged humans who aren't striving to overcome their ennui. You can't avoid negativity entirely but it is possible to wear a body condom of compassion and patience that provides a modicum of protection from the season's human-perpetuated blahs.
Humans going through motions are fearful that they'll no longer belong to the herd because they choose a different path than the accepted norm. Jump off the rat wheel. There's plenty of room here in Clarityville, but be warned, the weather in Clarityville is the same as it is in Oregon.
Why do things for humans you don't give a crap about and vice versa? Why go to a job you hate? Life is too short to suffer 24/7/365 isn't it? You think humans behaving negatively are going to change if you keep working on them? Some will improve and others will not. Invest your time in real friendships and let the rest go. Know the difference between friendship and acquaintances.
Hang with those whose opinions you respect and remove yourself from those who've become toxic super sites.
There are many excellent ways to eliminate seasonal blahs and blues. Get off your ass and motivate yourself. Self help books have not been helpful. Either fix yourself, let friends help fix you, or remain broken. And so it goes....
-
Overheard in a bookstore (which shall remain un-named):
Customer: Where are the self-help books?
Bookseller, snarkily: If I told you, it would defeat the purpose.
-
Good snark, Penny!
-
Anna Wintour is depressed?
-
Peggy From Eugene reminds me that I'm not fed up with the holidays. I'm fed up with the commercialism, consumerism and pretense painted over a period that was traditionally thoughtful, meditative, quiet, and at times, even joyful. More gadgets and more money won't fix this.
Guide me Landru, I am of the body. Peace and serenity is mine. May it also be yours.
-
Ahem, excuse me, trurl9, that's Penny From Eugene.
-
"Guide me Landru,..." -- trurl9 — Tue Dec. 14th 12:57p.m.
Is this supposed to be a quote from Star Trek: TOS Episode "Return of the Archons?" Because other than Louisiana politicians Mitch and Mary Landrieu, that it the only Landru I know of.
-
Penny Lane,
Peggy Sue from Eugene, I was hearing the lyrics of that song perhaps. A thousand apologies for my fat-fingered typing.
Yes, Return of the Archons from Star Trek. This episode reminds me of tea baggers who've crowded around Glenn Beck's Splenda-laced Kool-Aid bowl too long. The followers have lost their ability and will to think clearly for themselves.
Embittered and angry souls who seek retribution against those who are not of The Body. These sheep allow the computer, Palin, to tell them what and how to think. Somatized masses easy to lead to salvation via the meat grinder of The Machine....
Insert synthesizers from Pink Floyd's' Welcome to the Machine here.
Okay, enough mangled metaphors through the sausage grinder of my mind for this apology.
-
No worries, trurl, I was just trying to joke back, despite my dislike for the holiday/winter season.
(By the way...are you impressed that I remember that from a show that was on so long ago, even though it lives eternally in syndicated re-runs?)
-
Penny,
Do you think you may be clinically depressed? Anger and disgust can be emotions masking a depression. 40% of women experience depression in their lifetime, and it is a terrible affliction. Some say worse than the diagnosis of cancer.
I am symmpathetic to your unemployment situation, but there are millions of unemployed in this Recession. Millions worse off with small children dependents, foreclosed homes, a suddenly downsized life, or homeless. But Depression does not always accompany poverty. And there are others with a job, house, car and relationship who are intensely unhappy as well. Depression makes any bad situation a whole lot worse.
Our life circumstances are given to us. What we do with it is our character. I think you can be helped with modern medical treatment.
40% of the population has a diagnosable mental illness at some time in their life, whether depression, drug or alcohol addiction, anxiety disorder, personality disorders, obscessive-compulsive, paranoia, schizophrenia, dementia or just plain psychosis. And more than half of them remain untreated and undiagnosed. And they are the zing that make law enforcement and ER work 'fun' or at least unpredictable.
It is not just the patient, but their loved ones and those close to them that suffer from the affliction of the disease. Like a bomb exploding, those closest to the epicenter get the most damage--a wife, children, parents. The family will live with disease as much as the victim. The patients commonly are ostracized, shunned or shut out of families for what should be a treatable medical illness. Many end up homeless and friendless.
And unlike most physical diseases, there is a deep denial or unawareness of the malady. Treatment and medication by most, are rejected as unwanted and unneeded and it makes me feel funny(?Probably feeling normal is feeling funny.)
If writing is a window into the mind, you can see the usual run-of-the-mill depressives, bipolars, personality afflictions, paranoids, schizoids, and megalomaniacs right here on this blog. I even think there is a split personality disorder who is interesting but tragic to read.
In mental illness, we are either affected or afflicted by the other 40%. .........That's what makes it so fun!
-
I don't know, jacob. I have grown to dislike winter over the last dozen or so years, but I don't really have any complaints or other problems related to the other seasons.
I think that my dislike of winter may be related to the fact that not one, not two, but three family members have died in January -- two of them within a week of one another in 1999, then my mother in January 2007. So the anniversaries of their passings all occur within a week and a half each year!
Now do you see why I have a strong dislike for winter, and don't really have much use for the holidays, either?
.
But then again, having been in counseling (necessary while transitioning) for over two years, one or the other of my counselors would probably have picked up on it.
-
Penny, You should try the "5 -Year Old Test." Sometimes counselors are trained at the level of a Community College are more mixed up by theory and suppress their own observations and common sense.
Meet and talk with a 5 year old. Afterwards have someone interview the child and ask her opinion of you. If she thinks you are sad and talked scary, then you are probably depressed.
If a 5 year old can see sadness, then it probably is there.
Too bad we have been desensitized to simple facts and simple observations. And we suffer from lack of common sense.
-
I remember a cartoon in Playboy mag years ago where an obviously very wealthy couple were in a huge room of their luxurious house with the husband sitting at the grand, not baby grand, piano and the wife said "Why don't you play some blues?"
That sure was funny at the time.
-
Never a religious nor commercial person myself, i've truely come to DESPISE this time of year! Infact, i don't think that ANYONE really gets into this "christmas" garbage - not really. It's kinda like clowns - nobody likes clowns, loathes them actually. Yet, there's this persistance that everybody just LOVES clowns.
Even most so-called christians get rather tired of it, i suspect. Why is this nonsense continuously forced upon us? Is it just for commercial reasons??? WTF?!
-
I have Seasonal Affective Disorder.
What i do is put severall full spectrum light bulbs in my office at work. I also have a table lamp that I have rigged so the shade directs the light sideways. If i feel I need more exposure I use the table lamp in 10 minute increments per session per day.
A word to the wise: it's very easy to overexpose yourself. No full spectrum lights at night! You will not get tan or a sunburn from over exposure you WILL create insomnia!. It surprized me how powerfull the effect was.
The other things I do is go to a sunny spot for my holiday vacation and supplement Vitamin D3 during fall and winter.
Dont want to sound like and advert but I bought the bulbs from the
light bulb lady (That's the name of the store)
3901 N Mississippi Ave,
Portland OR 97227 (503) 281-0453 -
Thanks for your guest Dr Alfred L.
I'll try just regular light bulbs. Those other bulbs are $5.00 a piece.
-
Before I had children, my mother died on Christmas and my step-dad died on epiphany. Christmas has become more difficult as my own children have grown. The best way that I can get through the holiday is to use day or overnight trips to get out of the house, put up my mom's decorations, and turn off the radio when "Blue Christmas" comes on. I enjoy the children's happiness at Christmas and try not to be a downer. I wish there was more support for people like me who have lost our families at Christmas.
-
Many churches offer "Longest Night" or "Blue Mass" services at Christmas. Church is not for everyone, but these services are explicitly designed for people in your situation.
-
Vitamin D deficiency-SAD, economic-money issues, commercialization, sad-traumatic family history...all contribute to sadness that can be felt in the holidays.
Factors such as SAD, lack of Vit D sometimes cannot be noticed until we have been suffering for awhile, the brain lacks the ability sometimes to know we are going through it.
Emotional, family issues...we are a society that do not deal with these to completion. Mostly, we bottle unresolved issues and let it linger and fester...
To answer the cynics around, the best holiday I had was when I decided to ignore all the hoopla surrouding it (nothing wrong with that really) and concentrated on being thankful. That was the best.
-
We went from political ads on TV to "Christmas is all about how much money you can spend". How depressing is that!
As a Christian, I find myself apologizing to God that the celebration of the birth of our savior has turned into an economic rat race. I try to tune out all of the blitz but I am bombarded by the theme of buy, buy, buy.
True clinical depression is not just related to winter, shorter days and the artificial image of what Christmas is but is a chemical imbalance in the brain. Situational depression can, however, be caused by the short days, longer hours of darkness and feelings that one is not living the image of the perfect life of family, wealth, friends, etc. that the ads portray our lives are supposed to be like during the Christmas season.
-
As a kid, Christmas was always hard for me and I never knew why. There was no particular reason that I could identify; it just felt like a sad time. When I was in my twenties I found I envied people who had jobs that required them to work on Christmas. Seemed like it would be a great way to get out of the holiday blues. Ironically enough, 30 years later, I'm a clergy person and spend the entire month of December helping others through this dark season and getting ready for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day services. One service that is especially meaningful to me and to lots of others is the "Longest Night" service we do every year around the solstice, to honor people who are grieving or depressed this time of year, perhaps because Christmas reminds them of a particular loss, or for no specific reason. I call it "Christmas in a minor key," for people who want to observe the holiday but aren't feeling particularly joyful. Lots of churches have these services; interested listeners should google "Longest Night Service" or "Blue Mass" to find one in their area.
-
Mothersara - shoulda read further down before I posted my comment on the Longest Night service... I like working this time of year too. I liked it when I was in grocery, too.
-
People who get depressed because of cloudy weather seem overly animal. It is hard to believe it is actually the weather, or some-kind of inherent physical response to lower light levels that are built into the human---I believe it is a social response to weather. I personally am a bit creeped out by anyone who has a response to the normal range of weather. Maybe I am ridiculous for these views, but I have them. For instance if someone loves the sun and needs to bake themselves on the beach, it seems icky to me, it seems desperate and primitive. I often say I prefer the winters and clouds, which is really just as silly as other people saying they prefer the sun. I think people with SAD are depressed to begin with, yes, they may be more depressed in darker weather, but it is not the cause of their depression, it is simply how it is manifest or an added trigger. It is, yet, another chicken or egg question!
-
Seasonality was our "animal" history. Most people do the same job season in and season out. What changes for them is recreation. Most folks don't have bad weather, dark day recreation. So a seasonal disorder is logical to observe. When we stood in one place for a couple generations, folks got used to the local seasons or died off, hail Darwin. But now, we mix it up all over the world and forget we drag our adaptive genes to places they have never been, so welcome seasonal depression, which can happen to perfectly happy people.
-
FarmerMike,
I don’t disagree with any of that. I just think SAD is a simplistic diagnosis for people who want answers to a complex problem. I think SAD is a trigger, but the disease is much more complex then that. I perhaps take issue with this idea that the cause needs to be outsourced, as if bad weather was like the death of a relative---and, now I have the answer to my problems: the weather. Additionally, it seems scary, and somewhat unbelievable that the human could be so adversely effected by the norms of the natural world. And it would be hard to say if the weather is the only cause, or the paramount cause? Or whether that cause was somewhat self-induced by our social views about the weather? Or perhaps there is an underlying depression problem and the weather is a trigger?
What I want to say is that the problem is most definitely within the person, whether it is biological or some other type of response to the weather, there is nothing about the weather itself that is problematic, the problem lies in how the person handles it. It seems like a small distinction, but it is important. I am not trying to take something away from people, or belittle the very real depression that they feel.
-
The lack of daylight has always been a problem. One thing that helped me, though not easy for everyone, I spent the winter after college in England. Several of the best months of my life and now I associate the short rainy Oregon days with that time in similarly dreary England.
Still have problems getting up in the morning, but the association helps.
-
I'm a law student, so the holidays are challenging and depressing for reasons other than those mentioned by your other commenters. The holiday season is law school final exam season, so my classmates and I are unable to partake in the holiday celebrations from around Thanksgiving time until almost Christmas eve because we have to focus on studying for final exams. It it challenging and relatively depressing to do nothing but sit and study for 12-14 hours each day for 4-5 weeks straight while the rest of the world is joyfully gearing up for Christmas. For the past three years, I feel as though I've almost entirely missed out on the holiday season, which saddens me, but I'm thankful for the opportunity to further my education, and it's just something that comes with the territory.
-
As a child, I lived up near Fairbanks, Alaska for two and a half years and this time of year we would have the sky just glow brighter from about 11:00 am to 1:00 pm without ever seeing the sun rise above the horizon. Sometimes we would get the Northern Lights which is just amazing.
Given that some people live in the extreme polar latitudes year round, the question I wonder, is:
"Is there an opposite effect to SAD, a manic type effect for the very long summers when the sun stays up all day long?" Extreme unbearable happiness?
(Hmm, that reminds me of the very good movie "The Unbearable Lightness Of Being")
-
Recent latest vision science research has found a new blue-light sensitive neuron in the retina of the eye. This research implies that a blue light box, like this one, is as effective (or more so), than a full-spectrum light box:
http://www.amazon.com/Philips-goLITE-BLU-Therapy-Device/dp/B001I45XL8/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1292434003&sr=8-3
This is what I recommend to my patients with SAD, but I don't know if there have been studies on circulating melatonin levels after blue light therapy.
James Kundart, OD
Hillsboro
-
I heard that your recent guest recommended cool white flourescent lights. I had used a 3 way soft wite flourescent and noticed trouble sleeping. My neighbor, a natural health kinda guy, suggested the light itself was causing the disruptions to my sleep patterns due to the "cycling" nature of flourescent light. While the light looks constant, it is in fact a very fast cycling on and off that produces the visible spectrum.
I went out and bought an incandescent, and voila, no more trouble getting to sleep at night. This was in my den where I would spend 2 to 3 hours prior to bed. Now, with incandescents, no sleep troubles.
-
I am both an acupuncturist in Portland, and someone who suffers from winter depression, and I have found acupuncture and vitamin D to be hugely beneficial. In fact, even patients who are not coming in to be treated for SAD remark on how much better and more energetic they feel through the dark days.
-
I retired to a farm to get away from the winter blues. And I changed the holidays.
First, I look forward to Solstice in December and do it by the traditional bone fires, literally piling up things I can do without and need to be burned. (On a farm, this is easy.) And I have a nice bonfire on Solstice. Sometimes with family and friends showing up, thinking it is a good idea and they bring something to toss on the fire. Then I celebrate Christmas in Christmas--which is December 25th through January 5th, not the commercial stuff that ends with December 24th. (Start singing "A partridge in a pear tree.." here.) You want folks to be happy with you? Show up with a gift when they don't expect it. And be there for a discussion or talk about things in the past, now that they are over the stress of getting ready for "Christmas." Guess what, shopping is cheaper when you do this and you pick up hints at what people really want because they didn't get it during the commerical wave. Sharing gifts of foods, like a smoked bird or pickled bantam eggs from my farm, are great gifts.
Chickens help. If you want more eggs, chickens need 14 hours of light. Not hot light, as 40 watts will do the average coop. But you have an outside place with animals and more light to go when it is dark. 'Beats a SAD light in the bathroom. (Although I'm not knocking the SAD light...upping the wattage in the bathroom is a good winter trick. But a chicken that coos at you is something a SAD light doesn't provide.)
So the advice? Figure out how to live well and bring smiles to others means less figuring out what to do about your seasonal sadness. But if it is too tough, get help.
Happy Solstice all...
-
FarmerMike
Sounds right to me.
-
FarmerMike,
I love this. Having grown up on a farm I enjoy your comments about the chickens, etc. I think one of the wonderful things about living on a farm and caring for animals is that one really can't take a lot of time to feel sad because those animals need to be cared for on a daily basis. That process takes a person out of himself and into the service of other living creatures.
I also appreciate your comment about the Christmas season not ending on December 24. Christmas goes until Epiphany on January 6 when the Magi brought gifts to the Christ child.
Only five more days until the Solstice! Yahoo!
-
As a naturopthaic doctor in Portland I see many patients who suffer from seasonal affective disorder. One of the tools I use that is extremely effective for this type of depression is called 'neurofeedback'. It's a drug-free non-invasive brainwave biofeedback therapy. The brain learns how to change it's own activity and therefore reduces or eliminates the negative response to lack of sunlight. I wanted to comment because there is help out there besides going the medication route - which is often not very effective for many people.
Dr. Noel Thomas
-
I wonder if children could be taught those techniques in order to help themselves self-regulate all through their lives?
-
My wife is from California & I am from Idaho.
We have found that using melatonin at bedtime has significantly reduced the winter-blues here in the Willamette valley.
What has the doctor's results been so far?
- Glass-I (Beaverton)
-
I dislike the holidays for the sole reason that they are religious. Sure it is easy to go on about the commercialism, and all the other clichés associated with why people hate the holidays, but those criticisms can also apply to almost anything in modern life. Sometimes it seems passé to say how you hate the holidays, because it is such old news---doesn’t everyone already hate them? Even though I don’t celebrate the holidays, lately I have become fond of them, because I like seeing so many people going shopping---ridiculous, yes, but I can’t help it.
-
I wonder if SAD is non-existent around the equatorial latitude peoples?
-
I'm from Hawaii, so the lack of light and the hibernation has a major affect on me - and most of the friends and families who are from tropical places. Is there a difference for people of ethnic skin tone having worse depression? I'm currently on higher doses of Vitamin D and also use a Blu-lite which uses blue LEDs. Leaving the house to excercise is the hardest thing for me to accomplish. The idea of being out in the cold and dark is extremely uncomfortable, almost painful. But I know that excercise is a big one to feeling better.
-
One of the best ways I've found to combat the stress and sadness of this season is to acknowledge it. Too often, it's the forced cheer that makes everything worse. I'm a pastor, and one of my favorite worship services of the year is on December 21 - Longest Night Service - which includes quiet music, readings and lots of time for silence silence. It's pretty well attended, but even if no one came, I think I would do it just for myself. (BTW, if you want to try it, we are at Hillsdale Community Church - UCC, 6948 SW Capitol Hwy and the service starts at 7:00).
-
Something to be grateful for: The Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony Bomb DID NOT go off killing dozens, injuring hundreds and causing a city to plummet into Mass PTSD, Major Depression and a Super Depressed Holiday Season affecting the City, the State and the entire Nation for DECADES. You would see even Worse EPIDEMIC SAD that would make our current troubles look like a cake walk.
Attending funerals and seeing amputees would really dampen the holiday season.
-
I called in earlier and would like to add a few things. When the cycle begins in about October I get strong cravings for refined carbohydrates and the desire to stay in bed, sleep longer than usual, cover my head and not get out until spring. I ended up gaining over 100 lbs. over the last 12 years or so and I have had to work to lose the weight (lost 116 pounds total). Light is very important and is important for me to get outside daily even when it's cloudy. So when I mentioned eating well and getting the right amount of sleep (i.e. not getting too much sleep) it was in relation to not oversleeping. By going to the gym and getting regular exercise I also have my "social" time with my gym buddies. I believe that while light therapy is the primary treatment for this disorder, it's important to maintain a routine with both our physical and emotional bodies.
I have stepped away from all the Christmas "hoopla", as I believe it's too commercialized, so there has been a decrease in the stresses related to that.
-
The Humanist community of Portland is working to establish a non-religious, non-consumer based celebration built around the Winter Solstice. It is an effort to bring a more 'organic' celebration in which the emphasis is on our link to other people, the Earth and all it's creatures and life. Giving presents is quite optional and, if presents are given, it is preferred that one gives something of the personal heart; a poem, a song, something that one can sew or make, etc.. If something is bought it should be humble and of a one-of-a-kind, hand made, artisan nature.
We are having a concert event on Winter Solstice called DARKTOLIGHT. If you're interested in this type of celebration please feel welcome to attend. Suggested donation but no one will be turned away. For info go to : darktolightpdx.com
Hope you can escape the insanity!!!
Fred
-
Comments are now closed.
Interesting statistic from the book Prozac Nation: 40 % of all college freshman are on a PSYCHIATRIC DRUG: whether anxiolytic, mood elevator, ADD Drug or addiction therapy.
And these are considered the Winners of their Generation: Accepted and on track to a College Degree and a Leadership Role in society...versus the ones who stayed behind to work at McDonald's.
IF Happiness is so important, perhaps we should consider putting PROZAC in the Municipal Water Supply. We do no less for Dental Cavities with Fluoridation.
It would cost only pennies per capita, but the effect of Happiness would be Priceless: Less suicides, less murders, less addictions, less depression and less abuse.
Population Mental Health: We should pretreat the population for addictions, because we can see addictions like alcohol, tobacco, and illicit drugs will grow like a weeds in an untended field. We are the only species that gets bored. And purposely can become self destructive.
Should Happiness be consider no less important than periodontal disease?