Winter Holiday Blues? Try a New Focus

Sadness, depression, loneliness attack more than a few people at this time of year. Is there help for this?

Thanksgiving, carrying all its feasting and expressions of gratitude, has passed. With the first thoughts of all that needs to be done before the holidays also comes the thought that winter is upon us. Has the glow of Thanksgiving warmth died? No. The changing picture is just doing what it always does: changing.

But, as Dr. Kenneth G. Mills stated in his lecture Green Stuff, ". . . you can't believe the appearance if you expect to see a new spring." You have a choice. You can focus beyond the appearance.

Outdoors we see the apparent death of much of the landscape, with chill temperatures, naked trees and waning light. Dr. Mills speaks about those seemingly dead trees: "It wasn't that they were dead; it was that they were resting to be prepared to receive the wealth of foliage: that green stuff!"

Winter is darker and colder, for sure. But it is also part of an awesome pattern: the rhythm of the four seasons. Do you focus on the deadness, or on the eternal rhythms? (This applies to your inner state, as well!)

Of course, winter holds its own beauty. Pure snow, smooth and crystalline, before footsteps have mussed it. The intricacy of black branches revealed against a pearlized sky. The trees casting majestic shadows before the rosy four o'clock sun. Do you focus on the cold, or on the lovely details?

At the mall, "Black Friday" heralds the start of holiday shopping, and with it, so it seems, a seductive emphasis on over-consumption. A painful yearning for Something unrecognized may unfortunately find its release in frenzied buying and partying.

But as the holidays approach, there are also the people who volunteer to help out, to give of themselves to a number of causes. Do you focus on the feelings of sadness, or can you focus on compassion and take action to volunteer yourself?

Do you allow the holiday hubbub to sweep you unwillingly along, or can you focus on the spirit, the soul, the meaningful symbols of the holy-days of Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza?

Do you find yourself thinking of childhood traditions lost, or can you focus on your current story, whatever it may be, and what it might mean as allegory? There is power here, waiting to be discovered.

Most of all, do focus on That which IS beyond time, beyond all appearances. The winter-- the seeming cold and dark -- is but another disguise of the Divine Radiance. The lacks, the losses, are a distortion of the Abundance and Love that can never dissipate. All the suggestions of sadness and sorrow could not even seem to appear were it not for the clear, untouched Light of Consciousness. Love's embrace never goes away.

What is your focus now?

[Note: Green Stuff is copyrighted 2010 by The Kenneth G. Mills Foundation. See their website to order it as a chapter in Mills' book The Key: Identity or as a booklet with CD.]