Originally written at the end of winter 2023

As the cold darkness of winter gives way to the warm light of the spring and new life I can’t help but feel a slight tinge of sadness. A sadness towards what I love about winter, with its long periods of isolation, warm deep flavorful meals, and beautiful picturesque snowstorms. I also learned to love its less redeemable qualities like the cutting winds and piercing cold morning air. I commit myself to the season, completely allowing the biting chilly air to instead hug my body when I traverse the harsh New York environment. When the final leaves of autumn have fallen and the newly quiet stillness of winter announces its own arrival, I smile.

A part of the continuous cycle of life, the weather just is. It’s immutable. I cannot stop the winter from coming to me any more than I can stop the sun from rising and falling. Like many things in life it’s something we must submit to. But that doesn’t mean we must view it with such an overwhelming sense of hatred. Now I can completely understand why most people do this, I’m not a complete maniac. I’m aware of seasonal depression. I understand the importance of sunlight and vitamin D(and the lack thereof in the winter). And I know most people would prefer warmer temperatures to a long lasting cold front. But I’m also aware that, as humans, we have the power to change and adapt our mindset towards challenging circumstances, and through technological advances we can simulate some of the sun’s benefits through supplementation and recreation. It’s a waste to hate that which is inevitable.

Instead of hating the winter, I embrace it. As soon as the frost becomes the new normal in the morning, I make a commitment in my mind that there is no other season besides this one. I don’t day dream of warm breezes across calm meadows, or envision happy people lackadaisically making their way through cool water under a hot sun. By not envisioning in the middle of a snowstorm how great things would be if they were anything but what they are, I am able to make my way through it virtually unchanged or unharmed. I see the benefit of remembering good times when in the middle of bad, and of having this to push towards, but I don’t believe there is a benefit envisioning a time of sun and short sleeves-while being stuck in the dead of winter. That would create a slow and cruel style of self torture.

Over the last few years this scope of looking at the seasons has created a mentality of “this is all there is” which I’ve found to be very beneficial to my success- and dare I say, even flourishing- during the colder months. One can do anything for a short period of time, assuming you have the right framework around which to view it. There was a short three month period several years ago where my commute to work was an hour and fifteen minutes, one way. Did it suck? Certainly. But I also knew that it wasn’t forever and that it would ultimately help me with my career and my finances, so I burned a bunch of extra cd’s for the longer rides, pushed through it. I made it work. 

I would argue that this mindset, which I like to call ‘Deeper Daily Immersion’, doesn’t just apply to the cold weather; it’s a mindset that offers benefits year round, in all areas of life. Personally, this has been helping me transform over the last few years into being a lot more present in my day to day activities. It’s like being at work and looking at a clock. When you can’t keep your eyes off of it, it never seems to move. But when you forget about the clock and get immersed in the work that needs doing, time just keeps moving with you. When something you don’t want to do has to be done, dreading it or clock-watching will just make it worse. Embrace what you have to get done by putting your head down and going all-in.

There’s something interesting that happens when you all of a sudden have more things to do than there is time in the day. There’s a point where you pick up so many burning interests that you can’t possibly figure out a logical order to pursue them. And I’m not saying that I have so many movies and shows to watch I don’t know where to start. I’m saying I’ve found things that interest me to the soul as a human being, and I’m annoyed not only that I didn’t have these passions sooner, but also that I only have so many days to do them. Suddenly, I’ve become even more terrified of an early unannounced death. Not because of the eternal nonexistence that follows, but because of the progress I won’t be able to make. I’m afraid of the things that will be left undone. The feelings I won’t be able to experience. The sex I won’t be able to have. The love I won’t be able to share with a wife and children. And the great amount I wish to contribute and create with the world of ideas.

Life is made up of a great many parts and pieces. Some are quite long and arduous and some are quick and filled with pure, unadulterated joy. Firstly, through creating our own values, I believe we can make a way to minimize the bad parts through better decision making and more agency over our own lives. Secondly, by creating our own hierarchical value structure and knowing what to pursue it makes it easier to get through some of the more arbitrary tasks as we know they play a part in the bigger whole that is the top value. And finally part of knowing what things just are–requiring no additional strife or grievance–has helped takeaway any desire to overindulge the idea of being negative about something that can’t be changed.

Winter passes, and with it brings the new life that is Spring. In an odd way I mourn for the passing of winter, as one does the passing of a distant but admired relative. In the end-, I mourn for it because without its harsh reality many great lessons wouldn’t have made their way into my mind and then onto these pages. The joys of nice weather would be dulled, if it weren’t for the looming pale cold of the dreary dark winter. But only by accepting its inevitability and also its relative briefness, have I been able to love it and now mourn for it.