It’s sunny as I write this, on Monday—at least there’s that. Of course, by the time anyone reads this on Wednesday, it probably won’t be. That’s Victoria (in December, no less) for you. This time of year is hard, partially because we don’t get enough sunlight, which is one of the main natural ways to consume vitamin D. A vitamin D deficiency is linked to all kinds of health issues—increased rates of cancer, diabetes, and depression, to name a few, but I’m not a walking link to Web MD, and I certainly don’t think I’m qualified to have an actual educated opinion on any of the above health issues. But I can share my own experience.
The shorter days are like anything else: they impact some people more than others. For me, it’s annihilating. This time of year, every day I have to run 30 minutes, take 2,000 units of vitamin D, and sit under a Godforsaken sunlight lamp for an hour just to feel normal. But I’m not complaining. I love my time that I need to take for me, and I’ll never feel bad for taking it.
To be honest, as much as I work to be able to take the time, my life is also structured in a way that allows it. I have no kids, no particularly hectic life. If I want to take this time in, say, five years, I don’t know when I’ll possibly have time to sleep. I’ll have to be up at 2 am, running around under a massive lamp. And let’s just come out and acknowledge this, shall we? Being around the average age of most college students means that I see the world in a certain way. I‘m slightly terrified of that world viewpoint having to change before I’m ready for it to, but, in a nutshell, that’s what an education is—learning to choose how to think and recognizing that you’re part of a bigger picture, a bigger ideal, and a bigger world.
With the final weeks of the year in full swing—a year to remember but a year that no one wants to live through again—ask yourself how you want to go through the world in ’21 in a way that will make you, and that world, a better place to be. Within yourself is, after all, the place you most frequently are.