Wintering.

by Lisa Millman, Yoga Teacher

Did you know that getting vitamin D from the sun isn’t as simple as just letting your face catch some rays?

I learned this at a recent doctor’s appointment, when my new primary care provider was discussing a major vitamin D deficiency my lab work had revealed but previous providers had missed. I work in environmental education, so I was quick to explain that I’m still outside often in the winter, albeit bundled up.

“That’s not enough,” she said softly, then went on to explain how winter light sits lower in the sky, how shorter days and heavier clothing limit our ability to absorb vitamin D, and how our bodies feel the absence of sun even when we don’t consciously notice it.

Well, I thought, so much for successfully wintering.

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I first stumbled upon the concept of wintering in 2021, during my first winter working at an environmentally focused school. That year, our school had been in and out of quarantine. It’s already difficult to convince adolescents to head outside for a full day every week in the winter; it was even more challenging to persuade them to do so on their own at home. I approached these days with my students much the same way I approached ACT prep: overly cheerful and loud enough to drown out their complaints. 

In the middle of that winter, I happened to scroll past this post from writer Victoria Erickson:

“So many feel lethargic, unmotivated, or worn out in this hemisphere. We are really not made to rocket straight through winter, ablaze with energy. Look at nature. The ground and plants and animals are deep at rest. This is the natural way of things. Spend some time with the long nights, the moon, solitude, the bare earth, stillness. Be easier on yourself.” 

I shared this during a virtual professional development session with other environmental educators in the state, and after we all quietly reflected, someone asked, “Have you ever heard of wintering?”

I hadn’t. But I’m a lifelong learner, so it didn’t take me long to uncover the book Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Hard Times by Katherine May. In this memoir, May asserts that winter—and thus wintering—comes for all of us, in every season. Rather than viewing winter, sadness, suffering, and grief as states to simply endure, she encourages us to develop the skills needed to live well within them:

“Plants and animals don’t fight the winter; they don’t pretend it’s not happening and attempt to carry on living the same lives that they lived in the summer. They prepare. They adapt. They perform extraordinary acts of metamorphosis to get them through. Winter is a time of withdrawing from the world, maximising scant resources, carrying out acts of brutal efficiency and vanishing from sight; but that’s where the transformation occurs. Winter is not the death of the life cycle, but its crucible.”

That was when I made it my mission to reframe the way I treat winter.

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I’m a lifelong Wisconsinite. I’m not new to long weeks in which everything looks the same gray of dirty snow; or that bright, sunny days are deceptive because they are often the coldest. But for much of my adult life, winter became a season to endure and survive – even more so when I became a parent. The routine of bundling my kids up every morning and sorting through their damp winter gear every night added a layer of banality that I wasn’t prepared for. Add holidays to that mix, and life simply became a checklist. Did everyone have their coat? Check. Did I get a gift for my son’s teacher? Check.

It felt like I was on autopilot for half the year.

And at some point, I realized that surviving winter had quietly become my only goal. I wasn’t listening to the season, or to myself—I was just getting through it. Learning to think of winter as a verb gave me a way back into the season, not by adding more to my plate, but by paying closer attention. After a few years of practicing wintering and continuing my studies, here are some invitations for you to begin your own.

1. Give yourself permission to slow down. I know, this is hard. Go back to the passages I’ve shared, and read them again. We are meant to slow down. Chad Everett, writer of The Alchemist Papers on Substack, explains, “After weeks of social intensity, disrupted routines, and heightened emotions, your nervous system tends to downshift. Fatigue here shouldn’t be looked at as failure; it’s pretty standard.” Nature conserves its energy this time of year, and so should we. 

Lately, I’ve been paying closer attention to the moments when I feel hurried. I pause and ask myself, Do I need to be rushing here? Is there room to move more slowly? More often than not, I find that rushing is unnecessary. When I honor that pause, I arrive with less frantic energy, and that softness tends to ripple through the rest of my day.

2. Listen to your body. It’s normal to feel more fatigue or lower energy during this season. When we fight those instincts and try to override them, we often create tension in the body or carry unnecessary guilt when we finally do rest. 

Yoga offers a different approach: one that works with the season instead of against it. Practices like Slow Flow or Yin invite us to move at a more sustainable pace, prioritize sensation over achievement, and rest without apology.

3. The beginning of the year doesn’t have to be a hard reset for everyone. The new year may have turned, but the season has not. While there are countless reasons people struggle to maintain New Year’s resolutions, I have my own theory: our bodies don’t understand the sudden demand for change in the middle of a season that is built for slowness.

Add to that the cultural expectations many of us grew up with – for years, I made resolutions out of obligation, convinced that if I wasn’t actively improving myself, I was somehow failing. But obligation has never been a particularly fertile place for growth. No amount of tips or tricks can make change feel nourishing if it’s rooted in resentment or fatigue.

Everett offers perspective here: “January often feels dull because of this body recalibration. The magic is happening quietly, beneath the surface, without much spectacle.”

In response, I’ve scaled back how much I encourage my students to set intentions in class during this season. Setting an intention often creates expectations, and while expectations aren’t inherently harmful, winter is a time to loosen our grip on them. This is a season for fewer demands, more listening, and trusting that the work is still happening, even when it isn’t visible.

4. Cultivate simple anchors during this loss of light. Having darkness fall so early in the evening can disrupt our natural sense of regulation. Sunlight helps us track time, rhythm, and orientation, which is why the loss of light can create the blurriness so many of us feel in winter. Without support, the days begin to blend together, and before we know it, the winter months have passed with little memory of what filled them. 

Developing small rituals and routines can help anchor you back into your sense of time and presence. These don’t need to be grand or complicated. Maybe you light a candle when it gets dark each evening. Maybe you drink a certain kind of tea between dinner and bedtime, or pause for a few slow, deep breaths before getting into bed. Think of these practices as gentle supports – not rigid rules. As an added bonus, they give you something small and steady to look forward to each day.

5. Use yoga as a way to practice slowness and rituals. Let your mat be a place you return to, not something you conquer. Make your practice less about poses and more about presence, about noticing breath, warmth, and the simple act of showing up. You don’t need to do more to be “doing enough.” In the winter months, consistency matters more than intensity. A few minutes of intentional movement or stillness, practiced regularly, can be more regulating than an occasional all-out effort.

This winter, consider showing up for yourself in the small, steady ways that matter: slow breaths, mindful movement, gentle routines. Just as nature works beneath the surface to prepare for spring, your intentional slowing and tending now is building the energy, focus, and clarity you’ll carry into the year ahead. 

Even in rest, there is power.