With winter right around the corner, it seems like the endless heap of tasks and incomplete goals are soon to follow. I feel as though my motivation for the winter declines months in advance. I always think I’ll be so productive and achieve my “winter arc” however, this is nearly never the case. The addition of unrealistic expectations and goals further deters me from my initial goals. Hence why I’ve decided to set realistic expectations for the winter months in 2025: accepting what’s to come and redefining how I would typically plan for the winter months.
To me, the anticipation of winter is almost always better than the reality. With shorter and colder days, along with what seems like a plethora of assignments and exams, it feels hard to enjoy this season sometimes. This is quite unfortunate as winter used to always be my favourite season. I love the holiday spirit, planning trips on the break, and hosting nights in. Beyond the obvious difficulties associated with winter, I believe setting unrealistic expectations in advance allows for self-sabotaging even before the season begins.
This year I want to do things differently. I started the fall season off by making big goals and a very strict schedule for this “winter arc” trend/challenge I was seeing on social media. Essentially this trend is all about self-improving leading up to the winter, to get a head start on your New Year’s resolutions. All in all, this concept sounds great as there’s nothing wrong with self-improvement. However, attempting to completely uproot your daily routine for an idealized version of wellness ultimately does not work for everyone. I’d rather find what is important for me and pick up little goals that can be incorporated into my lifestyle to achieve this. Finding a slower pace that correlates better with my lifestyle can help defeat feelings of exhaustion, unproductivity and disappointment, or in other words, the feelings my usual expectations of winter bring about.
One of the goals I want to continue into the winter is working out. This has always been a goal of mine and something I’ll usually be consistent with for a few months then fall out of it every few months. At one point, I was finding all sorts of different workout routines and gym trends that didn’t appeal to me. Once I tried going to workout classes, working out went from feeling like a chore to feeling like an activity. Going forward into the winter, I want to keep going to these classes, see my improvement and try new classes.
Additionally, I’ve been wanting to get back into reading for some time. I picked up a few new books, mainly in an area I already study so that therefore I can apply this knowledge to some class discussions or papers while learning more about a topic of interest. For more personal goals, I’ve started prioritizing self-care more, picking up my favourite face mask and journaling daily. For my spending goals, I decided to take up “No Spend November.” I have been wanting to stay away from consumerism for a while now, so I used this month as the perfect opportunity to do so, especially as the holidays are coming up, which for me means buying lots of presents. The key point of the goals I’ve set for this season is that none of these activities wildly alter the course of my day or interfere with my ideal routine.
It’s these little tasks and additions I want to take into the winter. Instead of making an intense daily routine in a season when I already feel sluggish, I’ve found little things that will benefit me long-term — things I enjoy and want to continue into the winter. At the end of the day, I think we all put too much pressure on ourselves to be perfect, trying to create the version of perfection we see daily on social media. I wrote this to share how I’ve found the seasonal transition much more peaceful by prioritizing my own unique goals and interests, and to provide an alternate approach to winter preparation that has already brought me more calmness.