Don’t wait out the winter

Winter is nothing to fear. When the sun goes down so early in the day and the cold air fills your lungs, it can be daunting. Sometimes it feels like I can’t breathe, and everything is dark and feels out of control, almost as if you don’t know whether or not the sun is ever going to come back. Getting stuck in that darkness can make life stagnant, clouding your thoughts with negativity and anxiety. If you have ever felt like this, The Griffin is with you, and we are here to hold your hand through the darkness and on to the other side. 

Rather than focusing on what winter takes away from us, we can notice all of the good it brings. People will almost always mention the holidays, which can be fun but shouldn't make or break the season. For those of us who live in Western or Upstate New York year-round, the snow has been a critical factor each and every year (except for those few Christmases that were green, which was weird). The snow is like a blanket laid carefully onto our home, and it can be extremely warm when looked at a certain way. Something we were all told as children, and something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately, is the individuality of snowflakes. “Every snowflake is different” – is that really true? Have we debunked that, or are we still focusing on the moon landing? Regardless of validity, it opens the doors for what I like to call ‘magical thinking’ (remind The Griffin to trademark that). Truly believing that each and every snowflake is unique, considering the remarkable number of them, can be brought into our daily lives. We are special and unique and different from the rest. People forget that – instead, they lump themselves into a group that might look like it fits the best. I don’t want to be in a group anymore; I don’t want to look at my problems as if they’re superficial and dealt with universally. I have this life, the one I’m living now, and according to science, the odds that any of us were born are like 1 in 4 trillion. Kinda like the odds of snowflakes. 

Another piece of magic that winter gives us are the smells. Peppermint and pine, myrrh and cinnamon. Humans can link memories through smells, and they are some of our strongest links at that. Giving yourself a way to remember moments through a scent is powerful, whether this be a candle, wax melts, hand soaps or potpourri. Having that power and being able to utilize it can hold memories dear for years to come. This does have a uniqueness to it – you can make a potpourri for special occasions or light a peppermint candle when reading before bed, for example. People will remember this too! The fact that everyone's house has a certain smell to it is real. Being able to customize that smell and bring people into a space is much more important than realized. It is one of the five senses, which we don’t utilize enough. For example, right now there are leaves on the ground and the snow from last weekend has melted and the aroma of the leaves is everywhere. Why is it something we don’t talk about more? The Griffin asks its readers to go out and smell something right now. It seems silly, considering the state of the world at this point in time it can be considered idiotic by those too caught up in what they see and hear. Connecting with yourself and your surroundings isn’t a crime but rather a lost practice amongst the busy lives of Americans. We need to spend every day with the intention of living it, and being able to experience the lives we all live to the fullest is a privilege as much as it is a right. 

“I deserve to experience life without fear” is something I say to myself often, because of some issues I might have with anxiety, but this is about you, not me. Don’t wait to live your life; don’t wait out the winter until it is warm and sunny again. Find the magic, if not for yourself, for me. Be a snowflake and learn how to make a damn good potpourri because it is much easier than you think. Stop waiting. The Griffin believes in you.