Fall and winter may be the coziest time of year, but they can also be the hardest on your health. With shorter days and cooler, gloomier weather, the blues can set in, sapping your energy and motivation. Respiratory viruses like the flu start circulating everywhere. The dry, frigid air — especially during winter — leaves your skin and hair bone dry. And busy schedules and holiday stressors can wear down even those with the strongest constitutions.
What is the prescription for wellness? Harness the power of Traditional Asian Medicine to boost your vitality and health during these seasons. The secret is using time-honored practices that help align your body with nature to nourish the body, mind, and spirit deeply.
Slow It Down
Fall and winter are the ideal times to slow down. Just as nature slows down and hibernates during the colder months, you too can take extra time to nurture yourself, stay warm, and get plenty of rest. This helps plant the seeds for regeneration in the spring.
Fall & Winter Meditation for Long-Term Health
The stillness of these seasons offers an ideal time for retrospection, meditation, and reflection. But to do this, we first need to slow down through mind-body practices, relaxation, or best of all, regular meditation. This slow-down process naturally gives rise to “stuff” often stuck under the surface: issues, thoughts, or patterns you may have been avoiding with chronic busyness. Allow these issues to arise, unfold, and slip away as you calm your mind with relaxation, meditation, and breathing practices.
Uncomplicated meditation practices have been shown in clinical studies to work as well or better than pharmaceutical medications for depression and anxiety.
Meditation instructions: A simple (yet profound) ancient meditation method is Shamatha, or “Calm Abiding.” Shamatha is a staple for both beginners and advanced practitioners of meditation. Here are the basic steps to follow:
- Find a quiet place to sit and pick a small object such as a rock to place on the ground in front of you, where it is comfortable to set your gaze.
- Focus your eyes and breathing on the rock. As thoughts arise (and they inevitably do), acknowledge and then release them, letting them slip away with each out-breath. When your mind wanders off, gently bring your attention back to your breathing and the rock, visualizing each inhalation and exhalation going to and from the rock.
- Even just 10 minutes a day of this style of meditation is shown to improve numerous markers of physical, mental, and emotional health. This type of mind/heart medicine is an integral part of healing.
Support Your Body’s Key Organs
In Traditional Asian Medicine, each season corresponds to specific organs. Winter, for example, correlates to the water element and influences the health of the kidneys, bladder, adrenal glands, bones (including bone marrow), and teeth. The kidneys are the primary source of vitality, energy, and inner heat, and energy is drawn from this source during stressful times or when the body requires healing. During the cold seasons, it is vital to maintain healthy kidneys and adrenal glands through an unprocessed diet packed with whole foods in season, targeted supplementation, good hydration, and energetic practices such as yoga and Tai Chi. These efforts help keep your core warm and well-nourished.
Get Some Morning Light
Winter, and to some extent fall, tend to be inactive, cold, and damp seasons. In Traditional Asian Medicine, winter relates to feelings such as depression. In Western medicine, many people are diagnosed with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), a particular form of depression/anxiety that occurs during the darker months, due in part to lack of sunshine and vitamin D3. Women often experience this condition more than men and it can result in poor mood, lack of energy, and weight gain.
Morning sunlight is key and boasts a unique benefit: Getting just 30 seconds of morning light — between sunrise and 9 a.m. — can reduce cancer risk by as much as 80 percent, according to research by Dr. Mohammad Muneeb Khan, a consultant clinical oncologist at Queen’s Centre for Oncology and Haematology at Castle Hill Hospital in the U.K.
Open your curtains during the day for the light, and take brisk walks (in sunshine, if possible) to improve circulation. Also, consider trying morning blue light treatment with a lamp. This is thought to help enhance your body’s production of vitamin D and has been shown to help improve sleep complaints and symptom severity in patients with post-traumatic stress disorder.
Warm, Nourishing Foods
Traditional Asian Medicine recommends reducing your intake of raw foods during the colder months, as they tend to cool the body and deplete its digestive “fire” — aka the ability to assimilate food. Instead, emphasize “warming” foods, and cook them longer at lower temperatures. Some good options:
- Soups and stews
- Lamb and chicken
- Eggs
- Root vegetables
- Dark leafy greens
- Kidney and black beans
- Walnuts
- Black sesame seeds
- Whole grains
- Seaweed.
These foods help fortify your kidneys, lift your mood, nourish your body, keep you warm, and help your body conserve energy. Dehydration is also an issue during fall and winter months since coldness draws away moisture, like freezer burn. Warm water is more hydrating than icy water — aim for 8–10 cups per day.
Essential Nutrients for Fall & Winter
Botanicals and nutrients that promote immune health during the winter are important for reducing your risk of viral and other types of infections. *
One supplement in particular, Padma Basic®, is a unique Tibetan Herbal Formula with more than three decades of clinical research behind it. Padma Basic® has been shown to support healthy immune function, as well as cardiovascular and circulatory health — critical during the fall and winter as we face colder weather and less physical activity.*
Other herbs emphasized by Traditional Asian Medicine in the winter include “tonifying” roots such as ginger and galangal for their warming, grounding, and strengthening properties.
Best Practices for a Healthier You
Acupuncture, Qi Gong (precise exercises to enhance the flow of vital energy), specific dietary recommendations, and targeted herbal formulas all have immense value during the fall and winter. They help to relieve stagnant energy caused by a lack of activity and weather changes while supporting immunity and boosting vitality. Practitioners of Traditional Asian Medicine also advise sleeping as much as possible during the winter to replenish your kidneys and restore essential energy. Getting to bed early and rising after the sun will help preserve your warmth and vitality.
Traditional Asian Medicine reflects an innate connection to nature, with each season presenting opportunities for transformation, healing, and growth. The fall and winter seasons allow for deeper introspection and nourishment. This allows our inspiration and intentions to develop internally before blossoming in the spring. Stay warm, hydrated, and nourished. Most of all, give yourself the extra time and space to slow down, rest, and meditate in these beautiful seasons of increased stillness.
