Beating the Winter Blues, Starting the New Year Right (Ep.31)

Beating the Winter Blues, Starting the New Year Right (Ep.31)

Feeling the winter blues? You are not alone. This second part of January is usually challenging for people for several reasons. But we don’t have to let the blah mood, feelings, and energy take over, and make life more difficult for ourselves. We can increase our awareness of what is happening for us, instead of being steeped in it with no light in sight. Picking up our head and bringing more consciousness to our situation allows us to tap into our resources and snap ourselves out of it.

Here are 5 reasons we are feeling the winter blues, including seasonal affective disorder (SAD), and 3 powerful ways of addressing them to elevate ourselves into new beginnings, and our New Ideal Future… 

5 Reasons for the Winter Blues

There is no shame or judgement about being afflicted by the winter blues. You might be experiencing some blahs and lack of motivation. Or you might be feeling straight up *depressed. Regardless of where you are on the spectrum, these will help you have your own back, feel better and get moving in the right direction for you and for your new future… 

*Please get professional support, individual or couple therapy to make getting on track easier – we are here for you!

Post-Holidays Lull

The Holidays are usually tough and their impact have a tendency to linger. You might have had a bit of momentum with the start of the New Year with stepping up your game to start the new year right. But soon after, any lingering and new negative feelings emerge as the accelerated pace, excitement, personal time, and availability for connection go back to normal and there is a sense of loss or let down.

Cold and Dark Winter Days

As there is a bit of hibernation, isolation, less sun light, fresh air, connection to nature, and shorter days that make it difficult to feel in the flow, bright and energized. Our circadian rhythm is off as we don’t properly align our life with sunup and sundown… And a lot of our biological systems get thrown off affecting our brain function and mood. Our mental health is impacted.

Financial Strain

Around this time is when it becomes more obvious how much the holiday season had an impact on our finances. Even if we were intentional about our spending, there might still be a part of us that feels the impact of the additional spending. 

Unfulfilled New Year’s Resolutions or Intentions

We all have the best of intentions to have our Best Year Yet, but nonetheless might be quick to fall into our usual routines, patterns, and lose sight of the changes we want to make. We let up on creating the new habits. And on addressing any frictions or obstacles to fully implementing any changes to our routines. 

Lack of Motivation

We are already feeling depleted from all the above, and additionally don’t we might not have a dream, a vision, and goals to pull us forward, inspire us and excite us. It makes sense that we’d be lost, stuck or gloomy and not feel like tackling anything.

We can experience any combination of the above to some extent. The result is having a bumpy start to the new year and feeling like we are behind the 8 ball. That we are not upleveling properly and timely for our best year yet. We might feel impostor syndrome, judgment, shame, fear, inertia at being in this place, making the whole thing even worse.

3 Empowering Ways to Beat the Winter Blues

The only thing to do is to be kind and compassionate with ourselves when we are not feeling well. To be gentle and loving, and to have our own back to get ourselves on the right track, and rocking it before we know it.  

Manage Yourself and Your Feelings

The key is to self-soothe/regulate, self-care and energize ourselves. 

Self-soothe – Use practices to manage and alleviate the feelings, change your mood, and uplevel your state: Meditation, breathing techniques, EFT, mindfulness, journaling, addressing limiting believes, cultivating joy, decreasing screen time, and focusing on things that are in our control (personal ownership and accountability).

Self-care – Aside from the above focus taking care of yourself: Proper sleep, nutrition, hydration, supplementation, exercise, personal care.  

Step up the fun and connection – Be super intentional about having positive experiences and nurturing connection: Schedule connection time with your partner and other loved ones, intentionally participate in your networks, map out and schedule or book fun experiences, play at old or new hobbies.    

Address Financial Distress

Regardless of your financial situation, the key here is to get a handle on where you are at and to make a plan to get back on track. Whether it’s to eliminate debt, replenish savings, start investing or some other goal. Of course, consider consulting a financial advisor to support you implement the right plan for you to achieve your financial goals.

Activate Your North Star

This one is my favorite. Aligning ourselves with our higher-self, our purpose, and what kind of life we want to live is the way to create that life. Identify what is your Grand Life Experience you are here to live… What is the vision, the purpose, the dream. Then identify specific goals against that vision to create it… And specific habits, tactics, and strategies to achieve them. Without a roadmap, a vehicle, and the gas you won’t get very far. This is the inspiration and motivation to propel you forward. You don’t need to depend on will power, discipline and grit. Tap into inspiration! 

If even the above feel daunting, know that it is totally fine to move at your own pace, to honor where you are, to take care of yourself, and take tiny actions on the above to get yourself moving in the right direction. And, of course, get yourself support as needed!

Wishing you clear sunny days, and an amazing New Year and New Future…

Hope this information serves you and helps you get on the path to your Successful Relationship and Meaningful Life. 

 

 

Episode Transcript

Learn more about the Podcast and check out other great episodes!

If you enjoyed the episode, we’d love for you to leave a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts to help others discover the show.

MENTIONED INSIDE

Connection Live
Top 10 Guidelines & Practices To Uplevel Your Relationship & Your Life

FREE Downloadable Exercises and Implementation Support
Planning and Reset Process
Identify Your Core Values

JUST FOR YOU

NEW! Monthly Activating Protocols
Establish Your Highest Potential in 10 Key Life Areas, Design Your New Life
Having a North Star ensures we stay the course on the path we desire on our Journey. It ensures we create the relationship and life we love, and have the Human Experience we desire… In this activation, we walk through a Visioning and Expansion Process to reprogram and reset for the New Year… We take a deep dive and activate the Highest Potential in 10 Life Areas to drive your reset. You get to explore your heart’s desires and identify the specific actions, tactic, or habits you’ll implement to create your New Beginnings, and your Ideal New Life… We design your ideal lifestyle you can start living immediately that’s the framework to live your Grand Life Adventure…

Don’t have a Membership with us yet? Access it and much more through our Radiance Membership! (Only $29 per month)
Get Enrolled NOW

RESOURCES

~~ Watch our related videos on our YouTube channel

~~ Download our FREE 1-pg Core Values Guide to align your vision today! Make your relationship resolutions, goals and dreams come true and create a shared life you love!

~~ Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Interested in Couple Therapy, Marriage Counseling, Relationship Coaching, Individual Therapy or Support Sessions?

We can help with our select memberships:
Radiance Membership – Transformational content and experiences subscription (Only $29 per month!) 
Success Membership – Private sessions and Radiance Membership access! (Start with an Initial Session)

~~ Interested in being our Guest? Interested in having Emma be a Guest in your Podcast?
Contact us about a possible collaboration!

 

 

DISCLAIMER: This content is meant to support your Journey and not as a replacement for professional assistance. Additionally, the ideas and resources provides by our guests are their ideas and recommendations alone and not necessarily a reflection of mine

Copyright (c) 2025 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.

How to Upshift for your New Beginning [VIDEO]

How to Upshift for your New Beginning [VIDEO]

Are you feeling inspired and motivated yet? Or, are you feeling out of sorts and kind of blue? Are you wanting to get better traction for the New Year? It recently heard that people use January as a breather from the hectic of the prior end-of-year… I’m wondering if this is true. I haven’t found this to be so, as an intentional tactic anyway… I think that most people mean to hit the New Year running but they immediately lose oomph, or they can’t get themselves into high gear. 

This ends up affecting their wellbeing, productivity, joy and even connectedness with their partner and other loved ones… Life just isn’t satisfying… It is not fun to feel out of sorts, floundering, unmotivated, overwhelmed, lost and the like… 

The key to any New Beginning, reset, or just plain and simple taking charge of our life to mold it into what we desire lies in how we choose to look at life itself… It has to do with how we view ourselves in our life, how we look at our context and situation, how we look at our partner, how we look at the world and everything else that is important to us…

Yes, getting esoteric and philosophical here for a moment – don’t worry, you know I always bring it down to takeaways, practical application, and assignments… I got you! 

First, we have to take the bird’s eye view of our Human Experience… Asking ourselves questions as to:

~ What is the meaning of our life?
~ What is our purpose?
~ How does our relationship play into it?
~ How is our partner our Life Partner?
~ How does our connection support our Journey?
~ What kind of life do we want to live?
~ What kind of legacy do we want to leave behind…?

Not for the faint of heart. But without the big questions how do we even know what we want to create and how to go about it? Usually, not only do we not have the answer, or thought-out answers, to these questions, but we also don’t have our back in going about creating the experience we want… 

As I mature and become wiser. As I practice what I preach. As I ongoingly seek to uplevel my experience while being deeply grateful and in awe of what it already is. As I learn more and do more research. As I connect with people smarter and more learned than me. I realize how beautiful and magnificent everyone is in our Human Experience. 

And, I realize that most everything boils down to Love… Don’t roll your eyes, hang in there. You’ll like this, I promise…

Everything boils down to Love… 

~ The way we are treated, is a reflection of how we treat ourselves… If we don’t love ourselves and treat ourselves well (including our ongoing self-talk in our head!), we won’t receive very good treatment… 
~ When we don’t feel well it usually has to do with how we’ve neglected ourselves… 
~ The happiest moments in our life can be narrowed down to moments of love and connection… 
~ Everything we do is primarily out of love and for our loved ones at the end of the day. 
~ When we think about what kind of life we would like to have lived, I’m sure very few people would say that they would prefer to have lived it alone.

Research shows that in advanced years people who had a successful relationship live long, healthy, and happy lives.

Therefore, it behooves us to start off by upleveling how we love ourselves… How we do our Self-Love Practice, and how we choose to show up in the world – including how we show up to our relationship. We can choose to be the Best Partner because we are connected with ourself, resourced, and very much brimming with love, and we can create the most amazing relationship in turn…

It all starts with the decision to want to uplevel your relationship and your life… 

Watch the video to learn how to start your New Beginning! 

 

 

Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…

With Much Love & Light!

 

PS: Related Articles
Change starts with you…
Strategy to change course…
3 Steps to your New Year Strategy
Habit building for best life
The power of having Intentional Habits™
Intentional habits to glide into the New Year with ease
New habits, routines and motivation
Coping with healthy vs unhealthy habits

 

PSS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?

Interested in Couple Therapy, Marriage Counseling, Relationship Coaching, Individual Therapy or Support Sessions?

We can help with our private and group memberships:
Success Membership

Radiance Membership

 

Look forward to seeing you inside!

 

   Copyright (c) 2024 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.

 

Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include:
Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™
with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com

Just having a pretty idea of what we want to realize is not enough… [VIDEO]

Just having a pretty idea of what we want to realize is not enough… [VIDEO]

As we get deeper into January, we might be ready to get over the slump of the New Year and possibly already having quit working on our intentions and goals… The key to creating change is knowing what we want to create and then doing something about it… Action without vision might lead us in the wrong direction. And vision without action, just doesn’t become a reality… So… It’s time to step out of the slump, grogginess, and disorientation… It’s time to step into alignment, integration, and progress with ease, beauty and flow…

A pretty idea of what we want to realize is not enough…

And, that if we even have an idea… Most people are going through life without knowing what they want to create… Without having dreams they are striving for, without having a vision of the life they want to live. How are they supposed to live the life they want if they don’t identify what kind of life it is they want to live. The same goes for their relationship. This is not how we create our New Beginnings… Without intentionality we create by default and old programming… We don’t create what we desire… 

So first things first, we have to identify what we value, what we desire, what we want to create, what we want to experience, what kind of life and relationship we want to realize…

Investigating the why we want the things we want is a huge help because sometimes we are being robotic about stating what we want, when with further exploration we might not actually want what we thought we did…

Once we are truly in touch with what we desire and why, then we can go about taking steps to making it happen. 

Now, the thing about this is again that we can under or over do this approach depending on who we are… The key is to identify how to go about creating what we desire with ease and joy, not by whiteknuckling it. Gone are the days of the Grind… But we are still to find our stride with how we realize what we desire with a less aggressive and destructive approach… And, obviously not by not doing anything… 

Creating change, flowing through transitions, and having our New Beginnings, have to do with honoring who we are, resourcing ourselves, leveraging and integrating this new way into how we go about our life so we create what we desire with ease, joy, and enjoyment!

We can realize and experience anything we desire…

 

 

Watch our previous Podcast Episodes on our YouTube channel

Get this FREE Identifying Your Core Values exercise

 

Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…

With Much Love & Light!

 

PS: Related Articles
Change starts with you…
Strategy to change course…
3 Steps to your New Year Strategy
Habit building for best life
The power of having Intentional Habits™
Intentional habits to glide into the New Year with ease
New habits, routines and motivation
Coping with healthy vs unhealthy habits

 

PSS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?

Interested in Couple Therapy, Marriage Counseling, Relationship Coaching, Individual Therapy or Support Sessions?

We can help with our private and group memberships:
Success Membership

Radiance Membership

 

Look forward to seeing you inside!

 

   Copyright (c) 2024 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.

 

Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include:
Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™
with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com

How to make sure you get your New Beginning

How to make sure you get your New Beginning

As we embark in this New Year, it is up to us what kind of experience we have and what we are able to realize… Even though a New Year brings with it the promise and excitement of newness, it can feel like a letdown when January 1st rolls around, and life is as it was the day before… Why should the first of the year be any different than any other day? The thing is that It is. Because we say so… We can have a new beginning at any time, including on the first of the year… 

So why then, it the first of the year not any different? Well, I challenge you to reconsider if it actually isn’t… 

For you see we are always changing, nothing is EVER the same… We are in a constant state of flux. No two moments are the same. Change is actually the only constant in life… The first of the year is different than the day before and than any other day before it and after it… 

When things feel stuck, the same, and not able to change it’s because we choose to keep constructing the same story about our experience… We are the ones that choose what we observe, what dots we connect, and what meaning we assign our experience… 

If we have the same old thoughts, the same old observations, the same old reactions, the same old conversations, the same old expectations- guess what? We create a very predictable life… We continue to recreate the same thing over and over… 

If we are really about creating some new and having a new beginning, all we need to do is suspend the usual… Quiet down the chatter in our head. Mind the habits we engage in from the moment we open our eyes in the morning. Intentionally choose what to focus on and give our attention to at any given moment. Stay open to the flow of life. Look for the synchronicities, the serendipity, the blessings, the magic… Stay in expectation of surprise, delight, and joy. 

When we set up our day to live this way, when we align with what is important to us, when we cultivate this state, and when we orient ourselves to realize our fullest potential of our human experience, then that’s the experience we have…

We experience a delightful life- where when we are sick we are just upgrading our body, when something breaks it’s a chance to upgrade it, when someone lets us down it’s an opportunity for a meaningful conversation, and so on… 

Then everything is just marvelous. Life is all you desire it to be, and it’s pregnant with promise and blessings…

 

Watch our Podcast Episodes on our YouTube channel

Get this FREE Identifying Your Core Values exercise

 

Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…

With Much Love & Light!

 

PS: Related Articles
Change starts with you…
Strategy to change course…
3 Steps to your New Year Strategy
Habit building for best life
The power of having Intentional Habits™
Intentional habits to glide into the New Year with ease
New habits, routines and motivation
Coping with healthy vs unhealthy habits

 

PSS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?

Interested in Couple Therapy, Marriage Counseling, Relationship Coaching, Individual Therapy or Support Sessions?

We can help with our private and group memberships:
Success Membership

Radiance Membership

 

Look forward to seeing you inside!

 

   Copyright (c) 2024 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.

 

Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include:
Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™
with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com

Uplevel EVERYTHING by embracing a Self-Love Practice… [VIDEO]

Uplevel EVERYTHING by embracing a Self-Love Practice… [VIDEO]

A lot of times we want to create change in our relationship and our life, but believe it’s too hard or even impossible… Well, let me tell you that it’s actually neither! Change is totally possible if we truly desire it… It might be hard, if we make it so… 

The thing is that a lot of times we simply get in our way of creating the relationship and life we desire. We do that by being stubborn about being right about how are partner, or others, are wrong! 

We do that hanging on to limiting believes and ways of looking at relationships and life that are not conducive to joy, harmony, and love… 

And, we do that by grinding and banging around our life without full personal ownership, without intentionality, and without commitment and purpose. 

We create our own hell… We rather take the dopamine hit and the secondary gain than step up our game with simple tactics that just elevate EVERYTHING… This is the key to creating your New Reality…

It is actually that simple…

In this Podcast episode, I share my Signature Self-Love Practice to help you in getting out of your own way, create the space for the new, and show up differently to your relationship and your life so you can realize everything you desire…

 

 

Watch our previous Podcast Episodes on our YouTube channel

Get our FREE Identifying Your Core Values exercise

 

Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…

With Much Love & Light!

 

PS: Related Articles
Change starts with you…
Strategy to change course…
3 Steps to your New Year Strategy
Habit building for best life
The power of having Intentional Habits™
Intentional habits to glide into the New Year with ease
New habits, routines and motivation
Coping with healthy vs unhealthy habits

 

PSS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?

Interested in Couple Therapy, Marriage Counseling, Relationship Coaching, Individual Therapy or Support Sessions?

We can help with our private and group memberships:
Sessions Membership

Radiance Membership

 

Look forward to seeing you inside!

 

   Copyright (c) 2024 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.

 

Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include:
Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™
with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com

Pin It on Pinterest