Tis the Season

For a lot of us in the mid to upper half of the country winter has found us with a passion. Most of the northern states are really getting hit by the snow and ice. That will of course make our trip to Disney, in two weeks, that much sweeter. We need things like that to look forward to, having a light at the end of our tunnels keeps us sane.

This time a year is the worst for depression. Without bright spots on the horizon life can seem pretty bleak. We adult athletes have an edge here because we usually have a trip or even just a race planned soon. One of the big causes of depression is the feeling of being out of control, like you have no control over anything in your life. We do have control over ourselves. We can be the masters of our own thoughts and our bodies. We may not be able to control the constant bad news that cable news spits out everyday but we can control our own outlook on life.

Working in a mall the way I do, I get to watch the masses of people moving by my doors. Many look completely lost this time of year. They wander by with blank looks on their faces, I guess hoping that an idea of the perfect gift will pop into their heads. It's really bad on Christmas eve. Talk about a deer in the headlights look, it could be changed to the last minute shopper look.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that things are not usually as bad as we make them out to be. This is the information age but it's also the communication age. We can pick up our cell phones and make a call or send a quick text message. We have literally a whole world of new friends at the other ends of our computer keyboards. We never have to be alone anymore if we don't want to.

As adult athletes we have a vast support group of brothers and sisters out there in cyber space. We have places to go where we are understood and where we are welcome as long as we go as friends. Sometimes something nice happens to us and we just want to share our joy, our on line families are a good place to share because you need to hear positive stories to balance all the bad news you hear.

As we go forward to the end of this Christmas season and this year, lets all make a decision to dwell on the positive in our lives and not the negative.

Thanks for reading.

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