How to: Fall in love with life (again)

The winter months can bring with them some dreary weather, and this weather often comes with those typical gloomy blues, so it becomes exceedingly important for us to focus on ourselves in this season. That makes it the prime time for falling back in love with life, and I’m going to run through some of the best ways for you to do this.

Romanticising life may feel like one of those nonsense TikTok phrases, a silly buzzword that goes viral and everyone pretends that they understand, but at its core, it is a beautiful thing that we need to think about more. The easiest way to enjoy life is not to force yourself to change it, cramming in thousands of hobbies that just contribute more to your stress and become unenjoyable, but rather to find the little joys that already exist in life. In the same way that people preach about finding love within yourself before expecting someone to find that love in you (shout out to Mr Anderson from The Perks of Being a Wallflower!), we can’t just upend our entire lives trying to find the ‘perfect life’. We must find that excitement in ourselves.

Wander around in nature, appreciate those little things, make plans with the people you want to see – don’t feel forced into a passenger role in your own life by stress

When I look back on my childhood, it feels like the entire world was in technicolour, and it makes me wonder where I went wrong. When did I lose this worldview? But really, all we need to do is search for those bursts of colour in the mundane, and our days will again be filled with childlike wonder! And the romanticisation of life is at the heart of that.

Being a student, to put it plainly, can be incredibly draining – often we feel like we are constantly weighed down by preparative work, and scheduled contact hours seem to seep into any free time we may have had. For us to be able to fall back in love with life, we need to learn to approach things positively, and a good place to start with this is our outlook on academic work. Finding your happy place and relaxed mindset is key to not dreading studying, whether that is treating yourself to a hot drink and sweet treat in a snug corner of a local café or lighting a candle, playing some music and settling into a solo study date in your room.

Finding love for life is simple: stop expecting so much from it

Another thing that I find valuable is taking the time to live intentionally. Don’t let this time pass you by – if you want to try something new, have a stab at it! The simplest things can make your day, and one good day snowballs into a good week and, the next thing you know, you’re back into the groove of life. Wander around in nature, appreciate those little things, make plans with the people you want to see – don’t feel forced into a passenger role in your own life by stress.

Finding love for life is simple: stop expecting so much from it. Performative displays of the picture-perfect life are plastered all over social media and seeing them can often make us feel like we’re failing in our own lives, yet it’s crucial not to forget that we are human. The glamourised life on the internet censors all of the little mistakes, the bad days, the ups and downs – everything which makes us truly real – and these are the things that we cannot push down, acknowledging them will allow us to appreciate living to the fullest.

To be living, as we are, is so easily taken for granted, when it is one of the most incredible things ever. So, today, take a moment to step back and appreciate the little things in your life – move away from the destructive cycle of doomscrolling, treat yourself, and take the time to connect with nature and appreciate the world you get to live in.