Seasonal Depression And The Chanukah Candles

By Jonathan Green, LMHC

The first time I attended a Buddhist meditation retreat was during the semester break of my senior year of college. It was the end of December, and the retreat was held at the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts. We spent our days in silence: walking, sitting, walking, sitting. It was cold and snowy outside, and the meditation center had grounds with wooded hiking trails to explore between “sits.” Every chance I got, I’d rush out to the woods, pushing back my winter hat to free my ears so that I could feel the cold air and hear the quiet.

The teachers on the retreat spoke about winter as an invitation to slow down and hear the murmurs inside ourselves that we’ve been ignoring in the busy-ness of our lives. The quiet trails in the woods blanketed by snow on top of the autumn leaves was a mirror to the inner quiet that is the main purpose of meditation.

Outside of the meditation hall, when winter comes, many of us experience the low mood, lack of motivation, and depressive feelings that have come to be known as Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). From the perspective of psychoanalytic and psychodynamic therapy, it can be said that the gloomier weather of winter creates external conditions whereby one’s distractions from their pre-existing inner conflicts are no longer as reliable. There is a Chassidic teaching that one of the meanings of “Bereishit bara Elokim” is that Hashem created nature with reishit or hitchadshut, the power of renewal. During the long warm days of the summer, there are ample opportunities to renew ourselves in the beauty and inspiration of nature. But when winter comes and the tennis and pickleball courts ice over, these opportunities are less appealing, and pre-existing psychological pain can surface more readily.

This is especially true for those of us who have what psychoanalysts refer to as “depressive personality patterns.” In his groundbreaking 1917 paper “Mourning and Melancholia,” Sigmund Freud characterized melancholia (depression) as “lowering of the self-regarding feelings to a degree that finds utterance in self-reproaches and self-reviling.” Freud famously posits that depression can be understood as “anger turned inward,” whereby depressive personalities internalize what otherwise would have been experienced as disappointment or anger toward others as negative or deficient aspects of themselves. Perhaps Freud had heard the teachings found in Chassidus that depression is a result of deficiency in the sefira of yesod, which connotes deficiency in a person’s foundational sense of “self.”

These personalities are more prone than others to experience the pervasive misery of Major Depressive Episodes, but this does not indicate that they will inevitably fall into full clinical depression. Many robust and even happy people have somewhat depressive personalities, characterized by some quiet but persistent inner gnawing or a sense that there is something fundamentally lacking in the self. In fact, this trait can be part of a healthy psyche that wishes to grow.

Imagine yourself on a gloomy midwinter day, when the overcast skies seem to you to mirror your overcast inner world. It may affect your mood, and you may think to yourself along the lines of “If only the sun would come out, I’d feel so much better.” Though that moment of despondency can feel inevitable, it presents an invitation to ask: “What is really bothering me, deep down? What feelings and fears have I pushed away and replaced with inner rigidity and self-criticism? What in my life, and in myself, have I been ignoring and rejecting, that I know I must correct?”

In Chassidic teachings, chodesh Kislev is described as the month of dreams. Dreams have the unique capacity to reveal previously subconscious knowledge that can balance and strengthen the whole personality. They can reveal the very dynamics that have been holding us back, those same dynamics that are normally inaccessible through the conscious personality’s defense mechanisms. Kislev, the month in which the winter solstice usually falls, carries with it the opportunity to admit to ourselves the previously inadmissible.

I look forward, on each night of Chanukah, to savoring the profound words of Hanerot Halalu:

“We don’t have permission to use these lights other than to simply see them, which in turn is in order to acknowledge and praise your great name, Hashem, for your miracles, wonders, and salvations.”

If I had understood the meditation instructions in these words, perhaps I would not have had to spend the semester break of my senior year in college on a silent meditation retreat. The glowing candles themselves direct us to slow down and turn inward for a set time on the nights of Chanukah. We don’t have permission to use them for any pragmatic purposes or distractions, just to sit and gaze at them.

By looking at the candles without distraction, we can grow quiet and introspective, and are more able to open to and appreciate the inner dynamics that have been gnawing at us. We can even increase our ability to forgive and heal ourselves for that pain, thereby coming to understand that we’re really gazing inward, at our inner candle. This inner candle is our neshamah, which Mishlei tells us is the Ner Hashem, the Divine candle.

In “Modim Anachnu Lach,” we are thankful for Hashem’s miracles and wonders. But on the nights of Chanukah we add the element of yeshuatecha, salvation. It is specifically through gazing at the candles, and finding our inner candle, through lirot bilvad, that we can enlighten our own personal healing and redemption. So, on Chanukah night, when we gaze outwards at the candles and inwards at ourselves, we can know that while we may have our struggles, our inner self is not deficient, but rather made of light.

Chanukah Sameach. 

Jonathan Green, LMHC, is a psychotherapist in private practice in Cedarhurst. He specializes in therapy with men and teenagers struggling with relationship conflict, low self-esteem, anxiety, depression, and addictions and compulsions. He draws from psychoanalytic and spiritual disciplines to support the emergence and strengthening of each patient’s true Self. He can be contacted through JonathanGreenTherapy.com, or by calling him 917-720-6506.