Despair

A new study reveals the alarming impact of TikTok on young adults’ body image, showing that just 7 to 8 minutes of exposure to certain content can significantly damage one’s body image.

Researchers studied female TikTok users aged 18 to 28. Participants were split into two groups: one watched what the authors deemed “pro-anorexia” and “fitspiration” content, while the other viewed neutral videos like nature and cooking clips. Interestingly enough, both groups reported a decrease in their self-esteem after watching the videos. But those exposed to fitspiration content had the greatest decrease in body image satisfaction.

This isn’t an isolated finding. Other studies have shown that prolonged social media use is linked to increased anxiety, depression, and disordered eating behaviors.

One of the most concerning aspects is how widespread this content is. 64% of participants reported seeing disordered eating videos on their For You page without searching for it. Even seeking out positive content on TikTok can lead to inadvertent exposure to harmful material.

The study’s findings add to the ongoing discussion of the negative impact of social media on the mental and physical health of young adults. Earlier in 2024 at a U.S. Senate hearing that included TikTok CEO Shou Chew, senators made one thing clear: tech companies need to be held responsible for not protecting young users from harm.

“You have blood on your hands,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham in his opening remarks. “You have a product that’s killing people … You can’t be sued, you should be!”

The study shows that it only takes a few minutes on TikTok to cause serious damage. In order to protect one’s body image, it might be time for young adults to rethink how they use social media.

In her testimony for Christianity Today, Caresse Spencer recounts how she demolished her faith in pursuit of her "best life" during the pandemic.

In 2020, I typed two lethal words: F- God. With that, I resigned from Christianity. As the world fell apart due to the pandemic, my faith crumbled too. I stripped my vocabulary of the term God, soaked in the oppression of my past. Anger consumed me.

Caresse began questioning Christian teachings, especially around sexuality and biblical contradictions. Years of suppressing her desires left her feeling robbed and burdened by faith. Torn between the God she once served and her true self, she finally chose herself, embarking on what she called a “world tour”-exploring queer love, polyamory, sex, drugs, and even other religions. “I said yes to everything I had once denied myself and believed I had found freedom.”

Initially, the rebellion felt exhilarating: “There’s a rush that comes with rebellion and a thrill in doing things once feared.” But anxiety and emptiness crept in. She found herself “floating in a vast emptiness-lost and scared. Life had lost its meaning.” When rebellion no longer satisfied, she was left with “no God, no faith, no love, no peace.”

Suicidal thoughts became a constant presence. At her lowest, she cried out, “Help me!” and then a Christian friend called, asking if she was okay. For the first time, she admitted she was not. Her friend’s support pulled her back from the brink. Later, her sister gently asked, “Do you want to surrender?” Caresse accepted: “It was the invitation I’d been waiting for without even knowing it. I said yes-to surrendering my pride, confusion, rebellion, and emptiness. My life changed in an instant.”

Now, she talks to God about everything and has found peace. “God refused to let me die in disbelief. Because of this grace, I now understand that the only way to find true life is to lose it first.”

A recent article in The Wall Street Journal notes that “Fake Job Postings Are Becoming a Real Problem.” The article details how these fake postings are crushing the spirits of job seekers:

It’s a common feeling when looking at a job listing online: the title is perfect, the pay is right, and the company seems like a solid place to work. But you also wonder if that job is real.

Lots of job seekers have a story about the postings that linger online but never seem to get filled. Those so-called ghost jobs—the roles that companies advertise but have no intention of filling—may account for as much as one in five jobs advertised online.

The [fake] listings are dispiriting for workers, leading many to distrust potential employers and make a difficult process feel rigged against them. ‘It’s kind of a horror show,’ said one job site search business. ‘The job market has become more soul-crushing than ever.’

Possible Preaching Angle:

In the same way, the lies of the world, the flesh, and the devil can crush our souls with false promises and expectations.

In a New York Times piece “Gen Z Has Regrets,” Jonathan Haidt and co-writer Will Johnson ask if young people wish social media had never existed. Between a third and a half say they do!

Nearly all American teenagers use social media regularly, and they spend an average of nearly five hours a day just on these platforms. 52 percent say social media has benefited their lives, and 29 percent say it has hurt them personally. We have found this pattern…in a wide array of surveys.

We’re not just talking about sad feelings from FOMO or social comparison. We’re talking about a range of documented risks that affect heavy users, including sleep deprivation, body image distortion, depression, anxiety, exposure to content promoting suicide and eating disorders, sexual predation and sextortion, and “problematic use,” which is the term used to describe compulsive overuse that interferes with success in other areas of life.

If any other consumer product was causing serious harm to more than one out of every 10 of its young users, there would be a tidal wave of state and federal legislation to ban or regulate it. In 2020 Sarah Condon said, “We are in the 1920s of cigarettes when it comes to social media.” In 2024, the prognosis seems clear!

Gen Z does not heavily regret the basic communication, storytelling, and information-seeking functions of the internet. If smartphones merely let people text each other, watch movies and search for helpful information, or interesting videos (without algorithms intended to hook users), there would be far less regret and resentment.

Respondents wished these products had never been invented:

Instagram (34 percent)

Facebook (37 percent)

Snapchat (43 percent)

TikTok (47 percent)

X/Twitter (50 percent)

When disaster strikes and it’s time to evacuate, what valuables are you taking with you? One survey finds that answer often differs depending on your age — and not everyone makes wise decisions.

It turns out Americans are more likely to grab their cell phone than their Social Security card during an emergency evacuation. A survey of 2,000 U.S. adults revealed that in an emergency situation, Gen Zers are more likely to grab their laptop (35%) or a pair of shoes (35%) than their prescription medications (30%) if they only have five minutes to pack.

Gen X, on the other hand, is the least likely to take clothing with them (33%) and would rather save their family photo albums (43%). Meanwhile, baby boomers are more likely to grab their jewelry, including engagement rings and wedding bands, than they are to take water (21%) or food (17%) during an emergency evacuation.

When asked about the most important item (not including people or pets) in their home, it’s clear that Americans are clinging to sentimental value. Respondents had unique answers for things they’d grab, such as “the heart necklace that was my grandmother’s,” “the urns holding loved ones remains, and “the flag from my father’s funeral for his service in the military.”

In a more realistic sense, this may be why almost two-thirds of Americans take emergency preparedness more seriously today than they did 10 years ago. The top reason for being more prepared was concern over the increase in natural disasters.

The survey gave respondents just 60 seconds to select items from the standard Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) emergency preparedness checklist, mixed with a few other household items.

Possible Preaching Angle:

This could teach a valuable lesson about material possessions. The idea forces people to think about what they want versus what they really need and the consequences of their decisions. What are the absolute essentials in your life? This could also lead to a discussion about what you are sending ahead to heaven that is being guarded for you (Matt. 6:20; 2 Tim 1:12).

On the slope of a hill in Camp John Hay, you will find a rather unconventional attraction. Rather than tombs enclosing remains of dead humans, this cemetery is filled with cute tablets with inspiring inscriptions.

The Cemetery of Negativism was established by John Hightower in 1981. At that time he was the commanding general of Camp John Hay, about a 30-minute drive from Baguio City in the Philippines. The cemetery is a symbolic site for burying negativism—emotions, frustrations, attitudes, and thoughts that today we would call “bad vibes.”

At the entrance of the cemetery, a reminder reads, “Negativism is man’s greatest self-imposed infliction, his most limiting factor, his heaviest burden. No more, for here is buried the world’s negativism for all time. Those who rest here have died not in vain—but for you a stern reminder. As you leave this hill remember that the rest of your life. Be More Positive.”

Inscribed on one of the tombs is “Itz not possible. Conceived 11 Nov 1905. Still not Born.” Another tomb says “Why Dident I? Born???? Lived wondering why. Died for no reason.” There are dozens of different shapes and styles adorned with tiny sculptures of animals, flowers, and humans among others. The inscriptions are open to interpretations but the overall theme encourages visitors to open their minds, reflect, and leave the place in a better state than when they came in.

Camp John Hay is a popular tourist destination in Baguio City known for its tranquility, beautiful well-maintained park and gardens, luxurious mountain retreat, and shopping. The camp served as the summer refuge of the Americans from 1900 until 1991 when American bases were turned over to the Philippine government.

Possible Preaching Angle:

The weight of past mistakes can be a heavy burden to bear. Regret and negativity can consume us, leaving us feeling trapped in a cycle of self-blame and shame. However, the Bible offers a message of hope and redemption. Through faith in Jesus, we can experience a transformation of heart and mind. We are given the power to let go of the past and embrace a new life filled with hope and purpose. (Rom. 8:1; Psalm 103:12).

The day after the Trump assassination attempt, The Wall Street Journal ran a story in which they interviewed Americans about the state of our nation. The article concluded, “The weariness was palpable nationwide as The Wall Street Journal spoke with more than four dozen people about how they felt about the shooting that came close to killing a former U.S. president. They pointed fingers and expressed anger, fear, and heartbreak...”

Nearly to person, they expressed a sense of dread, saying there seems to be no good news on the horizon… But unlike other times of crisis, after 9/11 or Sandy Hook or George Floyd, this event left few Americans hopeful that any good might come out of tragedy.

A sixty-three-year-old cook said, “The world has gone to Hades in a handbasket.” A thirty-two-year-old electrician from New Orleans said, “There’s a hole in this country…We’re not sticking together.” A retired project manager said, “We’re in crisis. There is no easy solution, there’s no sound bite. We’ve lost our ability to listen or to hear.”

The article ended by focusing on a married couple in their late 40s from Austin, Texas. “They used to joke about plans to survive a zombie apocalypse,” the authors noted. “Now they talk seriously whether they can afford land outside of a city. A quiet place away from civil unrest.”

A Florida mother has sued artificial intelligence chatbot startup Character.AI accusing it of causing her 14-year-old son's suicide in February of 2024. She said he became addicted to the company's service and deeply attached to a chatbot it created.

Megan Garcia is on a mission to raise awareness about the dangers of AI. Garcia maintains that the site’s protocols to protect children are woefully inadequate, and wants to spare other parents from the pain she’s had to endure.

In an interview, Garcia said, “I want them to understand that this is a platform that the designers chose to put out without proper guardrails, safety measures or testing, and it is a product that is designed to keep our kids addicted and to manipulate them.”

Garcia maintains that her son, Sewell Setzer III, had been chatting with an AI chatbot on the platform for months, and that as a result, he’d become more withdrawn and sullen. Sewell eventually quit the JV basketball team during this time.

It was only after confiscating his phone as punishment for misbehavior that Garcia discovered that many of the chatbot’s conversations with her son were sexually explicit. “I don’t think any parent would approve of that,” said Garcia, adding that the discovery was “gut wrenching.”

In the lawsuit, Garcia says that her son had been specifically chatting with it in the moments before he died. In the exchange, Sewell had mentioned considering self-harm, and the chatbot seemed to encourage that desire. Sewell then shot himself with his stepfather's pistol "seconds" later, the lawsuit said.

Garcia said, “There were no suicide pop-up boxes that said, ‘If you need help, please call the suicide crisis hotline.’ None of that. I don’t understand how a product could allow that, where a bot is not only continuing a conversation about self-harm but also prompting it and kind of directing it.”

After the lawsuit was announced, Character.AI announced a sweeping set of changes designed to protect its younger users, a move that Garcia derided as “too little, too late.”

In May of 2023, over 5,000 Americans were asked “Do you currently have or are you currently being treated for depression?" The study showed that around 24% of women in the U.S. reported currently having or being treated for depression, compared to 11% of men.

These numbers have increased from a similar study in 2017, when 17.6% of women reported currently having or being treated for depression, compared to 9% of men. In six years, the total number of men and women having or being treated for depression increased from 13.5% (2017) to 17.8% (2023).

• According to the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), 1 in 5 Americans suffer from a mental illness.
• Anxiety disorders are the highest reported mental health issue in the U.S. with 42.5 million Americans claiming to suffer from this illness. (Mental Health America).
• Mental health crises account for 60 million visits to primary care and 6 million ER visits annually. (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention).
• More than 40,000 Americans die annually from suicide, which is the 10th leading cause of death in the U.S.

Editor’s Note: You can view many more mental health statistics here and here.

On a recent episode of The Howard Stern Show, the “shock-jock” host asked his guest, music legend Paul Simon, questions about music, life, art, and anything else that came to mind. Stern rose to fame with his exaltation of immorality and self-adulation. At the end of the interview, Stern said:

Paul, just give me one last answer. You seem very wise. You’ve lived through everything. You’ve created great masterpieces. Is there a God? Because I need to know. I’m getting older. Is this it for me? Am I going to die and that’s it or am I going somewhere? And please answer it in a serious manner.

Simon responded,

This is my feeling about God or Creator. The planet that I’m living on is so beautiful and the universe is so awe-inspiring. If that is the work of a creator, I say, “Thanks so much. I really love your work on the universe. Excellent work, coming from me, Paul Simon, to you, I really dig what you’re doing.” If it turns out that there’s another explanation for creation, I’m still unbelievably grateful for my existence. I still think it’s amazing. If it turns out, I thought it was God but it’s some other explanation, it doesn’t matter to me ….

Then, Stern interrupted, “But it’s so cruel. We have this existence and then we have to disappear. It’s hard.”

In 2023, an Australian man said that a chatbot had saved his life. He was a musician who had been battling depression for decades and found companionship with an AI through an app called Replika, and everything changed. He started playing the guitar again, went clothes shopping for the first time in years, spent hours conversing with his AI companion, and laughing out loud.

Though the musician felt less alone with his AI companion, his isolation from other people was unchanged. He was adamant that he had a real friendship, but understood clearly that no person was on the other side of his screen. The effect of this bond was extraordinary.

Replika, and other chatbots, have millions of active users. People turn to these apps for all sorts of reasons. They’re looking for attention and for reassurance. But the apps’ core experience is texting as you would with a buddy. They’re talking about the petty minutiae so fundamental to being alive: “Someone stole my yogurt from the office fridge;” “I had a weird dream;” “My dachshund seems sad.”

To Replika’s users, this feels a lot like friendship. In actuality, the relationship is more like the fantasized intimacy people feel with celebrities and influencers who carefully create desirable personae for our screens. These parasocial bonds are defined by their asymmetry—one side is almost totally ignorant of the other’s existence.

Jesse Fox, a communications professor at Ohio State University, said that if we continue relationships that seem consensual and reciprocal but are not, we risk carrying bad models of interaction into the real world. Fox is particularly concerned by the habits men form through sexual relationships with AIs who never say no. “We start thinking, ‘Oh, this is how women interact. This is how I should talk to and treat a woman.’”

Sometimes the shift is more subtle—researchers and parents alike have expressed concern that barking orders at devices such as Amazon’s Echo is conditioning children to become tiny dictators. Fox said, “When we are humanizing these things, we’re also, in a way, dehumanizing people.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

Church; Fellowship; Friendship - This illustration highlights the wise exhortation of Scripture to “never neglect meeting together, as is the habit of some, but encourage one another” (Heb. 10:25). God did not create us to be alone (Gen. 2:18) but to find fellowship, encouragement, and love in the company of others.

Some experts call it “the new great depression.” Since the rise of social media, depression and feelings of hopelessness have skyrocketed among teens. According to a new poll, nearly half of teens now say they agree with phrases like “I can’t do anything right,” “I do not enjoy life” and “My life is not useful”—roughly twice as many as did just a decade ago.

Psychologist Dr. Jean Twenge says, “These are staggering numbers, just enormous increases, and parents are rightfully very concerned about their children’s mental health.”

The poll, conducted by the University of Michigan is just the latest startling revelation about youth mental health, as rates of teen anxiety and depression have grown.

The number one cause, according to Twenge, is social media and screen time. In fact, rates of teen depressive symptoms have increased massively since the mass popularization of the smartphone in the early 2010. “There’s no question that is the primary cause of the increase in teen depression now,” Twenge said. “It’s by far the largest change in teens’ everyday lives over the past 10 to 12 years. Nothing else even comes close.”

A Gen Z journalist named Rikki Schlott wrote an essay to explain her generation to parents of Gen Z children. She called the essay “her best shot to explain the malaise of my generation.”

Gen Z has inherited a post-hope world, stripped of what matters. Instead, we have been offered a smorgasbord of easy and unsatisfying substitutes. All the things that have traditionally made life worth living — love, community, country, faith, work, and family — have been “debunked.”

“These are the sentiments I hear often from peers”:

• Love — “Monogamy is so outdated.”
• Community — “I have enough friends online.”
• Country — “I’m embarrassed to be an American.”
• Work — “I’m quiet-quitting.”
• Family — “I’m not bringing kids into this melting world.”
• Faith — “My parents are such naive Bible thumpers. By the way, what’s your star sign?”

Everything that matters has been devalued for Zoomers, leaving behind a generation with gaping holes where the foundations of a meaningful life should be. They’re desperately grasping for alternative purpose-making systems, all of which fall short.

I’m not saying all Zoomers should become church-going office drones who churn out babies and never question their country. But our dismal mental health records and the scars on our wrists seem to indicate that becoming faithless digital vagabonds is just not working out for us.

Admiral William H. McRaven writes about what he learned during Navy SEAL training that has helped him and could help anyone live a better life. Hope. He said:

Hope is the most powerful force in the universe. With hope you can inspire nations to greatness. With hope you can raise up the downtrodden. With hope you can ease the pain of unbearable loss. Sometimes all it takes is one person to make a difference.

We will all find ourselves neck dep in mud someday. That is the time to sing loudly, to smile broadly, to lift up those around you and give them hope that tomorrow will be a better day.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Hope truly is a powerful force and yet “living hope” goes beyond what is satisfying in life because it is based on the resurrection of Jesus. Our hope is living because Jesus is alive.

In his article for The Atlantic, David Brooks says that recently he’s been obsessed with the following two questions:

The first is: Why have Americans become so sad? The rising rates of depression have been well publicized, as have the rising deaths of despair from drugs, alcohol, and suicide. But other statistics are similarly troubling. The percentage of people who say they don’t have close friends has increased fourfold since 1990. The share of Americans ages 25 to 54 who weren’t married or living with a romantic partner went up to 38 percent in 2019, from 29 percent in 1990. A record-high 25 percent of 40-year-old Americans have never married. More than half of all Americans say that no one knows them well. The percentage of high-school students who report “persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness” shot up from 26 percent in 2009 to 44 percent in 2021.

My second, related question is: Why have Americans become so mean? I was recently talking with a restaurant owner who said that he has to eject a customer from his restaurant for rude or cruel behavior once a week—something that never used to happen. A head nurse at a hospital told me that many on her staff are leaving the profession because patients have become so abusive. At the far extreme of meanness, hate crimes rose in 2020 to their highest level in 12 years. Murder rates have been surging, at least until recently. Same with gun sales. Social trust is plummeting. In 2000, two-thirds of American households gave to charity; in 2018, fewer than half did. The words that define our age reek of menace: conspiracy, polarization, mass shootings, trauma, safe spaces.

Brooks concludes: “We’re enmeshed in some sort of emotional, relational, and spiritual crisis, and it undergirds our political dysfunction and the general crisis of our democracy.”

A young woman named Trieste Belmont was struggling with depression. Her grandmother had just passed, and she was going through a dramatic break-up. She was teaching a dance class at this time, but without a driver’s license, she relied on a friend to drive her to and from work every week. One day however the friend didn’t show, and Belmont waited for hours before being forced to walk home.

The route she used went over a high bridge. And when she got there, she stopped for a moment. She said:

I was just having one of the worst days of my life. And I was looking down at all the cars, just feeling so useless and like such a burden to everyone in my life that I decided that this was the time and I needed to end my life. I was sobbing and crying and working up the courage to just go through with it, because I knew at that moment that it was going to make everyone’s lives better.

At that moment, a driver, whose face Belmont didn’t see, and whose hand she would never shake, passed over the bridge and hollered out of the window. “Don’t jump,” they said.

It immediately clicked a lightbulb went on in her head; that if a stranger could care enough to speak up, then suicide was not the answer. She enrolled in therapy, and with the help of her friends, family, and therapist, she is far down the road indeed from that dark and fateful day.

Belmont uses the incident as an example to teach others to be kind to people, as it’s never obvious what they’re going through. The smallest kindness is multiplied by the distance, socially, between two strangers.

Mike Tyson is one of the greatest boxers of all time. Over his career, “Iron Mike” had 50 wins, including 44 knockouts, and only six losses. Coming from a difficult childhood, during which he was surrounded by crime and poverty, he escaped his circumstances through a laser-like focus on his dream of athletic greatness. And he realized that dream in 1986 by becoming the world heavyweight champion at the age of 20.

Despite his success and fame, Tyson was dogged by crises, failed relationships, and legal troubles, including allegations of domestic violence and nearly three years in prison in the 1990s after he was convicted on a charge of rape. He achieved all his ambitions of riches and renown, but a happy life seemed to elude him.

This might seem ironic or contradictory to some. To Tyson, however, it was neither. “You almost have to give your happiness up to accomplish your goals,” he reflected in a 2020 interview.

That is what we might call the Tyson Paradox. Building a good life requires us to have goals that keep us focused, enthusiastic, and out of trouble. But actually, attaining those goals might not give us the payoff we imagined, and could in fact bring us misery. Although most of us will never see the highs and lows that Mike Tyson experienced, we can all easily fall into our own version of the same trap.

In a 2019 PBS documentary America Lost, filmmaker Christopher Rufo explores the devastating plight of three of America's forgotten cities: Youngstown, Ohio; Memphis, Tennessee; and Stockton, California. In a YouTube video, he describes a successful men's ministry in Stockton.

Pastor Jereme of the Men's Recovery Home is shown speaking to a man on the street:

We gotta let go of some of those old ways and those old habits, you know what I mean? I know I was there bro. I ran away from home when I was 15 years old. I was living on the streets. I was gang banging. I was getting high, shooting dope. Doing my thing man, running while carrying a gun. You know I was messed up. I was a hurting man. I didn't know any other way until somebody just like this actually handed me a flyer from Victory Outreach.

I said, “God can change your life” and at that moment I was at a point where I was tired. I was tired of the way I was living. I said “Man what do I have to do?” I was ready to make a change. We got a Christian recovery home for men. It's an intense program to help you get your life together.

Pastor Jereme narrates:

Everybody has a story. Could be through drugs. It could be through abuse. It could be through violence. Our families are broken down, our communities are broken down, people's lives are broken down. They're devastated. That's why this ministry is here. We want to let people know that they're not in a hopeless situation. That as long as they're breathing there's hope.

‘The people that come into our church, they come in hurting. They come in empty. They come in broken. They come in in need of a miracle. In need of a healing. A need of somebody loving them. And that's the beginning of the process. If we can affect a person, we can affect the community. We can affect the city. We can affect the world.’

You can watch the clip here (56 min, 36 sec – 60 min, 31 sec).

If there was any doubt that the national mood could need a dose of uplift, more evidence showed up in late January. On X (formerly known as Twitter), the account for Elmo, the red Muppet from Sesame Street, asked what seemed to be a simple, innocuous question.

“Elmo is just checking in! How is everybody doing?”

In thousands of responses, social media users let Elmo know that no, they were not doing too hot. Users began pouring out their hearts to Elmo:

• “I’m tired, Elmo,” said one user.
• “The world is burning around us, Elmo,” said another.
• “Elmo I’m depressed and broke,” one wrote.
• Others told Elmo that they were anxious about the 2024 election.
• “Each day the abyss we stare into grows a unique horror. one that was previously unfathomable in nature,” replied author Hanif Abdurraqib. “However, I did have a good grapefruit earlier, thanks for asking.”

“I don’t think anyone anticipated how deeply this particular question would resonate,” said Samantha Maltin, a marketing officer for the Sesame Workshop. Maltin believes that Elmo’s question provoked a lot of feelings because his character is rooted in the nostalgic memories of so many millennials.

After about nine thousand responses in about 24 hours, the account posted again. “Wow! Elmo is glad he asked!” it read. “Elmo learned it is important to ask a friend how they are doing.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

It is more important than ever to have dependable friends who will listen to us and to whom we will give a listening ear. Let’s remind ourselves and others that God is always available to hear our troubles and provide “mercy and find grace in time of need” (Heb. 4:16).

With Christmas and New Year celebrations behind us, the cold, dark days of January can really get us down. January 16th has been dubbed by experts as the “most depressing day of the year.” But where does the term come from, and what can you do to combat the blues?

The term Blue Monday was coined by psychologist Dr. Cliff Arnall, who worked out a formula to show how the third Monday in January is especially bad. It takes into account factors including the average time for New Year's resolutions to fail, the bad weather, debt, the time since Christmas, and motivational levels.

On average, 1 in 15 people become depressed in winter and suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). It is believed that the problem is related to the way that the body responds to light. The main theory suggests that a lack of sunlight may stop a part of the brain called the hypothalamus from working properly. This could impact the production of the hormone melatonin, which makes you feel sleepy. People with SAD produce it in higher levels than normal. The production of serotonin could also be affected, further impacting mood, appetite, sleep, and feelings of depression.

What can you do to feel better? Dr. Arnall said that people should embrace the opportunity to turn over a new leaf. “Whether it's embarking on a new career, meeting new friends, taking up a new hobby or booking a new adventure, January is a great time to make those big decisions.”