Seasonal Mood Shifts | Seasonal Intelligence
Winter me writes poetry in solitary corners, finds profound meaning in bare trees, craves philosophical conversations that stretch until dawn. Summer me schedules back-to-back social events, optimizes productivity systems, believes problems exist to be solved rather than contemplated.
Who is the real me? The introspective creature of shortened days, or the energetic optimizer of extended light?
The revelation arrives slowly, then suddenly: I am not one person living through different seasons—I am different people emerging as seasons change. Each weather pattern activates dormant aspects of personality, brings forward psychological traits that hibernate during incompatible months.
Monsoon me becomes a different writer entirely. The steady rhythm of rain unlocks stream-of-consciousness that never surfaces during bright, demanding summer days. My sentences lengthen, thoughts deepen, the very structure of my thinking shifts to match precipitation patterns.
“Tumi winter e onnorokom hoe jao,” Happy observes. You become different in winter. She’s learned to recognize the stranger who inhabits my body during cold months—quieter, more internal, requiring different kinds of care than the version of me who thrives in heat.
But which version deserves recognition as authentic? The gregarious summer person who makes plans and keeps commitments, or the hermit-like winter person who cancels social obligations to sit alone with books and silence?
Modern psychology pretends we have fixed personalities that should remain consistent across all conditions. But indigenous wisdom traditions understand something we’ve forgotten: humans are seasonal creatures, designed to shift behavior as environments shift, to become who we need to be for the weather we’re actually living through.
The guilt comes from fighting this natural fluctuation instead of honoring it. I spend winter months trying to maintain summer productivity, and summer months judging my winter introspection as antisocial depression. Neither seasonal self feels valid when measured against the other’s priorities.
But here’s the liberation: what if they’re both real? What if authentic self isn’t fixed identity but fluid responsiveness to changing conditions? What if the goal isn’t consistency but appropriate adaptation?
The writer who emerges in December serves different purpose than the networker who surfaces in June. Both responses are intelligent adaptations to available light, temperature, social energy that shifts with planetary positioning.
“Season-appropriate personality” isn’t character flaw—it’s evidence that we’re still connected to natural rhythms that modern life tries to flatten into year-round sameness. The office that demands identical performance regardless of sunlight hours is fighting biology more ancient than civilization.
Arash changes dramatically with weather too. Rainy day child builds elaborate indoor worlds, creates complex narratives with simple toys. Sunny day child becomes explorer, athlete, someone who needs physical challenge rather than imaginative stimulation.
I watch him shift and marvel: this is what healthy seasonal adaptation looks like. No guilt about becoming different person as conditions change, just natural responsiveness to environmental cues that call different qualities forward.
Maybe the question isn’t “who am I really?” but “who am I seasonally?” Each weather pattern reveals aspects of self that remain hidden during incompatible conditions. Winter discovers my contemplative depths. Summer reveals my collaborative capacities. Monsoon unlocks creative flow that bright days make impossible.
The integrated self isn’t one consistent personality—it’s awareness of the multiple personalities that emerge responsively, seasonal intelligence that knows which version of me serves current conditions best.
Tonight, as autumn air calls forward the transitional being who bridges introspective winter and extroverted summer, I stop fighting the shift. Instead, I welcome whoever is emerging, curious about which qualities this particular weather will awaken.
Some people remain the same regardless of season. Others of us are meant to be meteorological shapeshifters, changing as consciously as trees change leaves, trusting that authentic self includes all the seasonal selves that conditions call into existence.
