Light in the Darkest Season
Find light in the holiday season's challenges. Explore a personal story of overcoming loss and illness with mental resilience and small daily wins.
The holidays are supposed to be a time of joy, but for many people they’re the heaviest season of the year. Between mid-November and New Year’s Day, depression, addiction, grief, and loneliness often rise to the surface, hidden behind a curtain of festive lights.
I know this because I’ve lived it. Years ago, someone I loved like a brother lost his life to heroin on New Year’s Day, just after returning home from rehab. The season that was meant to be about hope and renewal instead became a reminder of how fragile life really is.
On another New Year’s Day, I found myself in a personal battle with mortality. Surgeons performed major abdominal surgery that quite literally saved my life. I spent a month in the hospital, followed by three and a half years of trying to rebuild my body and my life after additional surgeries and setbacks. The truth is, it wasn’t just a close call—it was a complete upheaval of everything I knew.
Those years taught me something about the holidays that I might never have learned otherwise: While the world tells us to celebrate, many people are simply trying to survive. Some are mourning empty chairs at the table. Others are battling addiction, depression, or financial stress. And some are quietly holding on, just trying to make it through. If that’s you, I want you to know—you are not alone.
One Victory at a Time
I tried different methods of healing along the way. Some worked. Some didn’t. All of them took time. There were no shortcuts. I searched for solutions in medicine, nutrition, fasting, therapy, silence, and prayer. Each step taught me something valuable. But the deeper truth came slowly, almost quietly: After all the surgeries, treatments, and practices, I realized that the most important part of healing is our state of mind.
It’s not that tools don’t matter—they do. Fasting gave me clarity. Gratitude pulled me out of despair. Journaling helped me process emotions I didn’t even know I was carrying. Saying no to things that drained me gave me back some power. But what tied it all together was my perspective. When I stopped waiting for a quick fix and embraced the slow, steady process of positive mental consistency—adopting a one-victory-at-a-time lifestyle—something shifted. Healing stopped being a desperate race and became a journey of small daily wins.
The holidays make this especially important. It’s easy to get caught in the whirlwind of consumerism—rushing, buying, performing. But what we all need most during this season is presence, not presents. A listening ear. A phone call to someone who’s lonely. A pause to notice the light in the dark.
I believe every act of presence ripples outward. When you choose to take a breath instead of breaking down … when you choose gratitude instead of bitterness … when you choose to be with someone in their pain instead of turning away, you elevate not only yourself, but the collective. You become part of the light that slowly overcomes the darkness.
Rebuilding Life in the Light
If you find yourself struggling this holiday season, I offer you this: Don’t measure your progress in leaps. Measure it in steps. Celebrate the smallest of victories—a walk around the block, a day without giving in to despair, a meal that nourishes instead of numbs. Each one is a brick in the foundation of your healing. When it feels as though nothing is working, remember that even the darkest night of the year is always followed by the lengthening of light.
For me, the darkest season gave birth to a new life. Not an easy life, not a perfect one, but one that is more present, more grateful, and more honest than before. I carry the memory of those I’ve lost during the holidays, and I carry my own scars as reminders. They both teach me that life is fragile, and also that it can be rebuilt.
May this holiday season bring you not just surface joy but a deeper light. May you give presence to yourself and others. And may you remember that even in the darkest season, one small victory at a time can change everything.
by Christopher Servedio
