Christmas is over, it’s cold outside, and we all go back to work on Wednesday. If those aren’t reasons enough to induce a bit of winter blues, the fall back to standard time and seasonal short days will cause it! I’ve always suffered from winter blues, a form of SAD: seasonal affective disorder. Though I’ve never been officially diagnosed, each winter brings me a decrease in energy, a touch of depression, and a lack of interest in my normal activities. Verilux offers a variety of full spectrum lamps to help users combat the winter blues and for the past few weeks I’ve been trying their HappyLight Liberty VT20.
The HappyLight Liberty VT20 is designed to mimic natural light and compensate for those short, winter days and features:
- A broad field of 10,000 LUX
- Interchangeable High-Energy and Comfort Optix® Glare-Control Lenses
- High-Low Intensity Control
- Natural Spectrum® Illumination
The lamp’s compact design ( 12.5” H x 6.25” W x 4” D ) and 2 pound weight allow me to keep it on my desk without taking up too much space.
The HappyLight Liberty VT20 can also be wall-mounted.
Verilux recommends using HappyLight for 30 minutes to and hour per day. Since I sleep as late as the kids will let me, what I really miss is daylight in the evenings. When the sun is setting at 4:30PM I start feeling lazy and gloomy. Hubs arrives home about that time so he watched the kids while I work at my desk for about an hour with the HappyLight on. It’s my little way of pretending we are still on daylight savings time. 
I prefer to use the comfort lens on high-intensity setting.
So far I’ve noticed an increase in energy and productivity in the evenings. Activities don’t stop just because it’s dark at 5:00 and the HappyLight Liberty VT20 helps me stay productive. It also chases away that little rain cloud that seems to appear over my head in the late afternoon. Winter blues get lost!
As a side note, I also use my HappyLight for photography. It isn’t designed for this purpose, but since the light is natural spectrum I’ll switch it on in the office and point it toward our large living room window. It mimics light coming in from the windows in the office and gives my indoor food shots a little boost.
Disclosure: I received a HappyLight Liberty VT20 in order to facilitate my review. No other compensation was received. All opinions are my own.
OMG My husband needs one of these so badly. He hates winter
This light sounds like a great way to add light in different ways! I agree with you,..the winter blues can certainly set in this time of year.
Hope you have a wonderful New Years Eve night!
Happy New Years to you as well!
Luckily in Vegas it sunny most days. I have the blues because I have to go back to work next week.
I get the blues too, I’m thinking this sounds like a great solution.
I’ve read great things about these but we don’t need anything like that here in Texas.
Sounds great!
Florida is full of sunshine!
This is nice. I’m going to have to check this out.
One thing we do get a lot of here is sunshine, but that sounds pretty cool!
Sounds like I could use one of those myself.
I totally need this!!!
I have a light from Verilux and by golly, it really does work! I like the looks of this one you have though!
I get down if there’s too many dreary, cloudy days. I’ll have to check this out!
during the winter I don’t leave the house. I hate the cold and I hate when its dark outside. I get so depressed and antsy. Something like this would be perfect for me. I’d love to get one and give it a try to document my experience over a few weeks I bet it would really help others who experience the same Blah with the winter blues
The first thing I thought when I saw this review was, “Oh, I could use one of those too.” And the second was, “I wonder if I could use it for photos?” LOL! I’m glad to hear that it works well for both purposes.
It’s a multi-tasker! Or at least I’m making it be.
I really need this. I hate that it gets dark so soon too!
I could definitely use one of these on my desk. I have a small lamp but it takes batteries and I use it so much I find myself changing out the batteries once a week :/
I need one of these.. I don’t like winter
As a girl who loves (and is used to) bright sunshine and heat, I would adore one of these!
What a great solution to the winter blues. It’s been dark and gloomy around here the past few weeks and I miss the sunshine. This would be a great alternative.
I have felt a lack of motivation lately. Maybe I got the winter blues too.
I wish I would have bought something like this when I moved to Oregon. Now I’m just used to it, lol.
I need one of these for my house!
I need one of these here.
This looks interesting. Here in Florida it is rarely gloomy or too cold for too long, but I can see this helping a lot of people.
I’d love to try that!!
I need to look into that – I can easily get down and SAD will effect me if I’m not careful. These wintry, gray, cold weather is so depressing. I need sunshine to grow!
I have something similar and it’s amazing what the light can do for your moods. I need to remember to use mine more often
That’s awesome! I had no idea anything like this existed!
I take vitamins to counteract winter blues, but have friends who really struggle with it.