TikTok's Best and Worst ‘Winter Arc’ Rules to Build Better Habits Before January

There are a lot of terrible TikTok trends out there aimed at self-improvement, but even though everybody is making fun of the Winter Arc, I actually think it’s a good one! In the Winter Arc, you promise yourself you’ll stick to your fitness and self-care routines during and despite the end-of-year chaos. My only caveat: Make sure you choose rules that actually improve your life. 

What is the Winter Arc? 

Think of the “arc” here in the sense of a “story arc.” The Winter Arc is a self-improvement journey that unfolds over the last few months of the calendar year. According to #gymtok, it officially begins Oct. 1 and ends Jan. 1, just as everybody who is less dedicated than you is awaking from their holiday food comas and swearing they’ll get in shape. 

You may, of course, begin the Winter Arc anytime you’re ready for it. It’s the week before Halloween? It’s not too late to start. Learn about it mid-November? Sure, hop on board.

You get to choose your own terms for the Winter Arc. The general vibe is of buckling down, committing to your goals, and actually doing the things you’re always saying you’ll do. TikToker @carlyupgraded says that her mental image of someone nailing their Winter Arc is “hood up, headphones on, getting ready to go for a run in the rain at 5 a.m.” 

What’s good about the Winter Arc?

I’ve accidentally been Winter-Arc-ing for years; I just didn’t know that TikTok was going to come up with a name for it. Why save your gym routine for New Year’s when you’ll have the place to yourself all December? The Winter Arc is also a great follow-on from developing a running routine in the fall. We’re even gifted with an extra hour in the mornings to fill with something productive.

I really love the mindset shift here. Commonly, people are active in the summer (great time for outdoor fun), may or may not stick with their routines in the fall, and then let everything fall apart as the holidays approach. Who has time to go to the gym when you’re planning Thanksgiving, attending holiday parties, studying for final exams, or whatever else the end of the year tends to throw in front of you? 

But that’s the exact reason why this time of year is the best one to start (or restart) a fitness routine, or really any kind of routine. If you wait until you have a clean slate, no obligations, then you’re going to get really into your routine and give it your full focus. You’ll do the crash diet or the unsustainable workout challenge. Lord help us, 75Hard might start to look appealing. 

But when you start a routine during a busy time of year, you’ll be forced to make it sustainable. The gym routine you can stick with amid the chaos isn’t going to be one you drop after a few months. You’re already training yourself to work around obstacles as they come up, a key component of self-efficacy. And when the chaos clears on Jan. 1, your routine will become easier to stick to. 

What’s bad about the Winter Arc? 

Of course, there are ways to lean in too hard. Choose unsustainable habits, fall for bad diet advice, mistake not masturbating for some kind of health hack. The usual suspects. 

There’s also the pitfall of focusing too much on the vibes and too little on what you’re actually going to do or how you’ll benefit. For example, there are plenty of videos where a man yells at the viewer, lines like “What the fuck did you expect? You’re not putting in the work!” while motivational music plays in the background. 

And then there’s the framing: You were working on yourself all year, but you’re in danger of letting up on the gas. But you’re going to lock in so that you’re a step ahead of everybody who takes this time to slack off. I really don’t love this. Self improvement is not a competition. There’s a difference between being consistent in your training and healthy eating (good) and seeing the pursuit of health and fitness as something where you always have to work harder because you’re at risk of getting left behind. 

I also don’t love how gendered the Winter Arc TikToks are. When you search for Winter Arc content, the first few suggestions include “winter arc for women” and “winter arc for men.” 

The women’s versions are more likely to include restrictive dieting, or to focus on how the winter arc will finally (sigh) snatch your waist. That said, plenty of the women’s versions emphasize sustainability and many include protein goals, which I generally approve of, so that’s nice.

The men’s versions tend to go off the rails in another direction, with rules like “no girls” or “go ghost.” No distractions! At this point, the Winter Arc content out there is a mix of sincere and sarcastic, so there are plenty of videos where men are working out in the dark and telling their followers to divorce or break up with their partners. Pretty sure most of them are satire. But they’re only a slight exaggeration of the advice in the more serious videos. Come on, guys! Social interaction is good for you!

What is the best set of Winter Arc rules? 

If you’re going to do a Winter Arc (or if you’re already doing one), make sure to set it up in a way that will benefit you. Choosing 10 overly ambitious goals and setting yourself up for failure is not a healthy way to approach this, OK? 

It’s also helpful to think of developing yourself over this arc, rather than taking it as a three-month (or two-month) challenge where you have to do everything right all the time. If you currently wake up at 8 a.m. and want to wake up at 5 a.m., you don’t have to set your alarm for 5 a.m. tomorrow. It’s OK to go for 7:30, make that a habit, then 7:00, and so on. 

With that in mind, here are some ideas for ways to use the Winter Arc to your advantage. 

• Waking up earlier. Great, especially if you take advantage of the time change to make this easier on your body.

• Get to bed on time. Never a bad idea. Cultivating good sleep habits in general is always worthwhile.

• Exercise X times per week. Pick a number that works for you, and get into it. Be realistic about your goal, and for the best results, be consistent even if you’re sore at first. 

• Eat healthy. This is a great goal, with the major caveat that there are a lot of ways to eat healthy. You don’t need to cut out sugar or pretend that there’s something evil about seed oils. Do get more protein and veggies.

• Be more thoughtful about social media. I’m not going to say you should delete all your apps (“except TikTok,” as the TikTokers say). But it’s fair to consider whether you might want to delete a few apps, turn off some notifications, or put your phone on Do Not Disturb for more hours of the day.

• Journal or read. Journaling can be great for working through your feelings or cultivating a creative habit. Reading can be entertainment or learning. Choose what you need most.

• Learn a new skill. I’ve mostly seen this one in the men’s TikToks, and I love it. They’re often thinking of “skills” that will help in some kind of entrepreneurship grift they’re about to sell you, but there are tons of skills that will come in handy in life, or that are at least fun to learn. Practice a language, get better at cooking, make some art. Skills are, as I’ve noted, a multi-layered exercise for your brain. And they may come in handy someday.

Personally, my Winter Arc includes training for a weightlifting competition in December, maintaining a small amount of running so that it won't be too painful to restart in spring, waking up earlier when the time change hits, and making time to watch movies and play games with my family. (More social interaction, imagine that!) That said, I would have done this with or without the "Winter Arc" label. You choose what works for you.