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How to Absorb Sunlight Safely and Effectively

How Natural Light, Timing, and Physiology Shape UV Absorption for Health and Vitamin D

Kendall Toerner

Published: November 28, 2025

In other articles, you will learn all the benefits of light for the biophysics of your body. In order to get the benefits of UV light, you’ll need to adapt your lifestyle to fix anything causing hypersensitivity that allows ultraviolet light to damage your skin.

Sunlight sensitivity, in particular UV light, is a well established side effect of sun exposure.

Although UV light can cause damage, this is actually an unnatural reaction.

Human skin is designed to absorb sunlight, and the key is to prepare your skin for sun exposure.

The step of preparing your skin is essential, because many modern habits remove the natural “sunscreen” in our skin.

Why does skin get damaged from UV light?

Long term damage from UV light is unnatural.

The small amount of damage caused to skin from UV light is a beneficial signal, just like damage from exercise causes muscle growth and improved fitness.

The main factors causing skin damage from ultraviolet light are:

Lack of morning sunlight
Wearing sunglasses
Artificial blue light
Incorrect fats in your diet

How to prevent UV light damage and absorb it properly

Follow these steps in order, and start slowly if you aren’t used to being in the sun.

If you get any reactions, reduce your time or even take a break for a day or two.

Your body must adapt to the higher energy over time if you’re UV light deficient.

Build up melanin to develop a tan over time, and you’ll find you can spend hours in mid day sunlight without burning.

This works regardless of your skin type.

1. Red light acts as sunscreen

The high proportion of red light in morning sunlight acts as sunscreen to protect your cells and allow them to absorb UV light properly.

This red light increases melatonin levels in your skin cells, which is an anti-oxidant that “cools them off” and protects them when exposed to UV light. [1]

With more melatonin your skin can absorb more UV light without burning. [2]

The key here is to wake up and see sunrise outside every day, and get the sunlight on your skin for at least 30 minutes within the first hour after sunrise.

Alternatively, an infrared sauna or also a red light therapy panel can help your cells create this natural sunscreen when used before UV exposure. This is helpful if the cold morning air is too much for you.

2. Wearing sunglasses turns off UV protection

Sunglasses and even regular glasses block UV light.

UV sunlight in your eyes is essential for your body to prepare for and react to UV sunlight exposure.

Your body decides to prepare for UV light on your skin through the UV light signal in your eyes.

If you block UV light going into your eyes, you are preventing a hormone called α-MSH from being created from the UV light splitting a pro-hormone called POMC. [3]

You will burn significantly if you don’t create α-MSH, as it is responsible for melanin production in your skin.

Melanin is a pigment and semi-conductor in your skin that makes you look tan.

Once your eyes get more natural sunlight frequencies, they will become less sensitive to sunlight and sunglasses will be unnecessary.

No animal in nature needs sunglasses. If sunglasses were necessary, animals including humans would have evolved eyes capable of reducing sunlight brightness.

Ideally the only glasses you should wear are blue blocking glasses to avoid indoor man-made blue light, for reasons explained below.

3. Blue light wears down your skin’s defenses

Unnatural lights from man-made sources emit unbalanced blue light.

High energy light like blue and UV light use up melatonin created from red light exposure. [4]

In nature, red light and blue/UV light are always found together from the sun.

Too much blue or UV light without red light leads to the destruction of melanin, vitamin D, and DHA in cells, all of which are essential for your cells to absorb and use UV light properly. [5]

4. Avoid seed oils and eat omega 3 fats

Your cell membranes are made up largely of fat. The fat they are made of depends on what fats you eat.

You need a proper balance of Omega 3 and Omega 6 in cells to absorb sunlight safely.

Omega 3 (DHA) acts as a cushion for UV light to soften the blow and “catch” the UV light, acting as a semi-conductor in cells. [6]

This is primarily found in seafood like wild-caught salmon and oysters, as well as high fat grass-fed meats.

On the other hand, Omega 6 is a type of inflammatory polyunsaturated fat found primarily in plant seeds.

It is very fragile and degrades easily. Omega 6 fats will accumulate in your cell membranes, making them vulnerable to UV light, by causing free radical damage (a sunburn). [7]

Omega 6 fats are found in high amounts primarily in seed oils — vegetable/canola, soy, sunflower, safflower, peanut, rice bran etc.

These are all highly refined and unnatural oils that aren’t compatible with the human body.

If you don’t want to burn in the sun, increase your risk of cancer [8], or lower your testosterone levels significantly [9], cut these out completely.

Key steps to absorb UV light

Get morning sunlight on your skin, or use an infrared sauna or a red light therapy panel to create natural UV protection in your skin
Don’t wear sunglasses outdoors so your skin can use melanin properly
Avoid blue light exposure on your skin from artificial lights
Get omega 3 fats from seafood or grass fed meat, and avoid seed oils to prevent skin free radical damage

It should also be obvious by now that you shouldn’t wear sunscreen if you want to absorb UV light.

All the steps above will protect you from skin damage, eliminating the need for sunscreen.

If you cannot limit your exposure in strong tropical sunlight, use clothes to cover up as you work to build up your tan over time.

Conclusion

Sensitivity or allergy to the sun is a curable condition caused by modern influences.

When your skin doesn’t have the natural signals it needs, it can’t prepare itself to absorb UV light later in the day.

If your skin is also full of unstable polyunsaturated Omega 6 fats from seed oils, UV light will easily oxidize your cells leading to huge amounts of damage and a bad sunburn.

Follow the signals of nature and build up your solar callous to absorb all the benefits UV light has to offer.

Relevant Products

Saunaspace Infrared Saunas

EMR-TEK Red Light Therapy Panels

Bluebalance: Prevent Eye and Skin Aging/Damage from Digital Screens

Blue Light Blocking Glasses

References

Yeager RL, Oleske DA, Sanders RA, Watkins JB 3rd, Eells JT, Henshel DS. Melatonin as a principal component of red light therapy. Med Hypotheses. 2007;69(2):372-6. doi: 10.1016/j.mehy.2006.12.041. Epub 2007 Feb 23. PMID: 17321060.
Cho EC, Ahn S, Shin KO, Lee JB, Hwang HJ, Choi YJ. Protective Effect of Red Light-Emitting Diode against UV-B Radiation-Induced Skin Damage in SKH:HR-2 Hairless Mice. Curr Issues Mol Biol. 2024 Jun 6;46(6):5655-5667. doi: 10.3390/cimb46060338. PMID: 38921009; PMCID: PMC11202801.
Skobowiat C, Slominski AT. Ultraviolet B stimulates proopiomelanocortin signalling in the arcuate nucleus of the hypothalamus in mice. Exp Dermatol. 2016 Feb;25(2):120-3. doi: 10.1111/exd.12890. Epub 2016 Jan 12. PMID: 26513428; PMCID: PMC4724293.
https://doi.org/10.1074/jbc.M502194200
Taylor HR, Muñoz B, West S, Bressler NM, Bressler SB, Rosenthal FS. Visible light and risk of age-related macular degeneration. Trans Am Ophthalmol Soc. 1990;88:163-73; discussion 173-8. PMID: 2095019; PMCID: PMC1298584.
Crawford MA, Sinclair AJ, Wang Y, Schmidt WF, Broadhurst CL, Dyall SC, Horn L, Brenna JT, Johnson MR. Docosahexaenoic Acid Explains the Unexplained in Visual Transduction. Entropy (Basel). 2023 Nov 6;25(11):1520. doi: 10.3390/e25111520. PMID: 37998212; PMCID: PMC10670429.
Perumalla Venkata R, Subramanyam R. Evaluation of the deleterious health effects of consumption of repeatedly heated vegetable oil. Toxicol Rep. 2016 Aug 16;3:636-643. doi: 10.1016/j.toxrep.2016.08.003. PMID: 28959587; PMCID: PMC5616019.
Soundararajan R, Maurin MM, Rodriguez-Silva J, et alIntegration of lipidomics with targeted, single cell, and spatial transcriptomics defines an unresolved pro-inflammatory state in colon cancerGut Published Online First: 10 December 2024. doi: 10.1136/gutjnl-2024-332535
https://doi.org/10.4103/1008-682X.190323