january – Aspirational Adventures

Found this on many sites of internet with no source so …

I was pondering why I think January seems to last “forever”. I’ve managed to read 5 books already in amongst planning workshops, walking the dog, have a room redecorated in my house, writing some, meeting up with friends, etc. So I’ve not been idle but I’ve fitted it all in in the last 25 days! And really we were still in Christmas holiday mode for the first couple. Oh and I’ve also watched 3 Netflix series and blogged some. So why does it seem like January will never end.

As I was googling I did find this piece in the New York Times which is worth reading – The Scientific Reason Why January Last Forever – Though without sounding too pedantic I’m sure if it is really scientific it should say “feels like it lasts forever”. “Lasts forever” is a bit of a fact. January really doesn’t last forever it just feels that way.

So why do I think so?

For us as a couple we spent time during our 10 days Christmas break planning things for 2024. Not resolutions, not even what we want to achieve, but holidays and seeing people. So, including husband’s work trips, we have 5 trips on the calendar. One each for the first 5 months of the year; a trip to see my son and his wife, a holiday for in May to a place I’ve been wanting to go to for a couple of years, 2 walking/climbing trips for husband and the 1st work trip for him of the year. I’m also wanting to slide in trips to see my mum and my daughter. It is all about looking forward not being in the moment.

Even things like looking forward to the days getting longer, the weather warmer, is all not being in the moment but waiting for a better day!

There’s also the “healing of the credit card”, the Dry January, the Veganuary, and all those other things people give up after Christmas, which come with a “waiting for January to end so one can get back to drinking/eating meat/spending/etc” Again all looking forward and not being in the moment.

Added to that not everything has restarted. I didn’t restart my writing groups until the middle of January. A church group I want to join doesn’t start till February. Even with doors open for me to run workshops they are all for later in the year.

January is a dormant month but we don’t do dormant. So much in society tells us to be planning for the future that we don’t relax into hibernation mode. We are pushing, hoping, waiting, for the next thing. Perhaps if we could hunker down and allow the season to unfurl around us maybe then it would not seem like it was taking so long.

I nearly wrote “to get a move on and get over itself”. I think too often we see January as a month to endue and not to enjoy. Perhaps we need to learn how to enjoy January – and we all know when you’re enjoying something time flies past!

Imbolc

Daffodils in my local park. Photographed by me March 2022

February 1st is Imbolc. Often seen as the start of Spring. It comes exactly between the winter equinox and the spring solstice. It is known as a quarter day. In the church calendar it is known as Candlemas the time to get candles blessed but also when the light is coming.

It has been noticeable on my morning dog walks that the sky is lightening, that there is a something in the air. Things have changed. The Met Office is still “promising” us a cold snap later in the month, but the air does feel different. The dawn chorus is more vibrant. This morning there was a large flock of geese flying out across the sea honking away. I can feel the urge to spring clean, to start a new things. Being me of course that means that after promising myself in January that I would only sign up for one thing at a time I now have three things I have signed up for and 2-3 others on the back burner, simmering. I can feel I want to get on and do things. Whereas at New year I wanted to hibernate. We were meant to be going to see our mothers on the 2nd weekend in January but my husband had a bit of a cold and instead of me pushing him onwards I advocated a hibernation weekend. I do think we both benefited from it. But now that the lighter days are coming I am ready to start planning.

So it got me to wondering why we don’t pick Imbolc, Candlemass, Brigid’s day, 1st February, as the day when we make resolutions for the year. I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels more like it. That heaviness of Christmas has gone. That need to be doing has gone. I know people who have done Veganuary and Dry January and so are feeling lighter, fresher, healthier. Now is the time to start thinking of those things we’d like to do during the year.

No I’m not going to now start advocating goals and resolutions, as I said before [sorry can’t find that post to be able to tag it]. But I am as the sun starts to show itself more often, as the light is fresher, I am going to start doing what many did on 1st January, and am going to start looking at what I would like to achieve this year.

I’m also in that strange limbo land. My friend with the cancer died last week but there still hasn’t been a date announced for her funeral. I should know today. But for now all I can do is hold my plans lightly, not put anything firmly in my diary, and also trust. Though I also think threshold time is a good time to plan. One is stood between two worlds not yet able to step into the next. I can write my wish list on the walls of the chamber I wait in.

Though of course maybe that is why people do this in that space between Christmas and the New Year? That is a threshold time too.