Happy New Year's Eve!

An invitation to start slowly

Happy new year! How do you feel as the year turns? Perhaps you are ready to run straight out of the gate with your goals in one hand and a checklist in the other. Or perhaps you are less certain and not so energetic. Either way you are welcome here, and you are among friends.

This year I feel somewhere in between. I have a few clear goals this year, including starting this newsletter, completing my coaching qualification, and growing my first artichokes at our allotment. And I also have some more hazy areas, where I am happy to go forward more slowly into the haze, enjoying the slow time before it clears. We, in the northern hemisphere that I call home, are after all still in winter. And aren’t new year's resolutions really more suited to the new life, green growth, longer days, warmth and energy of Spring?

So, I will allow the full picture for 2024 to emerge gradually over the next few weeks and months. I will honour the remaining days of Christmas, up to twelfth night on January 5th, and for some all the way up to Candlemas on February 2nd, the liturgical end of Christmas. I will take my next step with the goals I know about: plan a few posts for this space, keep up with my course, and order some seeds. I will set gentle intentions, read my next book, create a collage of images that stand out to me right now, listen out for a word or phrase to guide my year, and trust that come March all will be clear!

In this way I can allow myself the grace of not finalising my plans until well into February if that is how long I need. And still have time for the detailed planning before the start of Spring in March. When it will be time to plant those artichokes!

Photo by Sakura Ho on Unsplash

How are you feeling at the turn of the year? I’d love to hear more about where you are, and what goals, if any, are emerging for you.

A reminder that you can download my new year planning tools in the post below: