January: A Portal into the New Year

Bust of Roman God Janus, NY Public Library Collections

January is officially over. Happy Imbolc! I’m writing this to you on February 1st, 2024, at 11:11 a.m., which feels oddly correct.

If you feel like January didn’t happen, if it zoomed right on by, and you’re still trying to get your bearings on what 2024 could even mean for you, let alone creating resolutions and planning out your year, you’re not alone.

I’m in the camp that January isn’t a real month. Instead, it’s a portal into the new year. We are meant to tune into ourselves, reflect on the previous year, and look forward to the next. January is the middle of deep Winter unless you reside in the Southern Hemisphere. It’s a time to be introspective.

I think our modern society struggles because we’ve lost our attachment to and guidance of the seasons. We try to do Summer in January, and we're burnt to a crisp by the time we get to July.

Slowly, I’m coming to the point where I’m realizing there is a time for everything. There is a season for all manner of life, and when we are in tune with the planet's rhythms and our bodies, we can live from a place of ease.

Ease was my word for last year. Each year, I pick a word to set an overarching intention that becomes almost like a mantra—a reminder to return to my original intention for the year.

In working with ease last year, I was forced to give up or at least acknowledge all the ways I continue to work from adrenalized pressure. This is fine when it’s necessary to get through something, knowing there is an end in sight.

However, if you live your life this way all of the time, coming from a place of unconsciousness, it leads to burnout. In 2017, I burned out completely.

This Fall will mark seven years since I left my job as a consultant to go to La Muse in the South of France with no plan, only an inner knowing that I could no longer continue in the manner I had before.

It doesn’t feel like seven years; it’s been a long journey to healing and deconditioning.

I don’t pretend to have it all figured out; I’m not healed completely. I still struggle with debilitating chronic pain regularly. If anything, I’ve learned how to work to my capacity better (more on that to come).

I guess what I’m trying to say is, if you feel anxious on February 1st because it feels like January passed you by, remember that our month January derives from Janus, the Roman God of gateways, portals, beginnings, and endings. He has one face looking back and another looking forward. He bears the symbols of the senex and puer as one.

January is a gateway, a portal, a liminal period. We must learn how to stand with our feet in two worlds to hold the tension of where we want to go and where we’ve come from.

I long to share much I’ve been holding back from the world: paintings, writing, a book of poetry I wrote on my darkest nights. Initially, I felt sorrow that another month had passed and I still hadn’t shown my work. Then I remembered the symbols of Imbolc, the beginning of Spring, the halfway point between the Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox.

With the Winter Solstice, we honor a light that never goes out; we honor rebirth. The Spring Equinox is, in so many ways, the birth of a new year. It doesn’t matter which cycle you subscribe to. There will always be another beginning—a season for all things, and for all things, a season.

I hope you honor the cycle you’re in. I am wishing you many blessings this year on Imbolc.

With love,

Margaret