I didn't want to write this at the start of the New Year, because hopes are high, 'new year, new me' is the collective mantra and we're all happy and excited. We're reflecting on 2025, and a lot of time, in regret.
'I should be working on my New Year's resolution'
'I fell off already'
'Okay I'll start again tomorrow, it's still technically January'
There's nothing wrong with you. It's just that you're setting life-changing intentions and trying to force new beginnings when you're supposed to be in hibernation.
But if it's unnatural, why are we doing it? Let's get deep for a few minutes.
Across continents, cultures, languages, and time zones, humanity moves in near-perfect synchrony at midnight on January 1st.
As humans, we're naturally ritual beings. We also know our focus creates energetic momentum and can change the 3D world. When billions of people focus their attention on the same symbols, emotions, and intentions at the same time, something powerful happens.
Psychology and consciousness studies show that synchronised human attention can produce measurable effects. New Year’s Eve creates a shared emotional and psychological event on a planetary scale, raising the vibration of the energy on our planet.
When we look at the new Gregorian Calendar, we realise this ritual is actually man-made. But why?
Before modern calendars, humans lived in rhythm with cycles, not straight lines. Time was experienced through the moon, the sun, and the seasons. Many ancient cultures followed lunar calendars, often with 13 months, aligning life with visible celestial rhythms.
New moons marked beginnings.
Full moons marked culmination.
Waning moons marked release.
Time was circular: birth, growth, decay, rebirth. In the Islamic Hijri calendar, we have 355 days instead of 365 days in a month because we the Hijri follows the moon instead of the sun. We don't complete the year when the planet goes around the sun; the year does not “wait” for the Earth to orbit the Sun. The year ends when we've gone through all of the seasons. If anything, the feminine moon measures sacred time such as reflection, fasting, pilgrimage, whereas the masculine sun measures earthly rhythm, such as activity, work and observation.
Other cultures have a 13-year calendar, which we've all heard about. This is also a pre-Islamic Arabian practice called Nasi and it consisted of adding or shifting months to suit trade, war, or seasonal convenience. The Qur'an forbade this because it strictly calls for the moon to be the judge of time.
The decisive shift came with Rome.
In 45 BCE, Julius Caesar introduced the Julian calendar, fixing the year at 12 months and aligning it strictly with the solar cycle. Lunar rhythms were overridden. January, placed in the dead of winter, when nothing in nature begins, was crowned the start of the year.
January is named after Janus, the Roman god of doorways and transitions. He has two faces: one looking backward, one looking forward, never present.
Every New Year’s Eve, we are taught to embody the energy Janus represents, despite most of us not knowing who he is.
We review the past with regret.
We project improvement into the future.
And we miss the present moment entirely.
Standardising time in this way made empires easier to govern, taxes, armies, labour, obedience. Linear time is predictable, enforceable, and administrable. We see the effects of this ritual now. The embodiment of Janus' regret and anxiety, the inability to stick to our new 'beginnings' in the dead of winter and leaving our natural state and the rigidity that comes from systematic timekeeping that keeps us disconnected from the moon's energy that was supposed to gently direct our sense of time.
(Many talk about how this is the only time in the year where everyone is focused on one moment across all time zones and how it's an opportunity for sinister energy harvesting rituals, but that's not the point of this blog post. I will, however, reiterate that in everything you do and in every group or individual setting, claim, consolidate and ground your energy so no one has access or permission to steal or affect anything in your auric field).
I'm not telling you to avoid anything New Year related, I'm just directing you to your awareness so you can understand why it may feel depressing or unmotivating. Rather than it being a time of forcing spring-like newness, let it be a time of quiet reflection, projection, and inner alignment. You can create newness when hibernating, you just need to be aware of the process that aligns with what you need to achieve.
What to do instead
Manifestation gurus tell us we need to release our limiting beliefs and understand ourselves to call in what's new. This is the season to do it on a larger scale.
Manifestation during your hibernation period consists of observing your shadow, uncovering your limiting beliefs, and tracing the patterns that hold you back. Sit with your mind, embrace your darkness, forgive what needs to be released, and clear space within yourself.
Rather than taking action, the goal for hibernation is awareness and release, so that when the season of renewal arrives, you are ready to step forward with clarity and purpose.
Project where you want to be this time next year, not with strain or urgency, but as a gentle planting of intention. Understand your inner barriers, forgive and release them, and let the energy settle.
Then, when spring comes, whether in the natural world, through Noruz, Chunfen, Higan, or through any personal cycle of renewal, you can set your intentions with precision, cultivate growth, and move into creation from a place of alignment when your energy is as fertile as the soil beneath you. We are not disconnected from nature and we should stop acting like it.