Why February Isn’t Too Late to Plan Your Year

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Hi friends. It’s February!

January is a bit of a funny month – a fresh start, for most of us, perhaps, myself included. I find it can also take some time to get rolling again in January, after taking some time off to either rest, party, or binge-watch Netflix with a plethora of mind-altering goodies, be they café lattes, cannabis soda water (legal here in Canada), or a glass or two of wine. Many of us indulge a lot during the holiday season, and often ‘fall off the wagon’ in that time that is somewhat outside of time. What day is it between Christmas and New Years? Only god knows!

This slipperiness often merges into January, with the first few weeks or even first entire month of the calendar year feeling a little like an abyss, as many of us struggle to set resolutions, keep resolutions, or even just get used to waking up at a particular time again, or to keep a particular schedule.

In other words, it can be hard sometimes to really ground and root into the reality of a new year, until late January – or, yes, even until February. February is when the sheen of a new year kinda fades, and we’re left with whatever our reality is: exhaustion, burnout, a feeling of being a floating seaweed, either unsure of our direction or how to make concrete steps forward.

February is also when a lot of folks tend to fall off track, or give up on the bright and shiny goals that they were soooo excited about on New Year’s Day. It may feel like February is too late to get back on track, but it isn’t!

Trust me, I get it – back when I was a student taking university courses (during my undergrad, Masters, and PhD), I wasn’t always on time. In fact, I’ve always been a little “time-challenged” despite my best efforts (it’s a trauma thing, apparently – and a chronic illness/disability thing). The later I was, the worse I would feel. I’d feel full of embarrassment and anxiety, worried that everyone would look at me when I interrupted the class by poking the door open and sliding into an open seat. I was so freaked out I’d get in trouble, that I’d be outed as “bad,” that the professor would humiliate me and I’d be kicked out of class. I never liked showing up late, but the more I just came to class – even if late – without any ensuing drama, the more I relaxed. I could show up as soon as I was able to, without drama.

Have you ever been running late to something and then decided, “Ah, I’m just not going to go. It’s too late now,” even though you would have only been like, what, ten or twenty minutes late to a three hour long lecture? All is not lost when we just have a delayed start.

Unfortunately, I see a lot of folks giving up before things really get rolling, and shooting themselves in the foot with this kind of thing. Right now? It’s February. And that ain’t too late to get anything started. I could go off on a whole rant about how the beginning of the rest of your life is today – and can be any day – but I do know there is something really potent, powerful, and symbolic about the first few months of the year.

February ain’t too late, fam. Here’s why.

Reason #1: Better late than never. (And better now than never!)

Yes, the old adage is true!

So many of us don’t start on our dreams because we’ve convinced ourselves it’s already too late. Honestly, this is crazy behaviour and crazy thinking. I remember when I was 20 I thought I was too old to start doing yoga, that everyone else in the room was already way ahead of me and I would just embarrass myself. Maybe I should just stick to what I was good at, I thought.

This was so ridiculous of me and I’m so glad I grew out of it. It’s never to late to try something for the first time, and just because you’re a little late or delayed, doesn’t mean it’s a bad idea to start. No one’s going to die if you do your year ahead tarot reading in February.

No one’s going to die if you decide to plan your year with astrology and magic and ritual and the moon and all that fun stuff, in February rather than January.

Actually, you’ll probably find that the trajectory of your year (and your life) will improve when you take the extra time to get settled, to plan, and to turn to your spiritual practice, whether it be tarot and card reading, or through planning ahead for the big pillars of your ritual year.

The first time we do these rituals and practices – whether it be a year ahead tarot spread, a monthly tarot reading, or thinking ahead for what we’d like to focus on magically as the seasons turn – it can be confusing, disorienting, and disorienting. But from there, it’s onwards and upwards. It’ll never be as hard as that first time, and then you’ll have a template that feels good to work from.

Reason #2: The lunar new year is in February. (And the Western astrological year starts in March). There are so many completely valid places to mark as the ‘start’ of the new year.

 The lunar new year is in February. For me, this marks quite a significant energetic shift, though I do primarily celebrate my new year on the first of January, and plan out my year with January as my first month of the year. That being said, I do find that February is when a year really does start to feel like that new, fresh year – it ain’t the previous year anymore. January is a bit of a liminal space, foggily linking the two together.

In many countries and cultures around the world, February is a more significant new year’s marker than January. And adding on to that, the Western astrological year actually begins in March.

So if you’re struggling to really get things rolling at the start of January – first of all, you’re not alone, and secondly, there’s an enormous energetic and vibe-related precedent for starting the new year symbolically in some spot that isn’t actually January.

If you don’t vibe with January as a start time, that’s totally okay! You’re not broken. It could be that your delay to get started in January is actually a helpful little hint that you’re more energetically aligned to start the new year in February, with the lunar new year, or even in March, with the spring equinox, the starting point of Western astrology (with fiery Aries)!

None of us vibrates in exactly the same way, and often times society and culture arranges structures that actually go against our nature. I vibrate in such a way that I LOVE the symbolism of starting anew in January, but maybe your own natural and most aligned way of working is a little different. Lean into it, and see what happens. What a cool opportunity.

Reason #3: Knowing how to reset yourself and plan your year (no matter what day it is) will help you exponentially throughout your life.

It’s never ‘the right time’ or ‘the perfect time’ to do anything, really – to get surgery, to start a new job, to launch a business, to fall in love, to break up, to have a kid, to do something scary but also important and which serves our growth. We spend a lot of our lives waiting for the perfect moment that will never come, and thereby waste our own damn time, in this precious, beautiful thing called life.

We often have to act before we really feel ready, or even once we feel we may have missed the boat and it’s too late. You didn’t miss the boat, it’s not too late – to the contrary, you’ve totally got this under control.

Knowing how to just dive in and do something – and getting comfortable with that – is a huge life skill. There isn’t a perfect time. It’s always too soon, or too late.

Once you know how to choose this present moment – to dive in, to make a plan, despite those hard or weird feelings – you’re undefeatable.

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