January never feels quite the right time to rush headlong into a new year somehow.
We make our resolutions, plan for the months ahead, and leap into action when the hedgerow is still hushed and quiet and the natural world slumbers on.
But though the trees are bare and leafless, their inner life is rich at the root, and the sleeping oak dreams a dream of acorns.
Perhaps, then, we too should take a leaf from mother nature's book, and simply use this time to rest and daydream, having faith that things will come to fruition at just the moment they are meant to.
In wintertime, flowers are simply a hope and a promise, a dream held within a seed -- but in their time, they too will bloom.
Our woodlands lie still beneath soft cloaks of snowfall and the earth beneath our feet glitters with frost and ice -- but although January's landscape may dazzle us with its wintry sparkle, refreshing us with its peppermint bite, why not let winter weave its spell a little while longer before plunging into the new?
January may not, then, be a time for hurtling into a fresh start -- but rather about gently feeling our way into a new chapter and wondering how we may like our story to unfold.
Late winter mornings are made for walking in pine forests, for wandering in wild places, and for dreaming wildly... then home again to warm ourselves against winter's sharp nip.
Wintry afternoons and evenings, then, are for cups of tea by the fire and reading books, for gazing wistfully out of windows, and for writing with my cat nestled into the warm nook of my arm.
This is our time to tread softly, to potter and ponder, to live slowly and soak up the beauty that is all around us. January is the morning of the year, the dawning of the new, the page turn and the crisp sheet of paper.
This time is for our dreams and the delicate weaving of plans -- plans that we may unpick and refashion anew if we wish to. This time is for being more and doing less. Think less, then, of what you want to do, and more of who you want to be? After all, doing follows being.
Even now, the birds are singing, the buds are slowly appearing on the branches, and the first snowdrops of the year are blossoming.
Soon enough, spring will return, but let's not wish the year away.
Let us, instead, enjoy this moment as nature intended, accepting winter's invitation to embrace slow living and simple pleasures, sinking ever deeper into rest.
All around us, everything is exactly as it is meant to be -- and so it is, too, with us.