Imbolc 2025

As I write it’s dark and rainy and cold and windy, I’m lacking motivation in general and I don’t really want to come out to play just yet.

Has anyone else been feeling a bit like that lately?

Well, the snowdrops near me don’t seem to mind. Peeking out through the frost encrusted devon banks. They are the iconic Imbolc Festival, or Candlemas, flower. And along with the lesser celandines, they bring joy amongst the bleak mid winter. Fickle floral first signs of spring.

Have you ever looked up inside a snowdrop?

Subtle changes are happening. The days are lengthening. Woodpeckers are tapping and proclaiming their territories. So are many other native birds like Great Tits ( do you know they have up to 70 different calls? ), Dunnocks and Song Thrushes. Hazel trees are flowering. For many this is a time to prepare to sew seeds. If the whole year was a seed, it’s now in the germination phase. The spark of life has fired and the stored energy, the wisdom and experience from the last year, is awakening.

Creation is stirring.

There's an alignment of planets, a fickle ceasefire in Gaza, Trump has been inaugurated and oligarchs are pissing on the futures of many. AI is influencing in complex ways. There have been massive fires in LA, and four storms visited the UK in a week in the run up to the end of January.

The stirring of creation has been challenging for many.  How has it been for you?

One of my challenges is that the longevity of my tenancy and role on the smallholding where I live is uncertain. Another is that someone in my family is ghosting me, leaving the relationship mysterious, and a strange power dynamic in the air. I’m also in total disbelief because my love has lost her job of 25 years. Our economy may be failing. There seems to be collapse all around too, as trees and limbs in the wood I work in have fallen to the ground.

And yet I see beauty around me. The buds of certain ideas and thoughts I had at the end of last year are beginning to swell…so I’m excited to see what grows from them.

Yes, the world changes every moment…and it feels like 2025 is preparing to be a year of many big changes.

At times like these it can be beneficial to ask: 'How do I prepare for change? What attitudes can help me be a still point in motion?'

Imbolc, is a time to align with the energies and spirit we want to see in the world and nurture them into being.

What are your intentions and the qualities of being* you want to grow this year?

Slowly and steadily dream them into your being. Maybe cautiously at first, because winter can return with a blast. Tender shoots need looking after.

Wishing you clarity, beauty, inner peace, joy and flow in this ever changing and challenging world.