NEW YEARS? Sacred Time, Seasons and Calendar awareness.

Remembering rhythm in a linear world

Time is one of the first structures we inherit. Long before we learn who we are, we are taught when to wake, when to work, when to rest, when a year begins, and when it ends. We learn to move according to dates, schedules, deadlines, and calendars that already exist around us. For most people, this learning happens quietly, without question.

The Gregorian calendar is the dominant timekeeping system of the modern world. It coordinates trade, school terms, employment, travel, governance, and shared public life. It allows billions of people to meet each other in time. In a modern, globalised world, that function is practical and necessary. And at the same time, it is only one way time exists.

Human beings do not experience time solely through dates. We experience it through rhythm. Light and dark. Warmth and cold. Activity and rest. Release and renewal. The tension many people feel around time does not come from the existence of a calendar, but from one system being treated as if it represents all of time, rather than one layer of it.

Calendars are designed systems. They are created to serve particular needs. The Gregorian calendar developed through Roman reforms under Julius Caesar and later ecclesiastical consolidation under Pope Gregory XIII in 1582.

Its purpose was consistency across large populations: taxation, agriculture, military organisation, religious observance, and administrative order. That history is well documented. Time was standardised so populations could be synchronised. The calendar became a tool for coordination and continuity. The Gregorian calendar was built for organisation, not embodiment.

Earlier systems of timekeeping were relational. They tracked the Sun, the Moon, the seasons, and the land itself.

Many included intercalary time: days or periods outside ordinary months used to recalibrate the calendar and mark a threshold between cycles. These pauses were stabilisers. Over time, as governance became more centralised, these pauses were absorbed into continuous sequences. Time became smoother, more uniform, and easier to manage at scale.

Even the month names still reveal this restructuring. The Roman year originally began in March. March, April, May, and June carried meanings tied to vitality, opening, growth, and sovereignty.

The later months were numbered: Quintilis, Sextilis, September, October, November, December. Over time, July and August were renamed for Julius and Augustus Caesar, and January and February were positioned at the front. The sequence shifted, but the names remained. January was named after Janus, the god of gates and transitions, fitting for administration and contracts. February carried liminal themes of purification and correction.

Meanwhile, the body never stopped being seasonal.

Human physiology responds to rhythm. Circadian cycles follow light and dark. Seasonal shifts influence hormones, immunity, sleep, digestion, mood, and cognition. For women, infradian rhythms add another layer. The menstrual cycle is one of the clearest expressions of cyclical time. The bleed is inner winter. It is release. It is lowered outward energy and heightened inward awareness. It is where the cycle begins, because something has completed. From there, energy rises into inner spring, peaks in inner summer, and becomes discerning in inner autumn before preparing to release again.

The sequence begins with clearing, not acceleration.

This matters when a culture names a “true beginning” that doesn’t match the season you live in, or the body you live in.

The solar year offers another clear anchor. Around March 20 or 21, the Sun crosses the celestial equator, day and night balance, and a new solar cycle begins.

Astronomically, this is the March Equinox. Astrologically, it is the moment the Sun enters zero degrees Aries, the first sign of the zodiac. Aries represents initiation and direction because the zodiac is mapped to solar movement. Many cultures recognised this equinox as the beginning of the year, including Babylonian Akitu and Persian Nowruz.

In Australia, this equinox arrives as autumn. Heat softens. Energy consolidates. Clarity often returns. Aries here expresses as decision-making and leadership rather than springtime rush. Once again, the pattern mirrors the menstrual cycle: release, then choice.

Solstices and equinoxes matter because they are the Earth’s real thresholds, and both hemispheres deserve to be included in the story. In June, the north experiences summer solstice while the south experiences winter solstice. In December, the south experiences summer solstice while the north experiences winter solstice. In March, the north receives spring equinox while the south receives autumn equinox. In September, the north receives autumn equinox while the south receives spring equinox. The Earth is always holding both.

Alongside solar and seasonal time, some people explore reconstructed rhythm-based calendars as a way of understanding why the body responds so strongly to cycles rather than straight lines. One commonly referenced model works with thirteen months of twenty-eight days, creating three hundred and sixty-four days, with one liminal day held outside the calendar.

This structure mirrors several natural rhythms at once. A twenty-eight day cycle aligns closely with the average menstrual cycle, the lunar cycle, and infradian rhythms in the body. Thirteen such cycles fit within the solar year, with a remaining day that acts as a pause between one cycle and the next.

What matters here is not whether this model is adopted, but what it reveals. When time is evenly paced, with regular completion points and a recognised pause, many bodies experience less internal urgency. The system knows where it is. There is space to integrate before moving forward again.

Earlier cultures often held similar “outside of time” days, not as inefficiencies, but as stabilisers. These pauses allowed the calendar to realign with the Sun and gave people permission to stop, reflect, and transition consciously between cycles.

Modern reconstructions are not claims of a single preserved ancient calendar. They are contemporary ways of mapping time that prioritise rhythm, rest, and coherence rather than constant acceleration.

Seasonal festivals once carried this awareness. Christmas is a clear example of an older solstice layer being repackaged. In the north, evergreen trees, candlelight, and fire were tied to the return of the Sun through the darkest season. In the south, December is summer solstice energy: peak light, warmth, abundance, and outward life-force, even though northern winter imagery is still widely marketed globally.

There are also older symbolic threads woven into these traditions. In some northern cultures, the red-and-white Amanita muscaria mushroom was dried on pine branches and used ceremonially during solstice rites. Over time, the colours, the tree, and the gift symbolism merged into familiar modern myths. This history isn’t about removing celebration. It’s about returning meaning.

The week holds memory too. Planetary days were once experienced as a living rhythm: Moon day, Mars day, Mercury day, Jupiter day, Venus day, Saturn day, Sun day. In the Norse layer, these are Mánadagr (Máni), Týsdagr (Týr), Óðinsdagr (Odin), Þórsdagr (Thor), Frjádagr (Frigg and Freyja), Laugardagr (bath and cleansing day), and Sunnudagr (Sól). Máni and Sól, brother and sister, chased by wolves, carry the mythic teaching of light and dark moving together in rhythm.

So where does that leave us with the Gregorian calendar and January 1?

Right here, in maturity. Two calendars can live in harmony.

The Gregorian calendar remains the collective system. It is how society coordinates. You can celebrate January 1 as a cultural ritual, a shared chapter-close, a moment of reflection and joy. You can enjoy it and still recognise that your deepest resets may arrive elsewhere: through your cycle, through the seasons where you live, and through solar thresholds like the March Equinox and Aries New Year.

I personally feel more aligned to celebrate the beginning of Aries in March as the New Year.

Time has layers. When each layer is allowed to do its own work, life becomes more coherent, not as an ideology, but as a lived experience. And that is the point of this work. Not to reject the modern world, but to remember rhythm inside it.

I explore this more deeply in Module 8 of The Courage Code, and it will also be woven into my upcoming books.

With love,

Laura xx