The month of January was largely spent sitting by my wood stove taking much needed time to journal, plan, dream, and set aside a daily chunk of time for prayer and meditation. I’ve cherished this silence and “free time,” and I’ll admit feeling reticent about turning the page to a new month: February will necessarily mean leaving behind quite a lot of that silent time alone to sit and think, mostly because as blissful and deserved as it was, “there’s work to be done…” as they say!! So, with gratitude I face busier days and a more hectic schedule but as I do an image keeps nudging its way into my brain and heart to the point that I must consider its ramifications. I keep hearing and seeing Jesus saying, “you can’t put new wine into old wineskins… or into cracked bottles. My pace is about to really pick up speed with all sorts of old and new commitments and deadlines. Will I return to the feverish pace that led me to such fatigue and listlessness prompting the January “vacation by the fire?”

What part of my “old way” of filling up my calendar can I let go of…and learn from my “new January calmer way?” Realistically, not very many of us can have the luxury of perpetual sitting and reflecting by the fire! But do I need to give that pesky image of old wineskins a bit more room? I mean it’s going to be all too easy to just revert to the old way; saying yes to too many things while complaining of too little time to breathe, relax and pray. What if I take these February weeks to slowly get into more work, but intentionally set aside an hour each day to just BE? In at least a small way I’d be learning to pour the new wine of a more balanced day into a brand new bottle of my life.

In this heart month when love is all around, perhaps what many of us need is a reboot of that new beginning frame of mind that January 1st just brought to us! After all, only four weeks have gone by since we set some new goals and took inventory of where we are going. February is really that last hibernating “winter month” that affords us time still to revise, reenergize, recommit to our New Year hopes and dreams. We might just need a new heart this month…an OPEN one that seeks wise balance, that is willing to try new ways, to find a new rhythm: God’s rhythm! Because for me anyway, Spring will rush in soon enough with a rhythm of its own!! (for more ways to greet each season’s rhythms, see my book, “A Seasoned Life.”)

“The object of a new year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul.” G. K. Chesterton

A new soul, an open heart, a brand new month, the new wine of better practices into shiny NEW bottles! may we all experience this newness all month long!