Choosing Regulation and Renewal Over Resolutions

New Year’s Eve arrives wrapped in lights and expectations...

The world tells us it’s time to become new — rewrite habits, push harder, chase a better version of ourselves as we round the corner into a new chapter… a new year.

But for many people, this season doesn’t feel like fireworks and fresh starts. It feels more like fog, fatigue, early sunsets, and a nervous system that wants to curl up like the rest of the natural world.

If you feel tired before the year has even begun, you’re not failing...Your brain and body are in winter.

Outside, the land is resting. Trees draw energy inward. The forest floor is quiet while roots deepen in the dark soil. Under the snow, seeds hold life without rushing it. Nothing about this looks dramatic or productive — but everything about it is essential.

Nature is not lazy in winter. It is wise.

And you are part of nature, not separate from it.

This year, instead of forcing a list of resolutions, what if you chose something different?

What if you chose regulation and renewal over resolutions?

Why resolutions often feel impossible in January:

Traditional resolutions assume:

• endless daylight

• endless energy

• endless motivation

But January is a season of:

• shorter days and altered circadian rhythms

• lower serotonin and increased melatonin

• nervous systems already under strain from stress and transitions

It is like asking a frozen lake to become a rushing river overnight.

Winter invites contraction. Many animals hibernate. Plants slow their sap to survive the cold. Even the earth itself moves into stillness. Yet humans often tell themselves: “I should bloom right now.” No wonder it hurts.

When the nervous system is already in fight, flight, freeze, or fawn, resolutions can feel like extra weight on thin ice.

We don’t need more self-criticism layered like frost across our hearts. We need warmth. We need thawing. We need safety… which is where regulation comes in.

Regulation first: warming the nervous system

Nothing in nature grows well when it is frozen.

Regulation is the process of slowly adding warmth — not by force, but by care. It means bringing your nervous system back toward safety and connection before expecting yourself to do more.

Regulation can look like:

• wrapping up in blankets like snow protecting seeds

• stepping outside and letting cold air remind you you’re in a body

• steady movement, like walking a winter trail

• warm drinks that signal comfort to the nervous system

• anchoring with breath as gently as falling snow

• talking with someone who feels like sunlight on a short day

When safety and warmth return, the ground softens. Thoughts thaw. Options reappear. Just like streams begin moving again beneath the breaking ice, life starts flowing naturally when the nervous system feels safe again. Willpower isn’t the engine of change — safety is.

Renewal instead of reinvention

Resolutions bark orders... Renewal listens.

Resolutions say: “Fix yourself. Be different. Try harder.”

Renewal says: “Something alive is already here. Let’s care for it.”

Renewal honours winter. It understands that fields need to lie fallow, forests need dormancy, and even the sun keeps shorter hours in this season.

Renewal looks like:

• letting yourself be a living being who experiences the rhythms of seasons

• choosing smaller, kinder steps

• respecting what your winter brain and body need

• noticing tiny shoots of energy instead of demanding blossoms

You don’t dig up seeds in February to check whether they’re working. Trust that your unseen work counts.

You are not broken.... You are wintering.

If this New Year’s Eve doesn’t feel like a launch, that doesn’t mean you lack discipline or faith or grit.....It means you are human.

Just like the earth, you have seasons of blooming and seasons of rooting. Times of long daylight and times when the light returns slowly, minute by minute. Times when your life looks like a meadow of flowers — and times when it looks like bare branches against a cold sky. Bare branches are not dead...they are conserving life.

Snow-covered fields are not empty...they are protected incubators for spring.

And you?

You are not behind… You are not failing... You are wintering.

As the calendar turns, may you choose:

• regulation over self-pressure

• renewal over harsh resolutions

• compassion over criticism

• roots before blossoms

Spring always comes — not because we force it, but because winter has done its quiet work.

May this season bring you warmth, steadiness, and gentle renewal from the inside out.