Peace In The Margins

Quiet morning. Steaming cup of coffee. Outside my window, a wooded landscape rests beneath a soft covering of snow. Water drips steadily from bare branches as the day warms just enough to loosen Winter’s hold. The snow hasn’t disappeared, but it’s slowly and deliberately changing.

There’s a stillness to mornings like this. 

This time of year carries a particular energy marking a subtle turning point, a moment when winter still dominates the landscape, yet spring has already begun to stir beneath the surface. Imbolc is a season of first light and quiet promise. Of tending rather than blooming. Of paying attention to what is waking, even when everything still appears bare.

Outside and without ceremony, the snow melts. Inside, something similar is happening.

Seasonally, we are moving from winter toward spring. Personally, I find myself in a season of gentle realignment. More journaling. More meditation. Less noise. I’m seeking out unhurried hikes and quiet moments in nature. Not to escape my life, but to feel more fully present within it.

Imbolc isn’t about dramatic transformation. It’s about preparation. About tending the inner hearth. About lighting a candle and trusting the returning light to do its work in time. Watching the snow melt this morning, I’m reminded that growth rarely announces itself. It begins quietly, almost invisibly, long before anything looks different on the surface.

For years, I treated transitions as something to rush through – something to manage so I could arrive at whatever came next. But nature doesn’t hurry its becoming. The trees aren’t anxious about their bare branches. The earth doesn’t demand immediate proof of spring. Everything unfolds when it’s ready.

There’s wisdom in that.

This season is asking me to tend rather than strive. To listen more than plan. Journaling becomes a way of noticing. Meditation becomes a way of warming the space inside. Time in nature becomes a reminder that becoming doesn’t require force, no, it requires patience.

Imbolc teaches that light returns gradually. That warmth begins as a promise, not a guarantee. And that the in-between is not something to endure, but something to honor.

As I finish my coffee, the snow continues to melt. The light grows a little stronger, almost imperceptibly. Nothing has shifted all at once, and yet everything feels subtly different. This season isn’t asking for certainty or completion; it’s asking for care. For tending what’s quietly awakening and trusting the process before anything blooms. 

In the in-between, I light the candle and call it enough.