Walk Into the New Year / Winter Trust
The morning arrives without announcement, noticed only because everything feels quieter than the night before. Snow fell while I slept, and the trail waits untouched, almost holding its breath. I step into it first, and the sound under my boots is clean and soft. The world feels paused, not frozen, but steady and attentive.
Dark stays with me as I walk. My headlamp draws a narrow path ahead, offering only what is needed for the next few steps. I start to notice how little light is required to move forward, how attention does more work than certainty. My body accepts this easily. My mind takes longer to settle into it.
Cold air meets my lungs, and my breath feels tender in my chest. A small ache sits in my throat, familiar and honest. The body asks its questions early. What am I carrying? What needs rest? What needs care? The dark does not soften these questions. It clears space around them and waits.
As the trail bends, the trees open into a small glen. The snow lies smooth and unbroken, like it has been waiting. I stop without meaning to. My hands slip into my pockets, and warmth returns slowly. When I stand still, the place seems to slow with me, and I realize I am willing to linger longer than planned.
Movement catches my eye. Then another. Small birds move through the branches with quick purpose. Chickadees and sparrows, winter residents who know this hour well. I have birdseed in my pocket and offer it without expectation. One bird lands, then another. Their weight barely registers. I feel how trust builds through watching and patience, through consistency rather than urgency. The birds understand this instinctively. They respond to what stays steady.
I know this moment will return later, on louder days when doubt moves fast and pulls for my attention. I can feel it settling now in a place inside me that feels steady and dependable, a place I trust. This is how the new year begins for me, not with declarations or direction, but with quiet participation, with listening that asks nothing in return, with putting my body in a place where learning happens quietly, and staying long enough to notice how patience yields its own important lesson. Truth be told, I am not very good at this.
When the birds lift off, they do so together, and the glen slowly finds its sound again. Air moves. Snow shifts. The place breathes, and I move with it. I start walking again, and my tracks continue to mark the first path of the day. It feels like a small responsibility, a reminder to move with care.
As the trail climbs, warmth returns to my legs and my breathing deepens into a steady rhythm, and with each step the stories in my head loosen their grip and drift a little farther away. The sharpness in my heart softens, not disappearing, not resolved, but easing enough to carry without bracing. Hope arrives without announcement and stays close, moving beside me rather than ahead, while compassion settles in and quietly shapes my pace.
The day opens as I move through it, step by step, toward what I do not yet see, and trust comes with me, learned slowly from birds who endure winter and from years of walking forward in the dark. The light keeps moving, patient and unhurried, and I follow.
Libby DeLana is an executive creative director with an explorer’s heart. She writes about walking, cold water, and the small rituals that make a life feel awake. Her books, Do Walk and Cold Joy, are companions for anyone who likes a little adventure in their days. You can find her on Instagram @thismorningwalk, @thiscoldjoy, and @parkhere. You can find Cold Joy at thiscoldjoy.com.