Why Caribbean healing doesn’t follow January 1st rules

Editor’s Note: This is an older article, but the culture inside it is timeless. It carries the weight of memory and the urgency of now. Let it guide you the way our elders guide us, with truth that refuses to fade.

It is still the first week of January, and I have already caved and hoovered down the chocolate I swore off, skipped the meditation I promised to do daily, and definitely haven’t started that gratitude journal that was going to “transform my life.” If you’re reading this feeling like a failure because your 2026 resolutions lasted about as long as Christmas leftovers, let me tell you something: You’re not broken. The system is.

Western wellness culture wants us to believe that transformation happens on a calendar schedule; that January 1^st holds some magical power to rewire our brains and behaviours completely. As Caribbean people, we know better. Our healing doesn’t follow Gregorian calendar rules because our trauma didn’t arrive on schedule either.

Think about it: When did your grandmother decide to stop speaking to her sister? Was it on New Year’s Day? When did your parents work through their immigration trauma? Did they wait for January to process losing everything they knew? When did your family start healing from whatever happened back home: the violence, the poverty, the heartbreak that made them leave?

Exactly. Life doesn’t wait for convenient timing, and neither does healing.

I’ve been thinking about this since New Year’s Day, when my WhatsApp was flooded with “New Year, New Me” messages. Everyone’s posting gym selfies and drinking green smoothies, performing wellness like it’s a competition. Three days later, reality hit. The same family dynamics that stressed us in 2025 were still there. The same financial pressures, the same workplace microaggressions, the same generational patterns we’re trying to break.

This is where Caribbean wisdom comes in. We understand cycles. We know about seasons, not just weather seasons, but life seasons. Hurricane season doesn’t ask if it’s convenient. Mango season doesn’t check your schedule. Healing season? It comes when it comes.

My great-aunt never made New Year’s resolutions. She used to say, “When you ready fi change, you aguh change. Calendar cyaa tell you when your spirit is ready.” She was onto something that million-dollar wellness empires are still trying to figure out.

The pressure to transform ourselves by January 31^st, is just another form of colonization. It’s the same energy that told our grandparents their natural hair wasn’t professional, that their accents weren’t intelligent, that their healing practices weren’t legitimate. Now it’s telling us our natural healing rhythm isn’t efficient enough.

Here’s what I’m learning: Caribbean healing is cyclical, not linear. We heal in community, not isolation. We heal through storytelling, not silent suffering. We heal through food, music, and laughter as much as therapy and meditation. We heal when we’re ready, not when January tells us to be prepared.

So, if you’ve already “failed” at your 2026 resolutions, good. You just freed yourself from a system that was never designed for us anyway. Instead, ask yourself: What does my spirit need right now? What would healing look like if it honoured my Caribbean rhythm instead of fighting it?

Maybe your healing looks like calling that family member you have been avoiding. Perhaps it’s cooking your grandmother’s recipe with intention. Maybe it’s finally booking that therapy session, but not because January told you to, because your heart is ready.

This year, instead of forcing myself into wellness culture’s timeline, I’m going to trust island time. My healing will happen when it’s supposed to, however it’s supposed to, in community with my people who understand that the most revolutionary thing we can do is heal at our own pace.