February doesn’t arrive gently.
It arrives with the heart already open—sometimes wider than we intended. The holidays are behind us, the resolutions have either taken root or quietly dissolved, and what remains is something harder to ignore: the question of love. Not love as a greeting card concept, but love as a living force—who we give it to, who we withhold it from, and whether we’ve been honest about what our hearts actually need.
This is why February has long been associated with Regulus, the Heart of the Lion.
Regulus is not a subtle star. It is the brightest point in the constellation Leo, sitting at the very center of the lion’s chest—the place where breath and courage meet. Every ancient culture that named this star called it the heart. The Greeks knew it as Kardia Leontos. The Romans called it Cor Leonis. The Arabs named it Qalb al-Asad. All three phrases mean the same thing: Heart of the Lion. When that many civilizations, separated by centuries and oceans, arrive at the same name for the same star, it is worth paying attention.
Astronomically, Regulus is remarkable. It is a quadruple star system—four stars bound together—shining with a blue-white fire approximately 360 times brighter than our Sun. It sits closer to the ecliptic than any other bright star in the sky, which means the Moon and planets pass near it constantly. In February 2026, something extraordinary happens: the New Moon on February 17th falls just one day before Regulus reaches opposition—the point in its annual cycle when it rises at sunset, crosses the sky all night, and reaches its highest point at midnight. This is Regulus at full power. When the Moon withdraws its light on the 17th, the Heart of the Lion does not merely appear in the darkness. It commands it.
The ancients understood this. The Persians classified Regulus as one of the Four Royal Stars—the celestial guardians stationed at the four corners of heaven. Regulus was the Watcher of the North, associated with kingship, triumph, and the authority that comes not from force but from genuine nobility of spirit. The Babylonians called it Sharru—the King. In India it was Maghā, the Mighty, the Bountiful. In medieval European magic, Regulus was one of the fifteen Behenian stars, the most powerful fixed stars recognized for talismanic work. Its traditional correspondences—garnet, gold, celandine, mugwort—were used to create objects of personal sovereignty, courage, and the dispelling of sorrow.
What makes Regulus relevant to February is not just its brightness or its mythology. It is the specific quality of its energy: bold, generous, heart-centered, and unapologetically alive. Ptolemy described its nature as Mars and Jupiter combined—the courage of the warrior joined with the magnanimity of the benefactor. This is not the timid love of hoping to be noticed. This is the radiant love of someone who stands fully in their own fire and lets that warmth reach others naturally.
This distinction matters in February more than any other month. February is when people feel the gap between what they want and what they have most acutely. Loneliness sharpens. Insecurity deepens. Even those in relationships may sense a distance they cannot name. The cultural pressure to perform love—to buy the right gift, say the right thing, prove devotion on schedule—often makes the real work of the heart harder, not easier.
Regulus offers a different path. Its energy does not chase. It radiates. It does not plead for love; it becomes so luminous that love is drawn toward it. Working with Regulus in February is less about attracting a specific person or outcome and more about rekindling the fire at the center of your own chest—the one that may have dimmed through disappointment, through guardedness, through simply forgetting that you are allowed to want what you want without apology.
Living With Regulus Energy Through Aligned Candles
A Regulus-aligned candle is not something you light once and forget. It becomes a practice—a repeated act of turning toward your own heart and tending the fire there. Over time, the candle becomes associated not just with romance or passion, but with the deeper current beneath both: the willingness to be fully present in your own life.
People work with these candles in ways that surprise them. One person lit their Regulus candle every evening during the week before Valentine’s Day, not to manifest a partner, but to sit with the question of what love actually meant to them outside of anyone else’s expectations. By the end of the week, they had written a letter—not to a lover, but to themselves—acknowledging years of settling for less than they deserved. The candle didn’t write the letter. But the steady warmth of the flame, night after night, made it possible to be that honest.
Another person used a Regulus candle during a period of estrangement from a sibling. They didn’t light it to fix the relationship or to rehearse what they would say. They lit it to find the courage to reach out at all. The star fire’s quality—bold but not aggressive, warm but not desperate—helped them find a tone that was honest without being combative. The conversation that followed was not perfect, but it was real. And it happened because someone found the courage to begin.
Others bring Regulus energy into creative work. February can feel stagnant creatively—the winter has lasted long enough that inspiration feels distant. Lighting a Regulus candle before painting, writing, or making music doesn’t inject artificial enthusiasm. It reconnects the practitioner to the part of themselves that creates because they must, not because the result will be praised. Regulus energy is generous but not performative. It creates from fullness, not from hunger.
This is what Regulus candles do best: they do not manufacture emotion. They restore access to the fire that was always there.
The Practices, as People Actually Live With Them
Most people do not experience Regulus work as formal ritual. They experience it as moments of return—small, repeated acts of placing their hand over their own heart and choosing courage over caution.
Some light their Regulus candle before a date—not to cast a spell on the other person, but to remind themselves that they deserve to show up as they actually are. The flame becomes a mirror: steady, warm, unashamed. Over time, this practice reduces the anxiety that turns first dates into performances and allows genuine connection to emerge.
Others use the candle during difficult relationship conversations. Lighting it beforehand is not superstition; it is preparation. The Regulus frequency encourages directness tempered by warmth—saying what needs to be said without cruelty, hearing what needs to be heard without collapsing. The flame holds the space steady when emotions threaten to overwhelm the room.
Some people bring their Regulus candle into self-forgiveness work. February has a way of surfacing old heartbreaks, old mistakes, old versions of ourselves we wish we could disown. Regulus—traditionally called the star of forgiveness in some lineages—helps soften the grip of shame. Lighting the candle and simply sitting with what hurts, without rushing to fix or explain it, allows the heart to metabolize grief at its own pace.
Perhaps the most powerful use is the simplest. Lighting a Regulus candle on a cold February night and sitting with the warmth—no agenda, no petition, no goal—just the quiet act of tending a fire. In that simplicity, something shifts. The chest loosens. The breath deepens. The heart, for a few minutes, remembers that it is allowed to be open.
Why These Practices Work
What all of these moments have in common is warmth without pressure. Regulus energy does not demand that you fall in love on a schedule or heal a wound by a deadline. It simply keeps the fire lit. It reminds you that the heart is a muscle that strengthens through use—through honesty, through vulnerability, through the willingness to feel deeply even when it is inconvenient.
The benefits unfold over the course of the month: greater ease in emotional expression, more confidence in relationships, a softening of the inner critic that tells you your love is too much or not enough. These changes are not dramatic. They are steady. And they tend to last because they come from the inside out.
That’s why February is such a natural time to work with Regulus. The month itself asks for heart. Regulus provides the courage to answer.
A Different Kind of Valentine
February does not have to be about proving love to someone else.
It can be about proving it to yourself.
Regulus reminds us that the heart is not fragile. It is fierce. It is the part of us that survives loss, that dares to try again, that burns even after being told it should have stopped burning long ago. When you look up at Leo on a February night and find that blue-white star shining at the center of the lion’s chest, you are seeing a reflection of something you already carry.
Working with Regulus energy through aligned candles is not about forcing the heart open. It is about standing near the fire long enough to remember that it never fully closed.
And that kind of remembering tends to change everything.
For those who choose to work more deeply with Regulus energy, using the Lion’s Heart Grid to prepare candles can be a meaningful way to bring that bold stellar influence into daily life. Arranging candles in the arc of the Sickle of Leo—the curved pattern that crowns the constellation, with Regulus at its heart point—creates a terrestrial echo of the celestial lion. Aligning candles in advance allows them to carry Regulus’s passionate, courageous presence whenever they’re lit later—during moments of emotional honesty, creative fire, or quiet devotion. Rather than performing something new each time, you’re tending a flame that already knows what your heart needs.
