We're heading toward the back half of February—and according to your weird aunt on Facebook, this is an unusual, maybe magical month. Some say it is a "miraclein," a lucky calendar configuration that only occurs once every 823 years. Others say February 2026 is a "perfect month." Some say it is the beginning of an extremely unlucky year. Some say that a late-month planetary alignment will cause great upheaval.
The February 2026 "miraclein"
Though it is not a word used by astronomers (or even astrologers, to my knowledge), some are describing this month as a "miraclein," a month in which every day of the week falls four times during the month. This only happens every 823 years, they say. A variation of the miraclein month has some people calling February "moneybags" and making the claim that it's a good month for abundance. (The markets don't agree: February has been volatile.)
Here's a video explaining the theory:
A quick check of a calendar reveals that miracleins happen almost every year. Every day of the week falls exactly four times every February (except leap years), because four times seven is 28, and there are 28 days in the month. It's not a miracle—it's math. It's not even new. People spread this every February. This is an example of a pervasive strain of myths and superstitions based on the calendar.
Is February 2026 a "perfect month"?
If you dig a little deeper into the lore of February 2026, you'll find people describing it as a "perfect month," in that it begins on a Sunday and ends on a Sunday. There's logic to this, because the calendar is a perfect grid, with no days overhanging. This is nice and orderly, but it's not that unusual. February 2015 was a "perfect" month and February 2037 will be perfect as well.
February's planetary parade
The "miraclein" and perfect month only exist because that's how we decided to write calendars, but there is a cosmic event happening this month that goes beyond humanity. On the 28th of February, six planets—Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune—will appear to be "lined up" in the sky. Some describe it as a "once every 6,000 years planetary conjunction" that will create a "paradigm shift for the entire planet" or cause gravitational anomalies. Some warn: "Do not look at the sky during the planetary alignment;" other, funnier, people say "The planets are having some type of conference or gang meeting on February 28." But whether you call it a "conjunction" or a "conference," it's not rare. Five or six planet line ups happen every few years, and last February, seven planets attended a gang meeting.
The planets aren't actually lining up, anyway. They'll just look lined up from our perspective on earth. Nothing will happen to your eyes if you look at it (you won't even be able to see Uranus and Neptune without a telescope anyway) and it won't affect gravity or cause a paradigm shift. It's just planets doing their thing in space.
Is 2026 unusually unlucky?
In 2026, there will be three Friday the 13ths—one just passed in February, one is coming in March, and there's a third in November—this leads some to believe that 2026 is a particularly unlucky or cursed year. Jury's out on whether the year is cursed, but if so, it's not because of Friday the 13ths. While three is the maximum number of Friday the 13ths that can happen in a calendar year, it's not unusual. There were three Friday the 13ths in 2015, and there will be three in 2037 too.
Speaking of the 13th, the belief that it's a bad, or unlucky day dates back to 19th-century France, but it's not entirely clear why people think it's unlucky. One guess is that Judas was the 13th apostle, but there's also a Norse myth about Loki showing up to as the thirteenth guest at a dinner party and doing mischief. Other cultures have other unlucky days. The 4th is unlucky in China. In Italy, the 17th is unlucky because XVII can be rearranged to form "VIXI," Latin for "my life is over," a common inscription on tombstones. The through-line is that none of these superstitions have anything to do with the physical world. They're examples of seeing connections where none exist.
All hail Apophenia, ruler of human thought
I don't have research to back this up, but I imagine the Venn diagram of people who believed the Rapture was coming, that Leviathan was rising from the oceans, and aliens were landing has serious overlap with the people who think there's something portentous about the planets aligning or that February is moneybags month. You'd think that when the aliens didn't land and the rapture didn't happen, folks would be more discerning about spreading future predictions, but that doesn't seem to be the case. But it's not just because people are gullible. It's a byproduct of how our brains are wired.
Apophenia is the tendency to perceive meaningful connections between unrelated things. Neurologist Klaus Conrad coined the term in a 1958 study of schizophrenics, describing "a specific feeling of abnormal meaningfulness," but apophenia goes beyond schizophrenics. It's in every gambler on a "lucky streak," everyone who sees a "man in the moon," and everyone who ever mistook correlation for causation. So: everyone. Our brains evolved to find patterns in data because it kept us alive and led to things like the scientific method, but the trade-off is that we think a rally cap is going to help our ball club win the series.
Pascal's Wager
Apophenia isn't the only thing at play here. Spreading a TikTok video promising abundance is a cranked-up version of Pascal's Wager, the philosophical argument that it’s smarter to bet on a reward when the cost of entry is low—hitting "share" takes almost no effort, and what if it works? While none of these beliefs are new, in the Before Times, if you wanted to be a doomsayer, you'd have to stand on a street corner with a sign reading "the end is near." That's a lot of effort and you wouldn't have an algorithm ensuring your message got to the people who would be most receptive to it.
Even misinformation that doesn't promise a monetary reward offers something to the person who spreads it. Sometimes it's the momentary high of feeling like you possess secret knowledge. Or it's a way of signaling belonging to an in-group ("I'm the kind of person who thinks the position of the stars has mystical significance!") or maybe it's just to get some attention.
I don't choose to post about "moneybags February" because my "cost of entry" would be my friends thinking I'm weird for sharing Facebook glurge, and a general sense that it's harmful to spread lies, but really, your weird aunt on Facebook and I are doing the same thing. We're both out here matching patterns and hitting "share"; we just have different ideas about which patterns to pay attention to. I'll still take bets on any conspiracy theory, but February is a cold month, and if it warms your aunt's heart to think it's bringing money, who am I to call her wrong? It's just that the same wiring that spreads "February is magic" also spreads beliefs and ideas that are legitimately dangerous, even deadly—at least according to the way I read the patterns.
