It helps to know their origin
Interesting question you raise. You won't find this in books, I guess, and the rabbis appear not to be aware of it, but the Sefirot, I am sure, originate(d) as follows.
1) The wheels of Ezekiel are four in number, from that resting where standing Adam Qadmon’s feet rest centered atop the head, to the fourth and last, the round of the womb resting in the belly of the third (zodiac of seated torso).
2) In each of these four 'worlds' is etched out the path whereby we, as individual units, 'evolved'. Beginning in the One, which is the Exalted (straight up, towards aries the head) or first sign, we develop on the nature or outer (forward) side of the wheel(s), then cross over to the inner or intelligent side to eventually get to where we are currently, an ‘inner horizon’, straight back (from the outer horizon straight ahead): this is the tenth sign or stage (capricorn), namely Malkut, wherein is the Shekhinah or Presence (of the Unit).
Aside: given the above, I for one would not wish to ‘climb’ back to the beginning by undoing all the progress thus-far made. Rather might one aspire to continue on round by the three remaining steps (aquarius, pisces, and return to aries) to complete the thirteen middot or divine qualities.
3) Orientation of the seasons according to the signs arises FROM the physiological attributions, since spring is when things spring up (towards aries the head), fall when things fall down (leaves, fruit), summer nature at her most forward (cancer, the breasts), winter nature at her most held-back (capricorn, builder of backbone lest we be ‘weak in the knees’).
4) These four worlds appear to be suits Clubs, Swords, Cups, and Money, respectively. Numbered cards are Sefirot, and court cards the Name, of four letters.
Postscript: as for paths, there are supposedly two different patterns of them, depending on purpose envisaged. The only light I can shed is that all the Hebrew letters said to correspond to paths (as normally allocated in occult circles) which connect to Tiferet (gimel-heh-zayin-yod-lamedh-nun-samekh-ayin) except the last (ayin) are sounds to the active or inner side of the wheels, the simples (all except gimel being ‘simples’) IN THEIR ORDER of occurrence on the original wheel of twelve simples (whose order was jumbled in an intelligible manner in the alef-bet itself). The paths appear to be a somewhat old tradition in Hebrew circles, yet whether Lurianic Kabbalah delt with them I would be interested to find out, as that is about the latest date at which any solid knowledge of the deeper (unspoken) Qabbalah would have been extant.