Making meaning along with the season

It’s the summer solstice here in the Northern Hemisphere. Over the last few years, it’s become a value of mine to live by marking seasonal inflection points throughout the year. To me, this is a way of looking to nature as a guide. It helps contextualize my life, and it creates meaning for me.

Right now, for example, I’m sitting outside and the sun is shining. My garden is blooming. I can see the colors of the flowers, the leafiness of the foliage, everything reaching upward. Bees are pollinating and buzzing around, and I can feel the energy of the day: also BUZZING. This expansive energy isn’t available to me at all times of the year, but I am aware it’s here now. It's fueling my hunger and motivation to be in motion out in the world. To embody this alongside nature is to honour and celebrate with nature.

But I had to craft how I celebrate seasonal changes in my own way over time and I wanted to offer a few simple ideas if you’re looking to explore this for yourself. For me, the ingredients that make a seasonal celebration feel meaningful are some combination of: ritual, reflection, and celebration. And the best part is, it doesn’t need to be complicated.

Ritual, for me, is simply engaging in some kind of practice of awe, reverence, or appreciation. I’m someone who likes to bring together objects I’ve collected or found that reflect the vitality and energy of the sun’s abundance. As a ritual, I set up a little altar where those things can shine in my home. When I got dressed this morning, I adorned myself in sunshine colors—gold, orange, red—as a way of embodying and making an offering to the day. But this could also look like going for a walk with a lot of presence, or making another kind of offering, like gathering flowers or setting out a cup of water. 

Reflection. I love to journal. During this seasonal shift, I’m looking back at the goals, intentions, and desires I expressed in winter and taking stock in a light way. Rather than pick apart what has or hasn’t happened, what I did or didn’t do, I approach it the same way I look at my garden. There are lots of things that are blooming, and there are things that are still unfolding. The tomatoes are still flowering, with some early green fruits just forming; it isn’t time to harvest yet. So, I journaled about:

• What has bloomed in my life that I’m grateful for? What’s here now that at one point I only dreamed about?

• And what’s still growing? How can I continue to tend to these things (while respecting their way and timing)?

And if journaling isn’t your thing, another way to reflect is simply to look through the photos on your phone from the beginning of the year and see what stands out.

Finally, celebration. For me, this is about doing what feels good and making the day special. Today, I’m joining a group of other delightfully weird humans who want to celebrate the summer solstice with a breathwork circle. Later today, my partner and I are eating orange, yellow, and red foods to mark the day together. 

I suspect you’re probably already doing something that falls into one or all of these categories. My invitation is simply to do it with presence. To be aware of how good it feels and of the energy that’s available here on the longest day of the year.

So I'm curious

What are you inspired to do to celebrate this seasonal portal?

It’s not the size of the action, it’s the meaning you give it.