Summer days are long, and in the subtropics, often the humidity can make any task an uncomfortable effort. Even simple things, like driving a car in the midday glare feels draining. The intense light and heat of summer invite a change of rhythm.
Rather than wish these months away, as I have often done in the past, I now challenge myself to slow down and feel into summer’s ripening depths. To pause and appreciate beautiful unrushed moments, where my nervous system recalibrates into the generative field of rising coherence. I listen as birds call and breezes whisper as they brush past me.
I observe, summer is generous as well as generative. It’s best lived under vines with flowers of rich hues in bloom – vines of grape, tomatoes, and cucumber – sprawling languorously. Herbs and vegetables spill out of garden beds in leafy abundance as I wander around, sprinkling water. Everything is growing so quickly.
Summer can also be restful. Sweet afternoons spent sheltering from the heat, in a hazy liminality of dreaming and imagining. Not merely dreaming of activities and plans but simply allowing summers’ ripening to work on my depths. To soften into my being, receptive to the vitality of the moment, and its co-creative potential. Waiting for the gentler light of dusk to signal time for the next move.
In summer evenings, the buzz of insects replace the birdsong while cool breeze moves through the long grass where cows quietly graze. Here, I am filled with appreciation for the life that moves through everything.
Dr. Justine Stratton