I’ve realised this year that I haven’t planned my summers out very well. For someone who grew up in a tropical climate, the context of seasons and really shifting and transition from one to the next hasn’t been that natural to me.

In saying that, I’ve lived in seasonal environments for over a decade now so I have certainly adjusted in a lot of ways. I really relish the cues from nature to turn a little more inward, to reserve energy, to start releasing. Through to powering up again, blossoming, and finding ways to energise.

Yet with summer, it’s something I’ve just never thought to ‘plan’ for. In fact it’s something that my peers in the UK seem to do so well. So well that when I first moved here I thought it was a little strange (if I’m perfectly honest). It would be mid-winter, in the lead up to Christmas or sometime in January and they’d be talking about what they had booked for their summer holiday!

What?! Crazy. Far too in advance. Then I’d start to panic too that I was missing out on something and should I be getting in on the action too?

But I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.

No matter how much I love a good plan (and certainly love a good holiday too!) my brain couldn’t quite compute summer when I was sitting in the middle of winter.

Yet they were really onto something. You see, when summer rolls around and you’ve really been indoors lots, or at least very wrapped up in clothing for almost half a year, there comes with the summer air a neediness of sorts to get unwrapped. To be in the elements. To feel the warmth of the sun, or the light breeze over your skin.

Yogis would tell you the sun has a pretty incredible energy to it. One of life force, of creation. And there’s plenty more research on the necessities of Vitamin D. However, you don’t have to be a yogi or a researcher to have considered this before either. Without the sun, the warmth, and the night and day, we wouldn’t have life in the way we do. We wouldn’t have the food we have. The air we have. I think you get the picture…

This year I have finally realised the real reason why my peers were planning their summer holidays so far in advance. Because when you get something in the diary it actually happens.

When you commit to the energy of the sun, it will commit to you. There comes a point by summer where we absolutely need to be ‘in it’ and without prioritising the heat, the sun, the vitamin D way back in winter, chances are summer could easily roll around without you even noticing.

We tend to fill our schedules with so much else, regardless of the season we’re in. Which means on a day to day basis we would barely notice the difference between a summer’s work day and a winter’s work day. Having a critical pause in the midst of it all reminds us to connect with ourselves, to nourish, to refuel in a way we just can’t and don’t during other seasons.

I’m paying way more attention to the sun this year. I’ve basked in its glory since it first poked its gorgeous head out in May. I’ve committed to wearing less layers even when there’s a slightly chilly breeze still laying about. And I committed to a week away from my regular schedule, away from the day to day, to worship the sun.

As I sit here typing this, sunglasses on, right arm burning hot from the sun left arm needing to shift a little in the angle to catch it, teeny tiny bit of warmth (not quite sweat) developing on my face, I smile. The sun is recharging me. Inside out and outside in. It’s giving me a new way to look at my life right now. A different kind of strength, charge and dynamic about it. Just as each season brings with it its own gifts, right now I’m being more present. I’m allowing the gifts to be unwrapped instead of rushing past without even noticing them.

The sun doesn’t have to equal the sun.

You don’t have to sit on a bench outside literally in the sun to feel its charge. There’s lots of ways to create the light, the strength, the energy in your daily life.

How will you go about worshipping the sun today?

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