Summer Solstice Embeddings
Integrating experience as the sun approaches its precipice
It is an understatement to describe the year that we are in as one of great change. We sit, as our ancestors have time and time again, at different points in history, at the precipice of enormous ocurrences. Decisions will need to be made, and we cannot continue to operate under illusions. We do so at our peril.
In our ecosystem, we sit at atop the precipice as well. The weight of responsibility is great: we are, after all, responsible for a great many beings. We have chosen this not from arrogance but necessity, and we accept that this makes our life complicated in ways that many would not choose. This weight feels especially heavy as our environment turns on us, as it does each year: temps in the 110's farenheit, harsh winds and brutal sun taunting us during lengthened days that leave little time for rest. Our Summer Solstice is akin to Winter Solstice for those in more temperate climates: during much of each long day we are indoors except to check on the beings out of doors, and the primary need for all residents is shelter. Summer in the Mojave is therefore a time for inwardness, for slowing down. Though, there is still some nuance – it is not exactly as void of activity as, for instance, a snowy winter. The mesquite pod harvest, for example, occurs right around the Solstice, and many of our Spring plantings are coming to harvest as well. In late Summer we sow and otherwise prepare for monsoons, assuming we get them that year. Summer here in the high desert is almost liminal: at once the body is forced to rest and retreat, and simultaneously activate to maintain the environment it is stewarding and its own homeostasis.
The Solstice is truly a tipping point between two distinct seasons, each with Its own sowing and harvesting cycle. It also tends to be an intepersonal tipping point, one which lays bare any needs or conflicts that have gone unadressed. Such is the inflammatory nature of heat, I suppose.
We honor the Solstice differently each year, depending on what is called for. Most often, it is an intimate affair for the residents and perhaps a few close friends. Sometimes we extend invitation to community, and whoever chooses to show up and participate does. It is never a party - or at least, that has been the case since we've inhabited this specific ecosystem. Usually we sit with water - I often hold a kind of baptismal purification ritual after shared or solo extended meditation. No one is required to get into the tub, but if you have something to shed: a conflict or grudge, an internal blocker, resistance to a great change, you may choose to. The water holds herbs, added in prayer and with thanks to their source. Candles are often lit, but not always, as we observe the moon phase simultaneously and this means sometimes candles are not warranted. This year, we will be approaching a new moon, and I hope for stargazing to be a crucial component of our ritual and meditation.
We hope to gain clarity of thought and action as we prepare to weather the hottest days of the year. We will ask the land what it needs, and what it can carry and grow through monsoon season. We time planting according to our sense of summer rains, and stopping to declutter, in a sense, our psyches allows us the space to re-attune to the minute changes in humidity and pressure that indicate it is time to sow seeds.
It is also an opportunity to integrate the experiences of the slightly less local: we look to engage the psychosomatic, and to attend to unexamined fear, anger, hope, despair, and so on. Where the world as it is right now often demands such reaction, we wish to embody pause. We understand that chronically stressed, enraged, or terrified bodies behave differently than those which are calm, invested in an ecosystem, and deeply accountable to a system of values and behaviors. And so as we seek to reconcile local and internal strife through ritual, we also look to reconcile that which is created by the reality beyond our immediate locality. Practicing the withholding of dramatic reaction allows us to practice the art of not centering ourselves in whatever is going on: some events are not about "how we feel" about them, and reactionary action only seeks to distract us and others rather than to listen and collaborate towards constructive solutions. Practicing stepping back enables us to learn how to view events at the level of systems, and to be critical in our evaluation of their relevance and reality.
I see intentional Practice and ritual as having effects on the world around us much in the way dropping a stone in a river affects the surrounding water: the resulting waves are ripples, outwards from within, concentric circles of influence having gradually less force as the opposing motion of the water acts on it. In this way, I wonder if the more we collaboratively Practice towards constructive being in these ways, the stronger our ripples will be, and the further they may travel outwards.
I would like to add a small footnote this month, thanking those of you who subscribe and share this newsletter. It is important to me that I offer you something of value, and I always welcome feedback and suggestions about topics you would like to learn more about or explore deeper. Thank you very much for reading, and I look forward to going a bit more in depth next month on meditation and consciousness alteration, including practical guidance for utilizing different techniques safely. Until next time ~