Summer Solstice is a time of celebration, festivities and rituals from many cultures worldwide. It’s also known as Midsummer or Litha, and it’s a significant time of year throughout history. So significant that monuments worldwide will be bathed in light in specific fractals during solstice alone. For those of us in the Southern Hemisphere we are celebrating this day right now! It falls between the 21-23rd of December year, in the midst of our Summer close to Christmas.
On Litha, life is in full bloom and glory, being the longest day of light of the year, the peak of light’s potential. It’s a time of peace, knowing we have cultivated as much as we can, and we can sit around sharing stories together about the good times.
Although Solstice marks a day of light, fertility, celebration and connection, it is also a sad day. Whenever we reach the peak of an experience, we also realise we have to begin the descent now. In this case, the descent into actual darkness, as each day hereon for 6 months, the light will fade. And for many cultures, the light fading means the potential of actual death to the cold hands of Winter.
The seasons are less viscous closer to the equator and so the cultures that dwell here have less variation in the year’s seasons. It tends to be seasons marked by rain rather than light.
Solstice it’s not just a day, it’s a moment. A moment that the earth reaches its maximum tilt and zenith; it’s highest expression. Solstice is derived from the Latin words sol (Sun) and sistere (to stand still). Today, the sun stand’s still, so may you too take a moment to bath in the light and be still.
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