Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature with me Liz Scott.
You join me in a field of sheep so you might hear the occasional bleating of lambs and ewes and I'm here up on Dartmoor with an incredible view looking out across the South Hams,
That's the land below where I live,
All the way across fields and hedgerows and greenery out towards the ocean itself.
And Dartmoor is a really beautiful place and just to get up here walking onto footpaths and through lanes,
Everything is almost at the height of its growth.
The lanes are what looks like getting thinner and thinner to get through because the undergrowth on the side of each hedgerow is spilling into the lanes,
The ferns and the shrubs and the flowers and the trees that overhang the lane,
Everything is crowding in.
It's like as we reach the summer solstice,
Everything is at its height,
The height of growth,
The height of light,
The busyness and the delight of growing and thriving in nature and in this part of the season.
And of course the summer solstice comes at the midpoint of the year,
This is a time to pause and reflect.
It might be a time of great growth and it might be a time of great creativity and also my request is that you consider that it's also in the summer solstice a time to reflect.
It's a good time to reflect on what you've achieved,
On your creativity,
It's a good time to acknowledge what you are all about in the world.
But equally it's a good time to pause,
This isn't about continuing to grow and to grow at such a speed,
This is a time to realise that soon coming up is a time to slow down,
That vigorous growth,
That vigorous creativity is being invited to slow down.
And also as we are here at the time of the summer solstice,
It's a time for you to reflect on maybe the areas that you have neglected to invest time and energy in.
The summer solstice is a time to reflect.
So it's a time to reflect and acknowledge where you've got to,
Acknowledge your achievements,
Acknowledge your creativity and if you've been energetic the energy that you've invested into getting where you are.
And the summer solstice is also a time to realise you are in a space of transition.
It's also an invitation to recognise that soon the time will come for you to slow down.
It's also a time for you to recognise that there might be areas in your life that need attention,
Areas that you've overlooked.
This is the summer solstice reflection.
So take a little bit of time today to acknowledge what you've achieved this year,
Just to acknowledge everything you've achieved,
However big or small you think it might be in your life,
Give time to acknowledge it.
And also spend time reflecting on the areas that need attention.
Maybe in your enthusiasm for creativity and growth you've neglected areas in your life that need a little bit of attention.
What are those areas?
What might you need to give a bit of attention to?
And the final aspect of this summer solstice reflection is just that acknowledgement that this is a time of transition,
Of moving into a different phase,
Of moving towards a phase of slowing down.
And just recognising that it's okay,
It's fine to work at speed and to go fast,
But it is also important to balance it out.
And I see the solstice as a time of balance,
It's like the fulcrum,
It's the middle of a seesaw,
It's the time when we move from one part of the year to the next part of the year.
So today,
Take away the summer solstice reflection.
Let me remind you of it again,
Three parts to it.
Firstly,
Acknowledge all that you've done so far this year and the creativity and growth that you've experienced.
Secondly,
Spend time considering if there are areas in your life that actually need attention,
That you've overlooked.
Give yourself time to reflect and give time to those things that need attention.
And thirdly,
Realise that this is a transition.
We are moving now from one part of the year to another and it might be you are moving from one part of your life to another and being invited to slow down.
I do wish you a very happy summer solstice.
