I had every intention to rise before the sun today.

I set an alarm, and yet…

I’m not an early riser, by nature.

Though I have lifelong aspirations to be.

The quiet, the potential, the chance to be a literal embodiment of a sun salutation — to be a greeter of the sun, no yoga mat required :)

If there’s ever a day to rise with the sun, it’s today.

The Summer Solstice.

Many gorgeous resources exist out there to offer you scientific explanations or traditional wisdom or bits of pure magic about what this longest day of the year means.

But I’ll borrow a bit from Irish poet & priest & favorite of mine (and some of yours), John O’Donohue who, in his beautiful book of blessings called To Bless the Space Between Us invites us to consider days like these as a threshold:

“A threshold is a significant frontier” and a “place of great transformation.” A powerful potency that marks crossing between two worlds, like the passing from spring to summer.

O’Donohue offers, and I tend to agree, that our modern culture “has little to offer us for our crossings,” so we must look deeper: 

“Never was there such talk of communication or such technology to facilitate it. Yet at the heart of our newfound wealth and progress there is a gaping emptiness, and we are haunted by our loneliness. While we seem to have progressed to experts in so many things—multiplying and acquiring stuff we neither need nor truly want—we have unlearned the grace of presence and belonging. With the demise of religion, many people are left stranded in a chasm of emptiness and doubt, without rituals to recognize, celebrate, or negotiate the vital thresholds of people’s lives, the key crossings pass by, undistinguished from the mundane, everyday rituals of life. … If we approach our decisive thresholds with reverence and attention, the crossing will bring us much more than we could ever have hoped for.”

My invitation to you today is to not let this day go by as another quick blip on the radar of busyness.

Instead, to move through this seasonal threshold with reverence and attention, even simply so.

The most immediate and accessible way to practice that I can think of today — 

Step outside into the sun. Palms, open and receptive (like you were feeling for rain). Let its warm fill you as you raise your head toward the sun. Take a deep breath in and and deep breath out. Pause there, receptive and open. Stay as long as you can. A way to remember to remember the reciprocal abundance of light and warmth we are a part of today.

Speaking of early mornings filled with potential — 40 Early Mornings is my twice-yearly, seasonal invitation to deepen or begin a meditation practice. A 40-day threshold into presence and grace. The next turn begins at the Autumnal Equinox in September.

You can put your name on the 40 Early Mornings waitlist if you’d like.