Consequences of a Summer Obsessed Culture
Summer — the peak season of doing. For those of us fortunate to experience all four seasons over the course of a year, summer is what most of us are longing for and craving. Those seemingly never-ending, warm, sunny days — basking in the beauty of nature in full bloom.
Summer — a season of reaping the rewards of what’s been planted, successfully harvesting, and an increase in production. A time where energy is heightened, where the sun arrives earlier and lingers far past our regularly scheduled bed-time (at least for those of us in the farthest northern reaches), a time which lends well to maximizing our activities each day.
Over the course of our history, summer’s emergence naturally leads to an increase in productivity. However, what I continue to witness is our societal obsession with constantly being in “summer-mode”. We’ve adopted an expectation to always be doing, producing, creating, and harvesting — that summer is meant to be constant.
We see this repeatedly in business and large-scale corporations, the desire — nay, the demand — to ALWAYS be moving in an upward trajectory. When in fact, nothing in nature moves in a continuous upward motion. Nature demands balance, regression, rest, dormancy, stabilization and rebirth.
As we have become entrenched in this “I must be constantly producing” expectation in an area that impacts us the most (i.e. our jobs, and by extension, our finances and means for survival), it’s not a far stretch to see how this messaging also bleeds into our personal relationships.
With the expansion of technology and the very real reality that anything and everything is available at the tips of our fingers, we continue to perpetuate and embody a “everything is and should be constant” mentality.
Through these mechanisms and truths, we have embraced an unspoken expectation that our relationships should always be in “summer-mode”. Constant butterflies, constant attraction, constant heat, constant mystery, constant intrigue, constant whatever (you get the point)…
In the process of putting profit over people (or dare I say, profit over nature), we are witnessing by extension a framework that is setting up most relationships for failure. When we haven’t learned to embrace and cherish all seasons of life, we will resist, give up or walk away at the first signs of “summer” fading from our relationship view.
And yes — with people available at the swipe of your finger, it has become too easy to seek out the next “summer” partner and call in your next dopamine hit, that is until “fall” rears its (seemingly) ugly head.
Relationships, just like nature, aren’t meant to be in a constant summer phase. And more importantly, people aren’t meant to be in a constant summer phase. Yet, we continue to place this unrealistic expectation on our partners only to be disappointed when we don’t receive the expected outcome.
Just as fall demonstrates the beauty of letting things go, we tend to resist the change of seasons in our partnerships and keep battling to keep summer instead of embracing what is coming. Not only is fall a season of letting go of what no longer serves us - it’s also a time to celebrate. A time to reflect on where we’ve been, where we are currently, where we desire to go and what we need to let go of to get there.
Imagine the possibilities of welcoming & celebrating the approaching fall season with your partner. Taking the intentional time to collectively celebrate what you’ve created so far together, addressing what isn’t aligned anymore and what you desire more of vs. anchoring yourself in a place of resentment & confusion that you are no longer in the hot and heavy season of summer.
The same could be said of embracing the stillness and hibernation of your relationship in those winter months — in those seasons of hermit-ing, of needing to tend to the self and clearly communicating those needs with your partner to support you both during a season of rest and rejuvenation. Taking the time to plant those seeds to support the next thriving spring season to allow you to show up fully and authentically in your relationship.
It begs the questions,
In what ways would our lives change if we integrated our personal experiences and relationships to be more closely aligned to the seasons of nature?
What would it look like to embrace and welcome the ebbs and flows, the organic shifts in your relationships?
How would it feel to deeply honor and seek wisdom from the current season you are in?
Lastly, how much more could we be rewarded during “summer” if we designed our lives to be more in harmony with earth’s seasons and embodied our cyclical nature?
