Spring, summer, autumn, winter. It is the same every year, one season following another, isn’t it?
Hey, this is the UK. I don’t think so!
Over the last few years, I have been very troubled about the lack of butterflies in my garden. When I first moved here in 2009, the place was alive with butterflies and grasshoppers every summer. Then they became fewer and fewer each year. My garden is pretty wild, and I don’t fiddle with it too much, but I began to wonder if there was anything I needed to be doing to make it more ‘friendly’ to wildlife.
But this year? Oh wow! It is wonderful to see all of them back again. There have been butterflies and grasshoppers leaping out of my way as I walk along the path. Such a wonderful sight.
The other thing that is different this year is the amount of fruit on the bushes and trees. I have never seen so many greengages, plums, and damsons. I can barely keep up with them all. And yet, back in April when the flowers were out, I was worried that I was not seeing many pollinators. I obviously got that wrong!
But what, for me, can be seen as a good year in my garden, may not be seen the same way by those looking to their grain harvest. They have experienced a very different year.
oOo
At some point, the leaves will fall from the trees, but this could be anywhere between October through December; and we can be pretty certain that January through March will be cold and wintery, though quite how cold is a weather forecaster’s guess.
We do know that as the days grow short, we see more and more bare twigs against the ever-paler blue sky and the late afternoon sunsets. The stars become visible much earlier and twinkle brightly all through the night. There is something about these short days that tells our body clock that it is time for a reset; rest up and regenerate. This is something we have in common with trees and plants.
It is during the long winter months that we can enjoy the plum jam and chutney that we are now producing from our harvest. We can drink the apple juice to keep healthy and, perhaps, enjoy a glass of damson gin.
oOo
Some might say that this abundance may be heralding a hard winter. But I suggest that we should live in the moment and not try to guess what it means. Nature is giving us a gift and she is reminding us that abundance is there for us. It is there all the time but so often we live in the mindset that: we are not worthy; it’ll never happen to me; the other man’s grass is greener; life isn’t like that. We learn so many aphorisms about how we are not worthy, it might be a particularly British thing, and it is time to turn it around.
The more we live in gratitude and joy, the more we attract to us the life we are really seeking: the one we find hard to express; the one we feel we are not worthy of receiving.
We know in our heart how we would truly like our life to be, so let this rise to the forefront of your mind and allow yourself to think it into reality. Our thoughts create the world we live in, because our thoughts send energy into the world around us. Since everything is energy, the energy of your thoughts can change your reality.
When we live in the higher vibrational frequencies like gratitude, joy and love, it is hard to be angry or jealous of others, hard to be greedy and selfish. Our thoughts can change the environment we live in; this is not restricted to individuals but whole communities as well. A simple shift in perspective, a different focus could change all of humanity.
So what is your harvest this Lammas? Maybe it would be more pertinent to ask, what harvest would you like this Lammas? Focus on that, and reel in the change.
Lammas blessings.