Monday 4:32am June 2021 BST marks Summer Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere.
What is a Summer Solstice ?
The Earth spins or rotates on its axis giving us day and night. It also orbits around the Sun once a year; taking 365.25 days. As the Earth’s axis is tilted 23.5 degrees from the plane of its orbit around the Sun, for 6 months of the year the Northern hemisphere will be tilted away from the Sun; our Winter, and for 6 months, it’ll be tilted towards the Sun; our Summer. The exact moment that the Northern Hemisphere is most tilted towards the Sun is Summer Solstice. It also marks Midsummer day and the longest day and shortest night.
Welcome SUMMER SEASON: PITTA and How to stay healthy.
In ayurveda the Summer Season is dominated by Pitta: fiery, hot, drying, sharp (penetrating), and light qualities. To cope with the changing season the body and lifestyle habits will need to shift and adapt to remain healthy, fit and disease free:
Out of balance and you may notice yourself becoming easily agitated, more prone to skin rashes and feeling ungrounded.
To balance Pitta look to its opposite qualities:
If you are hot (physically or mentally), pranayama, (breath practice) is a great way to cool and ground your mind and body. Spend time in nature to slow down sharp (penetrating) qualities like aggression as well as finding abundant shade to balance the heat / light. Look to reduce or avoid alcohol and caffeine intake too.
If you are feeling light and ungrounded, add-in some restorative yoga poses to your day – eg. legs up the wall pose is a great way to balance the qualities of pitta.
Less intense exercise may be balanced with lighter cold, liquid food choices; soups and juices, green vegetables, cucumber, sweet fruit watermelon, blueberries, pomegranates, cranberries, nuts and dried fruit full of vitamins and minerals.
Racheleyoga 