Another Turn of the Spiral
On Saturday, we crossed the seasonal threshold of Lammas, the midpoint between the Summer Solstice and the Fall Equinox.
Here in Edmonton, it’s the height of summer, although summer looks and feels different this year. The days have been wetter and more humid than usual, and the wind has been a near-constant companion since April.
Perhaps it should not surprise us that the weather feels different in a year when so much is changing. At times, it feels as though Mother Earth herself is moving through a kind of perimenopause, her familiar cycles and systems disrupted by the pressures of the Anthropocene.
Patterns are shifting. Familiar rhythms are changing. And the Spiral Dance of Life continues.
Lammas marks the beginning of the harvest season. Traditionally, it was a time to gather the first grain, bake it into bread, and gather in community to share it. It was a celebration of abundance, but also a time to pause and reflect.
What has grown from the seeds we planted earlier in the year?
Which seeds are we saving for a future harvest?
When Fullness Becomes Wisdom
In the Spiral Dance of Life, Lammas marks the place where the Mother begins her transition toward the Wise Woman.
The gardens are abundant. The trees are heavy with leaves. The Mother still stands in her fullness.
But she is tired.
The evenings are growing shorter. The sunrise comes later. The first colours are beginning to change.
The harvest reminds us that fullness is not meant to remain suspended forever. After creating, tending, and blooming come rest, release, and renewal.
As the Mother turns toward Wise Woman, her attention begins to move inward. She asks not only, What still needs my care? but also, What have I learned? and What do I need?
This seasonal transition echoes Sagescence, the passage through perimenopause, menopause, and the years beyond. It is the gradual turning from Mother toward Wise Woman.
Sagescence is not a single moment, nor does it unfold in the same way for everyone. It is a changing season of body and spirit, an opportunity to gather the wisdom of the life already lived and consider what we want to carry into the next turn of the Spiral.
Gathering the Harvest
The Disseminating Moon carries a similar invitation.
After the illumination of the Full Moon, she encourages us to share what has been revealed, give thanks for what has nourished us, and allow our insights to become part of something larger than ourselves.
At our recent Full Moon Wisdom Circle, the Sun and Jupiter in Leo invited us to consider where we are ready to shine. Across from them, the Moon in Aquarius asked how our individual brilliance might uplift the collective.
Saturn’s inward turn through retrograde offered another invitation: to look back, review, reset, and harvest the wisdom of our experiences. Do the patterns, structures, and long-held beliefs shaping our lives still support the future we are creating?
This turn of the Spiral invites us to pause.
To recognize what has grown.
To give thanks for what has nourished us.
To gather the wisdom within our experiences.
To release what no longer needs to be carried.
And to consider how what we have learned might serve our community.
Some of the harvest nourishes us now. Some becomes seed for the future. Some is returned to the earth, where it will become part of another beginning.
As we move between the fullness of summer and the first whispers of autumn, I invite you to reflect:
What are you harvesting from this season of your life?
What wisdom are you ready to share?
What are you ready to release?
What seeds are you gathering for the next turn of your Spiral?
