Earth is dressed in her Sunday best – Summer is a-comin’ in.

You would have to sift back to the emerging 1950’s to remember the velvet voice of Nat Cole crooning these lines.  And I did.  For me it captures the breathless anticipation and visual delight of summertime.

If I had to choose a season to be – to incarnate – there would be no contest whatsoever.  I am summer!  Inside, outside, upside-down.  Even in winter, I try to keep a feeling, an attitude of summer about me. 

If summer were a person she would personify light.  She would be warmhearted; her movement would be dance, and her voice the laughter of waterfalls and bubbling brooks.

I see her barefoot, with a wreathe of wild flowers in her hair, beaming her bewitching smile as she flies from house to house, throwing open doors and inviting us out to play in her greenness.

Light on the heavy; heavy on the light.  That’s summer, and it’s what I aim to be as well, because life IS just a bowl of cherries, isn’t it? 

    “Don’t take it serious, it’s too delirious . . . ”

What if we were to give up ‘heaviness’?  What would that look like? 

Picture a body moving forward, perhaps on a sand beach.  His shoulders are slumped, his head and body bent forward.  He is wearing shoes.  His hands are clasped behind his back.  His countenance is stern. 

Now imagine something (maybe my Summer Spirit) suddenly lifting the weight that this man is carrying, imbuing him with joy and lightness.  Watch the magic show.

His body straightens, head rises, hands unclasp and swing free.  He removes his shoes and his face lights up.  The first one to pass him in his newly awakened presence smiles back and feels a jolt of happiness that then boomerangs back to our new light-thrower. 

Because we are all so ‘connected’ (in other words, all One) we quickly pick up the energy of others.  And there are folks, quite frankly, whose energy is so depleting that we avoid them.  Phantom energy drainers.  I am certain that just reading these words conjures an image for you of someone who fills the description. 

Or the opposite – the one who lights up the room when she enters, lifting everyone’s spirits.  I don’t mean over-the-top terminal cheerfulness and pumping, relentless enthusiasm that can wear thin.  No. It is more of a warm, welcoming, deep presence that invites you in, something like a hug, and in fact can result in a hug.

Imagine what these opposite beings are making manifest in our world.  Feel the energy that is being broadcast by each.  It is not much of a stretch to realize how one’s attitude, light or heavy, affects the planet. 

I believe that we have a responsibility for what and who we are in the world.  Some sage said, “Life is 10 percent what happens to us and 90 percent how we handle it.”  We have free will.  We can send out either love and light, or fear and darkness.   If we are living in fear and darkness, then it’s time to make a change.  That is not who you were meant to be.  You are a child of the Universe; a child of God and that child is born of light and love.

Begin by breathing out fear and inhaling love. Exhale darkness; inhale light.  Everyday, whenever your shoulders slump, smile.  It’s amazing how smiling can change your energy.   Pretend at first, if you have to, then it starts to become real.  

Send out loving kindness to anyone you can think of, to the planet, and to your self.  This practice is critical for Earth right now.  The more we invest in it the more compassion we circulate. 

‘May you be happy. May you be free from suffering. May you find peace and joy.’

This simple little ‘prayer’ is an act of compassion.

And when you pass someone, a stranger who looks weighted down with gloom and doom, always smile even if he does not.  It’s those who cannot smile who need it most.

We have a role to play in healing the energy of the world.  On July 11 consider participating in Global Meditation Day when more than 500,000 of us gather online with Deepak Chopra, Gabrielle Bernstein and one common intention, “to turn around the rising tide of disconnection in the world” through renewed empathy and love. (https://chopracentermeditation.com)

#IAMCOMPASSION http://bit.ly/1m6Tbod

And now, kick off your shoes, ditch your clothes, jump into the water, roll down that grassy hill, and lie on your back ‘until the stars are strung’.

                                  Summer days, driftin’ away, to ah-oh, those summer nights.

                                                                                       -- Olivia Newton-John