What Does the Summer Solstice Mean?

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As we go about our days, experiencing both the routines and the unexpectedness of life, the Earth is in constant motion. Forever spinning around and around the Sun. Getting lighter and darker every 24 hours. And, over the course of an entire year, moving through four recurring phases: spring equinox, summer solstice, fall equinox, and winter solstice.

These phases have been recognized and celebrated by cultures around the world for millennia, with ancient civilizations understanding the alignment of these cosmological occurrences with the rhythms of the Earth and revering them as auspicious new beginnings. Markers commemorating these turning points remain, including Stonehenge, Machu Picchu, the Sphinx, and Giza pyramids.

But what, exactly, does the summer solstice mean in astrological terms?

When is the Summer Solstice?

The summer solstice on June 20, 2024, marks the beginning of summer in the northern hemisphere. In the southern hemisphere, summer solstice will take place on December 21, 2024.

What Does the Summer Solstice Mean?

The word “solstice” comes from the Latin words sol (“Sun”) and sistere (“to stand still”). For several days before and after the summer solstice, the Sun literally appears to stand still in the sky.

At this sacred time, the Earth’s axis reaches its maximum tilt toward the Sun, which has reached its highest point in our sky. It is here that we meet our longest and most light-filled day of the year in the northern hemisphere and our shortest and darkest day of the year in the southern hemisphere.

This day marks a turning point for the Earth. She has been building in one direction and has reached her peak before shifting into her next chapter, her next stage, her next phase of being. The summer solstice ushers us into the second phase of the Earth’s orbit around the Sun, following the equinox in March.

This shifting of our surroundings is an invitation to lean into the shift that is also taking place within each of us. It is through honoring the constant motion of the Earth and all of nature that we can honor our own cycles of change, growth, expansion, shedding, releasing, shifting, and more. Giving ourselves permission to change, just as the Earth does. Giving ourselves permission to let go when we know it is time, and to begin again when we are inspired to do so.

How Astrology Relates to Nature

As the Earth meets her next phase, we humans enter the next phase of our astrological year. The dates of these pivotal seasonal changes coincide with the Sun transiting into a different sign of the zodiac. 

Any zodiac sign that begins when the Earth shifts into a new phase represents initiation and new beginning. Cancer season, in particular, speaks to inviting us to nurture our inner worlds. This moment of standing still invites us inward to also become still and fully present with where and who we are, with what the moment is asking of us, and to reintroduce ourselves to who we have become. Ask yourself, how have I changed since the March equinox, and where am I ready to go next?

We can only meet our next chapter when we are fully present in our current, and we can only walk forward when we have both our feet fully grounded on the surface beneath us.

In the northern hemisphere, the sign of Aries initiates us into spring under the spring equinox, Cancer begins summer under the summer solstice, Libra initiates fall as we meet the autumnal equinox, and Capricorn leads us into winter as we reach the winter solstice. For the Southern Hemisphere, we switch directions with Aries begin autumn, Cancer initiates winter, and so on.

The Start of Cancer season

Cancer season takes us out of our heads and deeper into our emotional bodies. It is a time of warmth, compassion, emotion, and self-nurturing. It asks us to tap into our own healer, our own home, and our own comfort and source of safety. Knowing that when we allow ourselves what our minds, bodies, and souls have been craving, incredible healing occurs. And where we meet healing, we meet new layers of ourselves as we let go of the old. We meet the beautiful open space of potential, new chapters, and a new self.

Whether you are in the northern hemisphere moving into light-filled moments or the southern hemisphere meeting the darkest days of the year, the invitation is the same, expressed through a different lens: it’s time to meet yourself. To honor your cycles. To let yourself change. And to remember that you are your own greatest guidance system.

The Earth never doubts where she is or where she is going next. She never doubts that she will bloom again after releasing her leaves or that she will be reborn again and again and again, exploring herself in different ways. She knows she is never trapped in one way of being, in one chapter that was always designed to be just that, a chapter in the ever-shifting and evolving story of her life.

Your Invitation for the Summer Solstice