I have loved the summer solstice since I was about seven years old.
I can’t fully explain it. Growing up, I was the kid who believed in fairies, who spent hours in the garden looking for something enchanted, who felt more at home outside than in. I loved the longest day of the year the way some kids love their birthday. It felt like permission. Permission to stay up late, to be outside until the sky finally gave in, to feel the particular magic that lives in June light.
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My friends still call me a mermaid or a fairy, depending on the day. I’m okay with that. Because I think part of what we’re all starving for, especially those of us living at the pace of Los Angeles, is exactly that: a reason to step outside, look up, and remember that the world is more alive and strange and beautiful than our to-do lists would suggest.
The summer solstice is that reason.
What the Solstice Actually Is
The summer solstice is the moment the Earth’s axial tilt brings the Northern Hemisphere closest to the sun. It is the longest day and shortest night of the year, and it has been one of the most universally celebrated astronomical events in human history. Nearly every ancient culture oriented something around it, a monument, a festival, a ritual, a fire.
The word itself comes from the Latin sol (sun) and sistere (to stand still). The sun stands still. For one day, at the peak of its power, it pauses.
That pause is the invitation.
How Cultures Around the World Have Honored This Day
Humans have been marking the summer solstice for at least 5,000 years, and possibly much longer. What’s remarkable is how similar the instincts were across cultures that had no contact with each other.
At Stonehenge in England, which was likely constructed around 3000 BCE, the stones are precisely aligned so that the rising sun on the summer solstice shines directly through the heel stone and into the center of the monument. Thousands of people still gather there every year at dawn. Whatever you believe about stone circles and ley lines, standing in that alignment feels like something.
In Sweden, Midsommar is one of the most important holidays of the year, celebrated with flower crowns, maypoles, dancing, and meals that stretch into a night that barely gets dark. It is a festival of pure sensory joy, of color and food and community and light.
The ancient Egyptians aligned the Great Pyramid at Giza with the solstice sunset. In China, the summer solstice was associated with yin energy beginning to grow, the moment when the earth starts its slow turn back toward rest. The Celts celebrated Litha, gathering at sacred sites, lighting bonfires to mirror the sun, jumping over flames for good luck and purification.
Indigenous cultures across North America held ceremonies at the solstice that centered on gratitude, renewal, and connection to the natural world. Many of those traditions are still practiced today.
Almost universally, humans have responded to this day the same way: go outside, make fire, make beauty, make meaning.
The Witchy, Wonderful Side of Solstice
Let’s talk about the magic, because I refuse to be embarrassed by it.
The summer solstice has long been associated with fairy activity in the British and Celtic traditions, particularly the night before, known as Midsummer’s Eve. The belief was that the veil between worlds was thin on this night, that fairies were out, that unusual things became possible. Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is set precisely here.
If you are even slightly the kind of person who grew up looking for fairies in gardens, this night is yours.
Here are real rituals from real traditions that you are absolutely allowed to do this weekend:
Make moon water. Set a glass or jar of water outside under the solstice sky overnight. The practice exists in various forms across folk traditions and is simply an act of intentionality, of saying: I am making something sacred from something ordinary. Drink it in the morning. Use it to water a plant. It’s the ritual, not the water, that matters.
Plant seeds of intention. This is both literal and metaphorical. The solstice has always been associated with growth, with planting, with tending. Write down something you want to cultivate in the second half of the year. Plant an actual seed in soil if you can. There is something about putting your hands in the earth that resets the nervous system in a way that no app has been able to replicate.
Build a solstice altar. Gather things that feel like summer to you, flowers, citrus, a candle, something gold or yellow, something from outside. Arrange them somewhere you’ll see them. It doesn’t need a reason beyond: I made this, and it is beautiful, and beauty is medicine.
Light a candle at sunrise or sunset. The Celts lit bonfires. You can light a single candle. The gesture is the same. You are saying: I see this light. I am grateful for it. I am part of it.
Write and burn. Write down what you are releasing from the first half of the year. Then burn it safely, a candle works, or a firepit if you have access. Fire as transformation is one of the oldest human technologies.
Sing. To no one. To the ocean, to a tree, to the sky. Out loud. The body holds things that the mind doesn’t know how to name, and sound moves them. I know this about as well as I know anything.
What I’m Doing This Solstice
This Saturday I’ll be at the beach, probably barefoot in the sand. I’ll walk, and I’ll let myself be slow about it. I might sing something to the ocean. I’ll probably let myself think about what I’m leaving behind and what I’m walking toward, not in a structured way, more in the way that happens when you’re moving and the wind is doing something and there’s salt in the air.
On Sunday June 21, I’ll be teaching a sound bath at Soho Warehouse in downtown LA for anyone in the DTLA and Arts District world. And earlier in the day, a Power Yoga and Sound Healing experience in Marina Del Rey for those of you on the Westside.
Both feel exactly right for this day. Sound is ceremony. It always has been.
If you want to join: angelawrightmusic.com/classes-schedule
What Your Nervous System Actually Wants Today
Here’s the science underneath the magic.
The summer solstice is the peak of light, and light governs cortisol, melatonin, and circadian rhythm in powerful ways. Research by Dr. Matthew Walker and others has shown that natural light exposure, especially morning and evening light, is one of the most potent regulators of the human nervous system. The long days of summer, when we actually go outside and use them, are genuinely healing. (Walker, Why We Sleep, 2017)
Ritual also has measurable effects. Behavioral research published in Psychological Science found that personal rituals, even invented ones performed before a stressful event, reduce anxiety and increase confidence. The act of doing something intentional and repeated signals to the nervous system: I am in control. I am safe. I am here. (Norton and Gino, Psychological Science, 2014)
What every solstice tradition across human history understood, before anyone had a word for it, is that ceremony regulates. That beauty regulates. That being outside, in community, doing something meaningful together tells the body: you can rest now. You are part of something larger. You are okay.
Your nervous system is not asking for one more optimized morning routine. It is asking for a reason to go outside and feel like a kid again.
The summer solstice is that reason.
The Toolkit
Get outside at golden hour. The light at the ends of the day on the solstice is genuinely different, lower, warmer, slower. Go outside for it. Put your phone down. Just look.
Create one small ritual. It doesn’t have to be elaborate. Moon water, a candle, a walk, something written and released. Choose one thing and do it with full attention. That’s a ceremony.
Sound bath or yoga nidra. Both are forms of modern ceremony. They ask you to lie still, to let sound or guidance move through you, to be passive in the way that ancient ritual always invited. If you want to join me in person this weekend, the schedule is at angelawrightmusic.com/classes-schedule.
Sing something. Seriously. In the car, in the shower, to the ocean. The solstice has always been about voice and sound and celebration. You don’t need to be good at it. You just need to do it.
Action Step
Tonight, or tomorrow morning, step outside. Feel the ground under your feet if you can. Take three deep breaths. Look up.
Then ask yourself: what do I want to grow in the second half of this year?
You don’t need to write it down. You don’t need to plant it or burn it or make it official. Just asking the question, out loud or in your body, is the ritual.
The solstice is not asking you to have it all figured out. It’s asking you to show up, be present, and let the longest day of the year mean something.
Work With Angela
Build your practice online: Angela is building a library of guided sound bath sessions and meditations you can use before bed, when you’re stressed, or when you need a five-minute reset. Subscribe on YouTube and it will be waiting for you.
Bring it to your space: Private sound baths and corporate wellness events are Angela’s favorite thing to do. She comes to you, whether that’s your home, your office, a retreat, or an event. If you want to create a memorable evening of sound healing for your team, your family, or yourself, fill out this form and she’ll put something together with you.
Attend a class: Angela teaches sound baths and yoga nidra at a variety of studios across Los Angeles. See the full schedule at angelawrightmusic.com/classes-schedule.
Your nervous system will thank you.
I’m teaching sound baths this Sunday in DTLA at Soho Warehouse and in Marina Del Rey. Link in bio to join.
Happy solstice. Go find some magic.
This essay first appeared on my Substack. Subscribe for new writing on sound, rest and the nervous system.
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