Midsummer Celebration Ideas for your Family
Ancestors, Lineage, Dralas, and Midsummer
The drala principle is connected to our ancestry, both genetic and cultural. A lineage is a particular stream, passed from generation to generation. Family is our most fundamental lineage, though spiritual or artistic transmission might cut even deeper into soul than family. Some feel little connection to their genetic lineage, even to their parents; their ancestors are elsewhere (or in part elsewhere).
Our “inner” lineage is a mixture of the various lineages we have been born into, learned about, identified with or become part of. It is on the “inside” – in our thought-stream, feelings, emotions and beliefs; but even deeper, in our heart. Here, we can connect to the magic of the natural world and delight in arts, music, and dance, joining past and future in you. During Midsummer, we celebrate the dralas of the land we live on, the dralas of our lineages (genetic and cultural), and the flowering fertility of the land.
When the Earth is flowering again, after the cold of winter, is a natural time to appreciate and connect to the dralas of the natural world with song, dance, games, and a feast. The return of growth and fertility has been celebrated around the solstice for thousands of years, and as an extension of profound appreciation of the return of nature’s growing riches, Midsummer is considered to be a particularly magical time, when even common folk can try their hand at simple magic. As an adult, having childhood memories of celebrating nature and magic at the same time helps connect the two emotionally, creating reverence for Nature and our sacred world.
(You may not recognize all the traditions as celebrations of the summer solstice – keep in mind that a millennium of Christianity has scrambled the old ways. Whatever the current namesake (summer solstice, St. John, John the Baptist, Ivan Kupala), it’s an interesting coincidence that so many countries from different culture groups celebrate so many seemingly different things in the middle of summer in similar ways.)
Meeting the sunrise on Midsummer Eve to honor the Sun
Anglo-Saxons and their ancestors have gathered at Stonehenge at Midsummer for thousands of years, and over 10,000 people celebrate the solstice there every year. The reason is the alignment of the rising sun with the Heel Stone, as seen from inside Stonehenge.
Latvians also greet the Sun, as she rises at her most glorious among the rich splendor of summer.
In both Nordic and Slavic tradition, Midsummer is celebrated among the dralas in nature. People leave the cities for the lakes, meadows, forests, and mountains to perform their culture’s Midsummer rituals, which often include decorations of leafy branches and wildflowers.
Flowers and sometimes leaves gathered on Midsummer Eve are said to gain magic power in many places. Wearing flower crowns is common, and often there are divination, luck, or protective magic rituals involving flowers and herbs on Midsummer Eve.
Swedes say that if seven different Midsummer flowers are put under one’s pillow, one will dream of the person one will marry.
They also say that drying one’s flower crown and putting it in one’s Yule bath will bring good luck for the next year. In Slavic countries, the flower crowns are used for a love divination/attractor charm by throwing them out into lakes the same night.
In Latvia, flower crowns blur the distinction between married and unmarried women, and in both Slavic and Nordic countries, Midsummer Eve is said to create a March uptick in births; March 22 is the day the largest number of Swedes share as a birthday. (1) Slavic and Nordic folk belief is also that Midsummer night is the only night of the year one can find the mythical fern flower in the forest, and with the sky remaining light all night, one can venture out to look for it. (Perhaps with someone you like.) Anglo-Saxons gather flowers during Midsummer to be hung over doors and windows to keep evil spirits away.
Bring the intensity of fire at what little night there is
In many places, bonfires are lit, and the bonfires are also often considered magical in some way. In many places, jumping over the fire brought good luck, or secured happiness in love. In Estonia, old boats are set on fire, reminiscent of Viking burial custom. Witches were thought to fly to the top of Brocken Mountain in Germany for a grand celebration around a bonfire in Denmark, where people gather around bonfires lit on beaches and mountains, close to dralas, to celebrate. (Swedes believe the witches to fly there earlier, around the spring equinox, at Easter.) Bonfire celebrations were carried over into Christianity, where St. John the Baptist was often the namesake of the celebration.
Your family’s Midsummer celebration can be directly from, borrow ideas or feelings from, or not related to any of these. In Shambhala, we celebrate Midsummer to, at one level, be mindful to what’s going on around us (the seasons); and at another level, to celebrate our sacred world, of which we are very much a part.
A year comes like a dragon,
And today is like the spinal cord of the dragon.
It’s time to celebrate, but at the same time,
It is time to organize some sense
of exertion in our lives …
The day of Midsummer’s Day
is a day of breakthrough,
a day of actually realizing
how life can be understood and appreciated.
Plan your life so you can help others.
-Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, Midsummer’s Day address 1981
As long as you celebrate the longest, lightest day of the year in a way that feels authentic to you, you are celebrating properly!
Footnotes
- “Midsommarnatten inte är lång, men sätter sju och sjuttio vaggor igång” (Midsummer night is not long, but sets seven and seventy cradles into motion) is a Swedish saying.
