Celebrate Abundance
BRIGHT BLESSINGS of the full strawberry moon to you
Support for Every Season
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June 29, 2026
Find Abundance in Nature
The full strawberry moon is named for the delicious fruits that are in season at this time of year. Ripening under the hot sun, beautiful red berries stand in contrast to so much of what brings us down.
When inflation makes money even tighter than usual. When the supreme court is hearing cases that deeply impact personal rights. When our elected officials are deadlocked across party lines on decisions that impact the well-being of our communities. We can always look to nature to be reminded that abundance does exist.
The sun rises each and every day. It has done so long before humans walked the earth and will do so long after this life has passed. The moon waxes and wanes in predictable rhythms, showing us what it means to live in cycles of light and dark. Patterns of more and less. And even in the midst of financial scarcity, and fear of what this war with Iran will bring, and when the next mass shooting will occur and where, plants grow. Flowers bloom. Strawberries ripen.
Make an Intentional Choice
If you have read my blog for awhile, you’ve heard me come back again and again to this issue of choice. That even when we have different experiences of privilege and oppression and different access to resources of all kinds, the vast majority of us have some level of choice throughout our days.
We can choose to switch off notifications for five minutes and turn our face toward the sun (or the rain, depending on what nature has on offer in that moment). We can pause what we’re doing, stretch, and drink a glass of water. We can text a friend to say how grateful we are for their presence in our life.
And this is not to say that we should be practicing any kind of inauthentic or forced positivity. There have been significant seasons in my own life when grief and rage were what I had in abundance. And through those seasons, I’ve learned to marvel at just how deep those wells are and what that says about my capacity as a human being.
Much like the shifting balance of sunlight and darkness in our days, life is full of both/ands. Seasons of friendship and love. Seasons of loneliness and despair. Seasons of grief and receiving help. Seasons of anxiety and fullness.
On the one hand, it’s like, eat a strawberry. On the other hand, not everyone lives in a place with a grocery store that has fresh produce. Not everyone has a yard or balcony to grow a strawberry plant. Not everyone can drive to a farm and pick their own berries.
And yet.
This is what nature invites us to. To notice what we do have. To participate in a rhythm that is outside what human systems want to offer us. There is pressure to stay in a job that isn’t good for you. Pressure to not ask for what you need or want in your relationships. Pressure to yes to things that make you feel sick to your stomach.
Leaving a job may be too huge. Walking barefoot in the grass may be more accessible. Whichever choices are available to us, it’s up to us to make them.
Tonight, I will have the choice to sit in front of the TV, or to go outside and see how many stars I can see. At my parents’ house in Washington State, where I am today, I can expect to see too many to count. But even at home in Baltimore, I know I can see five or six from my little backyard. And let me tell you, being in a city, in the midst of traffic noise and city lights, those five or six are precious to me. But I spend far more nights on the couch than I do in the back yard. And it’s interesting to be curious about that choice, isn’t it?
Gather Data
Sometimes it’s difficult to notice what we have. And in those cases, it’s important to look back and reflect. I think of this as gathering data. It helps to cancel out self-talk that may be unsupportive. It can remind us that even if we’re struggling, we have experienced being well on some level at some time.
Here’s a journaling exercise to help us do just that. You can write down whatever comes to you, or you may just want to sit back and let your mind wander, allowing thoughts, images, or sensations wash over you.
Start by getting comfortable in your seat and taking a few deep breaths. Feel the chair, cushion, or ground supporting your body. Feel your heartbeat by sensing it in your body, placing two fingers over a pulse point, or placing a hand on your heart. Allow yourself to settle into the rhythms of heartbeat, breath, and groundedness.
Think about a time that you felt content.
What could you see? (Scenery, people, objects, colors, textures)
What could you feel or touch? (Bodily sensations, physical items like clothing, carpet if you’re inside, soil if you’re outside, plants, pets)
What could you hear?
What could you smell?
What could you taste?
What emotions did you feel?
Is there anything you want to grieve or release from that time?
What are you grateful for from that time?
Are there elements from that experience that you want to bring into your daily life? (Activities, textures, smells, people, sensations)
Take a few deep breaths. Look all the way over one shoulder. Slowly scan your surroundings to look over your other shoulder. Give yourself a gentle shake or make any other movements that your body is craving.
Remember to Play
If you join me in Spokane on the Full Strawberry Moon, we’ll do the reflection practice above. But we’ll also be playing some improv games to get us into an abundant spirit. Here’s one that we’ll do, and you can grab some friends and play this with them too!
The traditional game of 10 fingers is to say things you’ve never done and whoever has done the most loses. In this remix, we’ll go around the circle and each say something we have. That could be something tangible like, I have a car, or I have enough to eat. Or something intangible like, I am loved, or I’m a good listener.
Everyone else in the circle that has that thing will raise a finger. We’ll go around the circle until everyone has all 10 fingers raised.
The point is that, even thought we don’t all have all the things named, we all have 10 tangible or intangible resources at our disposal, and between everyone in the group, we have a lot of resources between us.
Choose to Cultivate
And just one final note on this topic to say, strawberries do grow in the wild. And they’re also cultivated—from a small household scale all the way up to large commercial farms. So we can absolutely look for abundance in nature. And we can also make a choice to cultivate it on purpose. We can condition the soil of our lives. Plant with intention. Create consistent practices that help it to thrive.
The beautiful thing is, we can do both. We can pause and notice flowers blooming in the summer sun. And we can also carve out time to join a knitting group, not check work emails outside of work hours, or start a regular dinner group with friends.
Abundance can come in many forms. And isn’t that just wonderful?
Join me
Monday, June 29, 2026, in Spokane, Washington. Together, we’ll eat strawberries, play some beginner-friendly improv games, and do this guided journaling exercise. I hope to see you there!
Photo by ROMAN ODINTSOV on Pexels.