august is basically just one long sunday

embracing the slow end of summer

As someone who works at a university, September 1st will forever be embedded in my mind as the first day of the academic year and a chance to set goals for the second act of 2025. Summer is winding down, the daylight is drawing shorter, and back to school energy is buzzing throughout the air. I have to say, I do enjoy any opportunity to take a pause, self-reflect, and re-align my goals. This summer has been a big break for me, much needed after almost two years of nonstop work and plans. I had time this summer to just ‘be’, and often documented the pleasures and challenges of this quieter time here on my Substack.

Photo by Anne Nygård on Unsplash

I tend to find that January and September are the great resets throughout my year. A mid-year reset in June is aspirational, but let’s be honest when it’s summertime all we want to do is sip an alcohol-free piña colada by a pool somewhere. This summer, I practiced the art of staying present and tried really hard not to overcommit when it came to setting goals. My intentions were very simple, routine based things that I wanted to implement to bring about structure in a time that really lacked any purpose other than to just slow down.

I’m very proud of how I handled myself (for the most part) this summer, because if you know me, you’ll know I prefer having a plan and a roadmap that will get me from A to B. But this was the summer of having no plan. I was incredibly lucky that due to circumstances, I had a month’s gap in between research contracts after our honeymoon. I used most of July to just potter around our home in the beautiful Waterford countryside.

I slept in, I read books, I watched films, I baked, tended to the garden, and allowed myself to unplug. I even ended this month off with a much needed break from social media. If you read last week’s newsletter, you will know that I took social media off my phone — and guess what? I loved it so much that I haven’t re-downloaded any apps. My daily average screen time went from four hours down to two hours. I’d say that’s being generous as well, because I went into my new office for the first time and used Google Maps on my phone (which counts as screen time) for navigation as I traveled there and back, which may have screwed my results a bit. I have no plans to re-download social media on my phone (for now).

As we are now over half-way through August and I have eased my way into my new research job, which doesn’t properly start until September, I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want the remainder of 2025 to look and feel like. I’ve been writing notes in my phone of goals I might want to set, changes I want to make, projects I want to tackle, and overall just how I want to experience the autumn and winter here in Ireland. I’m careful not to wish away this beautiful late summer season — after all, there’s still at least a month of Summer left according to the equinox calendar. But quietly, and slowly, I’ve been dreaming up some exciting things I’d love to achieve and experience throughout the rest of the year.

August is the Sunday of the calendar year.

Think about it—Sundays carry their own unique weight. They’re often slower, softer, and filled with a sense of winding down. You might feel an urge to be productive, or you might feel called to slow down and just enjoy a day of nothing. Both have their merit.

At the same time, Sundays hold the faint hum of anticipation (or anxiety) for what’s to come. You’re aware of Monday lurking just beyond the evening, and while you try to savour the last stretch of freedom, your mind can’t help but drift to the week ahead.

August mirrors this perfectly. The heat of July has started to mellow. The long, unstructured days of summer are beginning to take shape again with the back-to-school ads, planners in shop windows, and that quiet nudge to prepare for routine. We’re still in summer, but the whisper of September—our collective “Monday”—is consistent.

For some, Sundays and Augusts are comforting. They invite us to slow down, to savour what’s left of leisure, to sink into rest before the hustle resumes. For others, they’re tinged with dread, a reminder that fun is finite and that responsibilities never really loosen their grip for long.

But maybe August—and Sundays too—offer us a subtle lesson: life is not just made of beginnings and endings, but of transitions. These in-between moments are often where we grow the most. They remind us that it’s okay to pause, reflect, and reset before the next chapter begins.

So if August is the Sunday of the calendar year, maybe the best way to move through it is the same way we might spend a perfect Sunday: with gratitude for what has been, gentleness in how we care for ourselves, and a little bit of excitement for what’s still to come.

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until next time,

Melissa x