Summer is showing off.

All that digging up, letting be, and planting seeds — it’s paying out now, everywhere at once. The flower gardens look like they’re on a party drug that just keeps on going. Color, sunshine, warmth, parties, outdoor sports, vacations — the whole sleepy world seems to join the trees and spread out one big canopy of connection, stretching from backyard to backyard, coast to coast.

And underneath all that shine, something else is true too.

We’re not sleeping much. We’re on the go, trying to cram in everything we can while the cramming’s good. The heat drains us before we notice it’s happening, and by afternoon we’re the dishrag left on the counter — wilted, a little worse for wear, feeling like nobody’s wrung us out on purpose; we just… got there.

Abundance and exhaustion, side by side. Both true. Both summer.

So if your creative juices are currently busy planning a vacation and stretching a food budget, here’s the good news: there’s still something worth doing with what’s left of your attention. Something small enough to survive the heat.

You can ask a question.

Asking a question is one of the key ingredients of creativity — and here’s one worth carrying with you this summer:

What wants to grow — to flourish and party big time — in you this summer? What are you noticing?

Noticing doesn’t take much energy. You can do it sweltering in the midday sun. Notice your thoughts. Notice your feelings. Notice what’s making you happy, and what quietly isn’t. That’s it. That’s the whole practice.

Here’s why it matters: this sensory knowledge — the small, unglamorous stuff you clock in passing — is exactly what your creative flow runs on later. Think of it as fuel. You’re not wasting the summer by noticing instead of producing. You’re filling the tank

So instead of stressing over a creative block, or a lack of interest, or the sense that you should be making something right now — change the focus.

Just ask: what wants to grow?

Journal a few lines about it, whenever you get the chance. Say it out loud over a cold drink with your feet in the lake. Let it be a fragment, not a manifesto.

And while you’re at it — celebrate the season of more. The one where produce and fauna abound, generous almost to excess, asking nothing back but a little gratitude and a humble nod to the wisdom that’s been waiting, patiently, to be noticed.

It’s already growing. The only question is whether you’re paying attention.