Lammas - A Festival of Gratitude and Abundance
- sjholisticyoga
- Aug 1
- 3 min read
Rooted in ancient agricultural traditions, Lammas – also known as Lughnasadh – is a festival of gratitude and abundance. Celebrated on the 1st of August, it marks the first harvest of the year, when grains are gathered, berries are plucked from brambles, and the fruits of long labour are brought to table. But Lammas offers us more than just a seasonal marker; it invites a pause – a sacred moment of reflection, appreciation, and preparation. And if we listen carefully, its rhythms echo beautifully through the practice of yoga.
Just as farmers gather what they have sown, tended, and nurtured, we too can honour the inner harvest we’ve cultivated through practice, presence, and patience. Lammas becomes not just a turning point on the wheel of the year, but a potent reminder of the riches that grow when we commit to our inner landscape.

The Significance of Lammas
Traditionally celebrated in Celtic lands, Lammas honours the god Lugh – the light-bringer, the wise one, the craftsman. It stands between the height of summer and the soft descent into autumn, a liminal space of both fullness and gentle decline. The sun begins its slow withdrawal, and nature offers her gifts in ripened fruit and golden grain.
It’s a time of gratitude for the earth’s abundance – but also for our own efforts. This is a festival of recognition: of what has grown, what has shifted, and what is ready to be shared. And in that, there is a whisper of yoga. Because yoga, too, is a practice of presence, of tending, of noticing. We are not just stretching and breathing; we are becoming more fully aware of what is blooming within.
The Yoga of Letting Go
In harvest, there is an act of release. The farmer does not cling to the wheat. The fruit must be picked. And in yoga, we are asked again and again to let go – of tension, of expectation, of the stories we tell ourselves. We breathe into discomfort, soften into truth, and surrender into change.
Lammas teaches us that the cycle of effort and release is natural, necessary, and sacred. We cannot hold on to the fruits forever. They must be offered, shared, consumed – or left to seed the earth again. In the same way, our inner growth is not for hoarding. What we learn, we embody. What we embody, we live. What we live, we offer back to the world.
Persephone’s Choice: A Myth of Cycles
This time of year also brings to mind the myth of Demeter and Persephone – a story that weaves together themes of harvest, loss, reunion, and rebirth. Demeter, goddess of the grain, loses her daughter Persephone to the underworld. In her grief, she withholds her gifts from the earth – until Persephone returns, and life begins to flourish again.

There is something deeply cyclical, deeply feminine, in this myth. Persephone eats the pomegranate, binds herself to transformation, and reminds us that descent is part of the journey. We, too, must sometimes descend into our own shadowlands, our own stillness, in order to rise again with new wisdom. Lammas honours the first fruits, but it also knows that another descent is coming. In that knowledge, there is a quiet strength.
Coming Home to the Mat
In yoga philosophy, we speak of aparigraha – non-possessiveness. We are invited to let go of clinging, to release the need to control or keep. And we also speak of santosha – contentment. The sweet peace of enough-ness. Both of these teachings find their mirror in Lammas.
As you come to your mat during this season, ask yourself: What have I grown this year? What am I ready to gather? What am I ready to share? What can I let fall away?
Let your practice become a ritual of honouring – of your body, your breath, your becoming.
Let it remind you that you, too, are part of nature’s dance. And just as the earth turns and the crops ripen, so too do you shift, grow, and unfold.
This is the yoga of harvest: not striving, but receiving. Not perfection, but presence. Not clinging, but deep, open-hearted gratitude.
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