5th Season: when is Indian Summer?

DISCUSSION

It’s interesting that you ask this question, because I myself
became very interested in this question about 2 years ago.

As far as I know, it is not codified anywhere.

Consequently, I took it upon myself to do a little extended project . . .
to record my energetic feeling of when I felt like the “5 seasons” were
changing in the area where I live. I did this by simply asking myself
the question: “Does this still feel like the season XYZ?” on any given day,
and do this every day until I felt a shift. Remarkably, I could notice
the shift quite strongly, as in “yesterday on Tuesday, it definitely
felt like season X, but today it is definitely season Y”. I never felt
an “Earth” pause in between seasons; it always felt like a sharp shift
to me. I.E. (to me) the five seasons are in the creation cycle mandala,
not the cross mandala.

In any case, I was successful recording these shifts.
Since the Five Elements comes from Chinese culture and Taoism, I then
took my recorded “season starts” and correlated them with
the 24 Solar terms of the Chinese Calendar.

Consequently, I created my own five seasons calendar, which I will
now share. Feel free to ignore it or use it to your liking.

STEVEN’S FIVE SEASONS CALENDAR:

Earth: Start of Autumn, Limit of Heat, White Dew (Aug 8-Sept 22)

Fall: Autumnal Equinox, Cold Dew, Frost Descent, Start of Winter (Sept 23-Nov 21)

Winter: Minor Snow, Major Snow, Winter Solstice, Minor Cold, Major Cold, Start of Spring, Rain Water (Nov 22 – Mar 5)

Spring: Awakening of Insects, Vernal Equinox, Clear and Bright, Grain Rain
(Mar 6- May 5)

Summer: Start of Summer, Grain Full, Grain in Ear, Summer Solstice, Minor Heat, Major Heat (May 6-Aug 7)

COMMENTS:

1. Obvious discrepancies with the standard 4 seasons: Fall/Autumn doesn’t begin until Chinese “middle of fall” or Western date of “Start of Fall”. Winter doesn’t start on Chinese “start of Winter”, it starts two weeks later . . . yet still much earlier than Western start (at Winter Solstice). Spring does not start at Chinese start of Spring (not until Awakening of Insects), but still earlier than Vernal Equinox (Western start of Spring).

2. Summer is the only season to start on a Chinese start date. Fall is the only season to start on a Western start date.

3. The seasons do not have the same length. Intuitively I would have expected either all 5 seasons to have the same length, or I would expect Earth to be shorter (with the other 4 the same). However, this was not reflected in the actual energy shift that I felt.

4. My mind really resists putting August 8 as Start of Earth, as it is still immensely hot in August (which I associate with summer). But that is not when I felt an energy shift, and I can not argue with the energy feeling. Only mental justification is that the amount of daylight feels drastically reduced from high summer solstice . . . only logical explanation I can come up with.

5. Earth is the shortest season.
Fall and Spring are the same length.
Summer and Winter are longest.
Winter > Summer, but Summer+Earth (cultural summer) > Winter

6. Actual date is dictated by an energy shift, not by a calendar date.
Consequently, the new season can begin a few days off of the start date indicated.
Although, calendric start date is rough approximation.
Look for energy shift.

In short, season starts:
Earth: Start of Autumn (Aug 8)
Fall: Autumnal Equinox (Sept 23)
Winter: Minor Snow (Nov 22)
Spring: Awakening of Insects (Mar 6)
Summer: Start of Summer (May 6)