Editor's Choice: June Favorites

Body. Mind. Soul. Idleness.

Emotion of the Month: Idleness

Being idle is not one of my strengths truth to be told.

I come from a family where constantly doing something is seen as a virtue. Useful things, productive things, beautiful things, but always things. The idea of sitting in a chair for thirty minutes with nothing on my hands and nothing on my mind feels impossible. Which is exactly why I am leaning into it this June.

Idleness is often misunderstood. It’s really not about being lazy or avoiding certain things. I see it more as the conscious choice to stop optimizing, to stop achieving, to stop being useful for some time and to sit with the stillness that follows. The body needs it. The mind needs it. The soul needs it more than most of us are willing to admit. It’s this “be still and listen” thing that can be so challenging and yet also very rewarding.

To be idle is to let yourself be slightly bored. To stare at a wall for ten minutes and discover that there’s something inside of you that needs the quiet to be heard. To eat slowly because you are truly enjoying your food, you are present to the mere joy of eating. To walk somewhere with no destination in sight. To swim in a lake without counting time or speed. To sit on a porch and let the afternoon pass through you.

All of this is, especially in these times, almost an act of rebellion. Be rebel, if only in June but really always.

"...how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, which is what I have been doing all day." - Mary Oliver, from "The Summer Day"

What I Am Leaving Behind in June

Heaviness.

The accumulated weight of months of effort, vigilance, low-grade worry, major anxieties. The shoulder-bracing. The bracing-for-the-other-shoe-to-drop. The carrying that became invisible because I myself forgot I was carrying it.

June asks for lightness. So this month, I am working on consciously letting go, setting it down - not all at once (I wish, I could), because hardly anything happens with a blink of an eye, but a little every day. Opening myself up to the summer energy. Letting the light reach what was in the shade. Letting myself be carried by something larger - whatever it may be - than my own willpower.

If you can feel it too, consider this your gentle reminder to start now because now is always the best time.

On the Nightstand for the Soul: The Gift by Dr. Edith Eger

Dr. Edith Eger passed on April 27th, just over a month ago. She was 98 years old, a Holocaust survivor, and one of the most impressive psychologists who ever lived. I am reading The Gift again in her honour, and once again it is doing what it did the first time: stopping me at mindblowing insights - simple and yet powerful - and asking me to look at my own life with more honesty.

Dr. Eger writes about freedom - the kind that has nothing to do with circumstances and everything to do with the choices we make. She survived Auschwitz as a teenager and spent the rest of her life teaching people how to free themselves from the mental prisons they did not even realise they were living in. Her writing is plainspoken, deeply human, and somehow always exactly what you need to hear on a given day.

A line that has stuck with me:

"The biggest concentration camp is in your own mind, and the key is in your pocket.“ - Edith Eger, The Gift

Read it again. I mean, that’s powerful, isn’t it? Our minds are so good, so professional in keeping us in these prisions.

It’s best to read The Gift slowly. One chapter at a time, ideally in the morning with coffee but really whenever you feel like you need some inspiration. This book rewards patience. And it pairs beautifully with the idleness theme of this month.  Dr. Eger writes about freedom as something practiced in small daily moments. It’s achieved by observing yourself and making one consious choice after the other. Slow. Deliberate. Exactly what June is asking of us.

Movement for the Body: Swimming

After May's Lagree intensity, June’s for something entirely different.

Swimming is one of my favorite forms of movement. June is when I return to it, when I finally get to go to the lake again. Long, slow stretches in one of the beautiful Austrian lakes. The water holds me. I feel weirdly safe in the water. It’s one of my happy places. My body, weightless for the first time in months, finally remembers how to soften. Swimming is one of the few forms of movement that is truly effortless for me -  no resistance to push against, no rep count, no progress to measure. I just glide. 

The science is impressive as well. Swimming is one of the most complete forms of cardiovascular exercise that exists - full-body, low-impact, easy on the joints, and exceptional for cardiovascular health, lung capacity, and lymphatic flow. For women over 40, who increasingly need to protect their joints while still building endurance and muscle, swimming is close to a perfect movement.

I do it because it gives me that feeling of being held by something quiet and old and entirely unbothered by my to-do list.

Please find your water this June. In whatever form it is for you. Get wet.

Nourishment for the Body:  Raw Food in Summer

Years ago, I trained as a raw food chef in Santa Monica. It was among the most transformative things I ever did. The training did teach me to think about ingredients in a completely new way. Texture. Flavour. Colour. Creative ways of preparation. Food in its natural state can do a lot for your body.

Summer is actually a good time to experiment with more raw food. The body craves cooler, lighter, more hydrating meals when the weather warms up. Raw fruit and vegetables retain higher levels of vitamin C, certain B vitamins, and many of the heat-sensitive enzymes that get destroyed when food is cooked. They are also rich in water content, fibre, and phytonutrients that your gut microbiome loves. Adding more raw food to your summer table is one of the simplest, most effective dietary shifts you can make this time of year.

The book on my kitchen counter this June: Raw and Simple Detox by Judita Wignall. It is beautiful and the recipes actually work. If you are curious about adding more raw food, get Judita’s book. The featured recipe below is one I keep coming back to.

Recipe of the Month: Tropical Bliss Pudding
Adapted from Raw and Simple Detox by Judita Wignall

A fruit pudding you will genuinely dream about. Five minutes to make. Breakfast or dessert - it works for both.

Makes 1 to 2 servings | Prep: 5 minutes

2 cups (280g) cubed papaya
1 ripe banana, peeled
1 tablespoon (15g) raw tahini
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
Liquid stevia or your favourite sweetener, to taste
1 tablespoon (5g) shredded coconut
1 tablespoon (8g) cacao nibs

Place all the ingredients except the coconut and cacao nibs in a high speed blender and blend until smooth. Pour into a small bowl and top with the coconut and cacao nibs.

A note: Look for raw tahini made from sprouted sesame seeds for the most nutrient density. Sesame is rich in calcium, iron, B vitamins, and methionine, an amino acid that supports liver detoxification. The papaya has papain, a digestive enzyme. The banana provides potassium and prebiotic fibre. This is a pudding that tastes like dessert and feeds your gut microbiome at the same time. It is somehow biology dressed as pleasure.

The Summer Table

How my summer table looks like in June:

Fresh apricots from the farmers' market, eaten whole. Wild sweet peas in a small glass jar by the kitchen sink. A tall glass of hibiscus iced tea with rose water, the kind that tastes like late afternoons in a Marrakech courtyard. Cucumber slices in ice water with mint. The first heirloom tomatoes of the season, sliced and salted, with nothing else. A small dish of olive oil with flaky salt for whatever needs dipping.

A summer table is somehow very simple but also really beautiful. The best summer meals are those that need little planing but are super rewarding.

Where I'd Go This June: Traunkirchen, Austria

If you find yourself anywhere near Upper Austria this summer, go to Traunkirchen.

It is a small village on the shore of the Traunsee, tucked between water and mountains. For several summers it was my happy place. I rented the same house year after year. I swam in the lake every morning. I walked into the village to meet friends. I read books in the garden until the light turned gold.

The Traunstein rises directly out of the lake - a dramatic, majestic mountain that you can’t stop looking at. I climbed it a couple of years ago, taking the Hernlersteig route, which is the maximum my fear of heights will allow. The Naturfreundesteig is more direct, more vertical, and totally impossible for me. I mention this because some of you will be braver than me, and some of you will be relieved to learn there is a more reasonable way up. Both routes lead to the same summit and the same extraordinary view.

But honestly, you do not need to climb anything to fall in love with Traunkirchen. Stay by the lake. Swim every morning. Eat the curd strudel (because sometimes we have to indulge) at one of the village restaurants. Watch the light change on the water at sunset. Do less. See and feel more.

It is one of the most idle, most beautiful places I know.

The HWell Takeaway

"I love being bored. Boredom is such a luxury now.“ - Tilda Swinton

June is the month to slow down deliberately. To swim more. To eat with your hands. To read books that you can’t lay down. To sit on a porch and let the afternoon pass by. To be idle on purpose, because your body and your mind and your soul have been waiting for a long time.

You don’t have to earn rest. Seriously, you don’t! You don’t have to optimize your summer. You don’t have to be useful every minute of every day. Sometimes the most radical thing you can do is to do exactly nothing. Let the lake, the book, the papaya, the village, and the light do the work while you simply receive.

Set down whatever you have been carrying. Let summer do what summer does. Trust that idleness is and part imprtant part of the life you want.

💚 Gaby

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