One of my favorite pastimes.

On his Mercury Falling LP, Sting sings a piece called “Lithium Sunset,” about the healing properties of gazing at the setting sun. His lyrics cite the therapeutic qualities associated with this practice most introverts enjoy, given the solitude & quiet tied to being still in nature. He writes:

Fill my eyes
O Lithium sunset
And take this lonesome burden
Of worry from my mind

Take this heartache
Of obsidian darkness
And fold my darkness
Into your yellow light

I’ve been scattered I’ve been shattered
I’ve been knocked out of the race
But I’ll get better
I feel your light upon my face

Heal my soul
O Lithium sunset

Words like “lonesome,” “burden,” “worry,” “heartache,” & “darkness” act as a result of the speaker’s feeling “scattered,” “shattered,” & “knocked out” of the human race. What restores his being is the light of the sun on his face, healing the soul & lifting the spirits, with a lithium effect. (Sting described hearing from a South American shaman that lithium from a rising or setting sun could directly affect the viewer’s brain through the eyes, as Nature’s anti-depressant.)

There’s a beauty in enjoying the myriad of colors produced in the sky by a rising or setting sun.

We do know that sunlight can dramatically affect our moods, as regions where there are longer periods of seasonal darkness engender Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) in greater numbers, the treatment for which includes exposure to special lights meant to mimic the sun’s brightness. Places far up in the northern hemisphere like Alaska feel this the greatest.

The combination of sun & sea creates a wondrous calming effect.

Sometimes, just thinking about a sunset or looking at pictures of people looking at sunsets can help to calm my mind. Maybe it’s a memory or a vicarious experience in imagination. If I focus with intent, I can smell the ocean spray or hear the buzz of insects in the hazy heat in a nearby field. There’s a deafening stillness when the sun first welcomes a brand new day, just as there’s a solemnity to the sun’s sinking beneath the horizon, saying goodnight.

You can feel one with that glowing sun, bathed in amber rays that paint everything in illumination.

Maybe that’s why one of the most memorable scenes in film from my childhood remains Luke Skywalker’s gazing at the two setting suns over Tatooine in “Star Wars: Episode IV: A New Hope.” Over the vast expanse of sand, the two suns create a foreign, alien vista, strange but beautiful in that strangeness. That colorful image of the setting suns has long remained in my memory, as the lovely colors illuminate the hero, a future jedi, longing for something unnamed beyond that horizon.

The two suns over Tatooine.

These are the kinds of thoughts that often strike me during moments when I need to center myself & find some peace of mind. Isn’t it funny how a sunset over a desert is not that unlike a sunset over a calm body of water? Both can be equally dangerous & isolating. Yet, isn’t there also beauty in danger, attracted to things that could hurt us?

Fellow introverts, where do you enjoy your favorite sunsets? Sunrises? Which calm you most? Do others drink to the dregs the light of those lithium suns?

Sunlight dazzles the surface of water.

The beauty found when the sun casts off its final, dying rays of the day.