The Myth of the Perfect Summer: Tending Your Mental Health When the Pressure Is to Be Happy

July 7, 2026

"With increased awareness and compassionate support, you get to choose how to live a meaningful life."

— Vanya Laporte, RCC

Summer arrives with a particular kind of expectation. The days are long, the sun is out, and the message is everywhere: this is the season to be happy. To be social, sun-kissed, and effortlessly content. And yet, for many people, summer can quietly become one of the harder stretches of the year.

If the brightest season has ever left you feeling strangely flat, you are not broken. You are simply human, in a season that does not always match what is happening inside.

When the outside and the inside do not match

There is a specific loneliness in struggling while everyone around you appears to be thriving. Grief does not pause for patio weather. Anxiety does not take a holiday. Burnout does not lift just because school is out. When the world insists you should be joyful, low moods can come with an extra layer of shame on top.

Vanya Laporte, a Registered Clinical Counsellor in Victoria, BC, helps people meet whatever is actually present — not the feeling they are supposed to have, but the one that is here.

The hidden pressures of the "fun" season

Summer can carry stresses we rarely name out loud:

• The social calendar that leaves introverts and sensitive people depleted
• The comparison that comes with everyone's highlight reel
• The disruption of comforting routines that usually hold us steady
• For parents, the relentless work of filling long, unstructured days
• The quiet grief of a season that reminds us of someone who is no longer here

None of these make you ungrateful. They make you someone with a full inner life, navigating a season that is more complicated than the postcards admit.

Letting the season be what it is

A body-centered, mindfulness-based approach invites a different relationship with summer — one based on honesty rather than performance. Instead of forcing cheerfulness, you might notice what your body actually wants: more rest, more shade, more quiet, fewer obligations.

Vanya often draws on the rhythms of the natural world here. Even at the height of summer, the land models balance — the cool of early morning, the stillness of deep shade, the way everything is not in bloom at once. Your inner seasons are allowed to differ from the calendar.

Choosing a meaningful summer, not a perfect one

With awareness and compassionate support, you get to define what a good summer means for you. Perhaps it is fewer events and more genuine connection. Perhaps it is a standing morning walk along the Saanich Peninsula before the day heats up. Perhaps it is finally tending to grief you have been outrunning since spring.

In session, Vanya can help you sort the pressures that belong to you from the ones you have absorbed — and choose, gently, how you actually want to live these months.

If you are curious

If this summer feels heavier than it "should," let this be your permission to stop performing happiness. The most meaningful seasons are rarely the perfect ones. They are the honest ones, lived at your own pace, with support when you need it.

To learn more, or to book a free Meet and Greet with Vanya Laporte, RCC, visit www.vanyalaporte.com.