Plants for the Heart & Summer Balance
As summer peaks, we’re invited into the season of the heart, a time of brightness, outward energy and expansion. In traditional energetic systems, the heart is more than just a physical organ, it’s the seat of joy, spirit, and consciousness. It guides how we relate to ourselves, our communities, and the world around us.
While summer encourages us to expand, express and open, its fiery nature can also lead to burnout, overstimulation and emotional vulnerability. The good news is our plant allies can help us find balance. There are many herbs that provide cooling, calming and regulating support for our body, mind and spirit.
Discover some of our favorite go-to plants that herbalists have long turned to for cardiovascular, nervous system and emotional care. While they’re particularly helpful during the warmer months, these heart-centered herbs remain valuable allies year-round, whenever we feel the need to soften, ground and come back to what matters.
Lemon Balm (Melissa officinalis)
Lemon balm is a gentle, uplifting herb with a bright, citrusy scent that naturally calms the nervous system and lifts the spirit. Cooling and soothing, it’s often turned to when the mind is restless, the heart feels heavy or the mood leans toward anxiety or sorrow. Traditionally cherished as an herb that “gladdens the heart,” lemon balm brings a sense of emotional lightness, clearing mental fog, easing tension, and gently brightening depressive states.
Energetically, lemon balm helps clear inner agitation and brings ease, especially welcome in summer, when we can feel physically and emotionally taxed. It makes a refreshing iced tea and pairs beautifully with other calming or aromatic herbs like chamomile, rose or tulsi.
Hawthorn (Crataegus spp.)
Hawthorn is one of Western herbalism’s most beloved heart allies. Slightly cooling and astringent, it’s known to help tone the heart muscle, support healthy circulation and nourish blood vessel integrity. The leaves, flowers, and berries are rich in antioxidants and often used to encourage cardiovascular balance.
Emotionally, hawthorn is known to hold space for grief, heartbreak and emotional sensitivity, allowing the heart to stay open while reinforcing its natural boundaries. It’s commonly included in herbal heart blends and traditionally worked with over time to build steady emotional and physical resilience.
Linden (Tilia spp.)
Linden blossoms bring a soft, soothing presence to the cardiovascular and nervous systems. Traditionally used to support people through grief, restlessness, and emotional overwhelm, linden is energetically cooling and moistening, making it especially helpful in summer when tension and dryness rise.
Its floral, honey-like taste makes it a comforting evening tea. Herbalists often turn to linden for those who feel too tender to be met with stimulation or pressure, making it a beautiful companion during times of recovery, fragility or emotional processing.
Motherwort (Leonurus cardiaca)
Motherwort is traditionally harvested midsummer when it comes into full flower, its spires rising tall, signaling both vitality and readiness. Long considered a remedy for the heart and nerves, it’s said to be mildly cardiotonic, helping to steady the heartbeat, ease palpitations and release tension in the chest.
While it’s not heavily sedative, motherwort offers a strong calming presence, particularly where anxiety or emotional agitation manifest physically. Energetically, she helps dissipate emotional heat, including frustration, grief or melancholy without numbing or suppressing. Spiritually, motherwort is often called Lion’s Heart medicine, supporting courage through emotional transitions such as postpartum, loss or profound change. She reminds us that strength and softness can coexist.
Rose (Rosa spp.)
Rose has long been associated with the emotional and spiritual heart. It’s a gentle nervous system tonic, soothing irritability, emotional heat and raw emotions, whether from heartbreak, grief overstimulation or giving too much of ourselves.
Across many healing traditions, rose represents love, unity, tenderness and emotional nourishment. With its delicate petals and protective thorns, it beautifully embodies the balance of softness and boundaries. From my own experience, rose teaches that its safe to be soft and lean into our feminine qualities, releasing the need to be hyper-independent, defensive or protective, patterns often shaped during childhood. Being in its presence reflects that beauty and vulnerability can be safe and deeply supportive.
The most beautiful medicine is simply sitting with it, finding beach roses in abundance, closing your eyes and soaking in its scent and the gentle sound of the waves. We can enjoy rose as a tea, infuse petals in honey or glycerine as a sweetener, use rose water as a face and body mist or infuse petals in a bath or foot soaks for relaxation.
Hibiscus (Hibiscus sabdariffa)
Hibiscus is associated with the divine feminine, including creativity, sensuality and receptivity. Qualities we’re invited to embody during the summer months.
Vibrant, deeply cooling and moistening, it’s perfect for hot days. This beautiful flower powerfully clears heat, relieves thirst and is well known to support circulation, heart tone and gentle liver function. The tart, sour flavor reflects its actions to disperse excess internal heat caused by the sun, stress or inflammation.
Emotionally, hibiscus brings playfulness, pleasure, and ease when we’re running low on emotional reserves.
As we move through the height of summer with its brilliance, demands and emotional tides, may we remember to care for the heart.
These plants don’t just mend what’s broken, they help regulate, open and sustain the heart’s many layers: physical, emotional and energetic. Whether you're feeling the effects of rising fire in the body, or quietly carrying heaviness from the world around you, these herbs offer companionship. They remind us to pause, listen inward and find steadiness in the rhythms of nature.
Let’s remember to take care of our hearts and each other.