Personal ritual
Ritual is one of my favourite things in the world, because time and time again ritual has saved me. Through practice I’ve seen ritual ground, elevate and give magic to our everyday lives.
Let me share a story with you: a few years back a friend and I were shopping for mustard seeds at an Indian Grocery Store in Chatswood. These seeds were one of the many ingredients our teacher had asked us to buy for a Hindu ritual. Driving home I had a moment. It felt odd, and out of sync with who I am in the world. Don’t get me wrong I loveeeee a multilayered ritual, I live for meaning and wouldn’t be myself without my metaphorical & philosophical lens.
This was a big A-HA moment. Its a long story for another day, but it got me thinking and pondering many things. One of these was my love of ritual and how it always brings a sense of magic to my life. It is undeniable that it brings me joy.
Lets dive a bit deeper, in Dimitris Xygalatas book Ritual (a great book for a deep dive into ritual) he shares how students who took part in more rituals had lower levels of cortisol in their bodies. So less stress. We know this… when we practice ritual, our breathing slows down, our attention feels less scattered and comes together, our bodies begin to soften and relax. We begin to feel at home in the world. Rituals stabilise our lives. It must be why religions are overflowing with ritual, why Tea Ceremonies are so attractive, why Vedic meditation is popular, its the coming together of all the fragmented parts of ourselves, often with each other to give us feelings of oneness, groundedness, centeredness and connection.
There’s an unseen and magical glue there.
The function of magic is to ritualise man’s optimism, to enhance his faith in the victory of hope over fear. Magic expresses the greater value for man of confidence over doubt, of steadfastness over vacillation, of optimism over pessimism.
From; Ritual, How Seemingly Senseless Acts Make Life Worth Living by Dimitris Xygalatas:
Outside of formalised rituals, I’ve found the best rituals are the ones that appear quite naturally, organically from your everyday life. But I think we are so conditioned to think that ritual must have all the bells & smells for it to be legitimate. Here’s todays headline, it simply doesnt.
My daughter and I have a ritual that happens each summer. We gift each other a frangipani flower, she usually picks hers up on the way into the house mid morning, and I pick mine up from the tree out the back of our home, this one is Sunset colour. Its so simple, but it makes you feel like you ‘crossed someones mind’. And that is a little magical moment.
Our Sunrise Frangipani Tree
In the mornings I make a pot of tea, a delicious mixture of a few black teas but the main one is Black Rose Tea. I LOVE the idea of sipping tea infused with flowers, and I sit with this and look at some photo’s, read about art, or creativity and usually take a photo or two. This makes the hugest difference to my day. Without it, my day feels dry and flat. So its a small ritual that I gift myself. When I working my last job in Dementia Care, I would get up at 5.45am ensuring I could have some time before the world was up with me.
The last few years have shown me that we never know what’s around the corner, good and not so good, so to spend a few precious minutes making parts of the day feel special, magical, upleveled is something good to do, its worth doing.
🌼
