The natural world we live in is a mixture of order and chaos, the predictable, and the unpredictable. We know that the seasons will cycle, but every year they are also different. We know that the Spring brings rain and snow melt, but the level of flooding is unpredictable. In the midst of a variable world, we are wired by evolution to seek out the orderly, the predictable, the stable, that which is consistent so that we can have some certainty of surviving tomorrow as well as today.
Our need for regularity and predictability leads to rituals of all types. They both embody these qualities and serve to help create them. In this sense any regularly performed series of actions is a ritual. Some are small and personal; how we wake up in the morning and brush our teeth, have a cup of coffee or tea. Some are large and collective; the schedule for irrigation waters in the spring or the nine to five job which results in a paycheck on a regular basis. Some are spiritual or religious; the blessing of a new building, dances for rain, a collective service of worship, or a personal meditation.
All of these activities serve to create or embody stability, regularize our relationship with the world around us, natural and human; to promote survival and a sense of safety. Humans are nothing but inventive and we all have our rituals, large and small.
The interesting question about rituals is when do they serve our spiritual needs and are they sometimes a limitation, something done for their own sake, powered by the deep need for safety and survival but unconscious, habitual, perhaps even counter-productive? The 2 martini lunch was once seen as a normal social/business ritual, but now it is more often the sign of the dependancy of the alcoholic.
Do you work the job because it allows you to live the life you choose, or because you feel you have to have a job and can’t live without one? Do you wash your hands because it centers you and prepares you to eat a healthy meal, or because some unconscious belief won’t allow you not to? Do your rituals help you find an appropriate state of mind before performing artistically, or in sports, or are they compulsions that you can’t choose to skip?
In short; are your rituals an expression of, and an aid to, your mastery of your life, or have they mastered you? This discernment can be as uncertain and variable as the spring weather. Some are socially sanctioned and some are not, but this is not the same as which ones are healthy and productive, and which ones are controlling and destructive.
Take some time this Spring to consider your rituals, especially that ones that you haven’t thought of in those terms before. Give yourself permission to be conscious about them; to drop or alter old ones that limit or control you; to create or adopt new ones that empower, inspire or connect you. Notice which ones are based in fear and are mastering you and open to ones that are based in gratitude and love, supporting your mastery and joy.
(© 6/2011)
