Ritual consists of the external practices of spirituality that help us become more receptive and aware of the closeness of our lives to the sacred. Ritual is the act of sanctifying action – even ordinary action – so that it has meaning. I can light a candle because I need the light or because the candle represents the light I need.
Christina Baldwin
I was thinking about rituals today as I went through the arduous task of cleaning my fountain pens. Yes you read that right…pens.
I used fountain pens to write at work for over a decade because I loved the connection it created for me between thought and hand. It has a visceral pleasure for me – drawing the ink out of the nib and pulling it across the page.
But as life got ever busier, my fountain pens fell out of favor for the work they created – maintaining them, cleaning, filling, watching ink levels, blotting excess ink, waiting for ink to dry.
Watching the water wash away the old ink and old words down the drain, my fountain pen cleaning became meditative. Slowly polishing pen cases back to a gleam, the rinse/repeat/rinse/repeat until the water runs clean, the slow bloom of ink on the blotting paper as I tried to remove all remnants of old ink…it calmed me. It focused me. It transported me to another place.
The difference between ritual and habit and task is intention. Tasks are a list of things we have to do. Habits are tasks we get used to doing. Ritual is the elevation of whatever we are doing into something imbued with significance or meaning.
I’ve been trying to resurrect my handwriting. Digital communication has vastly improved my typing skills but my handwriting muscles have atrophied. It’s tiring to write long hand and often I can’t read what I wrote.
But lo. When I filled my fountain pen and set it to paper, my handwriting started to slip back out onto the page. Was this all I needed? Quiet intention? Slowing down my hand writing from being utilitarian to being the ritual manifestation of expression?
And that all got me to thinking about rituals – and how we create them.
Come to find out, I have a lot of rituals. They are small and they are ordinary, but I am acutely aware of the space they can transport me to when I am deliberate and intentioned.
Rituals are touchstones that anchor our lives. Maybe some of us don’t need them frequently, or maybe some of us need them scattered throughout our days. Maybe we just have them waiting in the wings where we can call the into action when we need comfort or inspiration.
What I do know is…I am filled with gratitude for ritual. I like having actions in my life that look small and mundane, but that hold in them something that recalls the grandeur of every moment is not in the moment but in our observation of it.
Today I invite you to consider the rituals you have in your life and where you could create new rituals to serve your purposes. I’ll share some of my more refined rituals in future posts…but for now, I want to hear about yours. What things do you do in your life that are deliberate and intentioned and bring you joy or peace or happiness?
