A Ritual For for Honoring Connections and Growing Friendships from Afar
Amy Yoshitsu and I met at Esalen, one of those delightful “travel friendships” (aka deep, meaningful, and inherently time-bound). I was teaching and she was artist-in-residence, which meant we saw each other nearly every day for a month. But when it was time to say goodbye, I had no idea if we’d ever see each other again. That’s when she handed me her calendar.
“I print about 100-200 of these each year and give them to people come into my life in a meaningful way. I want you to have one.”
Sure, it’s practical (mostly for keeping track of watering 40 plants). But the exchange was a symbol for something bigger. It said, “You’re my people now. You had a presence in my life this year, and regardless of how far apart we may be or how little we may talk in the future, I want you to know that matters to me.” This tool for rigidly marking time is instead a symbolic reminder that time and connection are truthfully quite elastic.
When 2022’s calendar showed up in the mail last week, it made tangible Amy's intention of carrying 2021’s connection into 2022. After texting my gratitude for the gift, we put time on our calendars to zoom in January. Go figure.
In my conversations with Amy, it’s clear that the act of reflecting and creating each year’s list of people is a ritual onto itself. The list becomes a kind of map, a geographical survey of the shape of her social identity, which is to say a particular way of examining who she has been, who she is, and who she is becoming. These lists, created over the course of the year, could be seen almost like tree rings--snapshots of that year’s particular social and environmental conditions that together tell the story of her life.
What would you list look like? Who are the 200 people that have shaped your year? Your life?
PS. An unintended bonus: a calendar of collages makes perfect collage material at the end of the year. Collages becoming collages. Collage Inception.
A Ritual For Celebrating Your Anniversary
Your anniversary is more than just an annual reminder to celebrate your relationship - it’s an opportunity to reflect on your past year together and set collective intentions for the year ahead.
So we spent the day enjoying each other’s company, drinking wine and eating cheese and having great conversations as we collaged our shared memories, remixing them into something new, beautiful, and so much bigger than the sum of its parts.
A metaphor for what it means to be in a relationship? Perhaps.
A new annual tradition? Definitely.
P.S. We got distracted and ended up working on these on and off for about 3 days, so no shame in taking your time aka extending the celebration.
The process of working on these together is even more important than what you end up making; taking intentional time to remember, reminisce, and reflect
Select
Part of what makes this so meaningful is learning what moments from the last year stood out for your partner and why. Scroll through your camera rolls and pick your top 10-20 (at least), then print them.
Pro Tips
Pics of you looking cute are great, but inside jokes, meals, beautiful places you visited, etc. will turn out to be super useful too, trust me
Throw in a couple weird wildcards just for fun
2. Assemble
Printed pics
Cutting mat
Cardstock
Glue stick or rubber cement
Scalpel or precision scissors
Optional but recommended
Symbols, memories, mementos, and ephemera (i.e notes or cards you wrote to each other, wrapping paper from gifts, receipts from date nights, tickets from shows, etc.)
A few cool magazines or old calendars
3. Create
Put on a great playlist, pour some drinks, make a cute snack plate, and settle in.
Enjoy quiet creative time with your partner, or use the time together as permission to ask the deep and vulnerable questions that have been on your mind.
Pro Tip: Use the collages as your cards by writing letters to each other on the back before exchanging.
A Ritual For New Years
My News Years ritual is usually off the grid alone in a cold cabin in the woods.
But I think I’ve had enough solitude in 2020. This year I’ll be together with my girlfriend doing “normal” things like drinking champagne, cooking tacos, and playing games. We started dating this year through lockdowns, shutdowns, and distance - a reminder that there are real roses worth celebrating amongst the thorns.
Sometimes we use the repetition of ritual to anchor us as the world changes: sometimes we purposefully adapt our rituals to help us contact the reality of what’s changing.
For me, this is a year of adaptation. What is your body telling you that you need in this moment? Here’s a few ideas to spark your creativity:
Get fancy - break out the suit or dress languishing in your closet
Reflect and set intentions - yearcompass is a phenomenal free guide and framework
Clean - reset your space, get into those hard to reach corners, use sage or palo santo to clear our stagnant energy
Journal - thiesolationjournals will send you a special new years prompt for the first 10 days of January
Salt - put a pinch of salt in your champagne (salt has been used as a symbol of purification and longevity in many cultures // or a riff on the ritual of dipping parsley in salt water on Passover to mix joy with tears)
Shake it out - the tension from this past year lives in your body; do 5 minutes of some dynamic meditation so you don’t carry it into the next (especially if you’re alone and no one’s watching)
How do you hold the immeasurable losses of 2020 together with all its moments of beauty and discovery & the relief of making it through & the reality of it not actually being over & the hope for a better year & the total uncertainty of what's ahead?
Moment of Silence
For the last minute before midnight, hold your breath.
Pure celebration doesn't feel right this year. Let's close this year with a collective moment of silence and stillness for all that we've lost.
This will be hard and uncomfortable and will feel like it lasts forever - just like 2020. Notice the familiar feeling of tension, suspension, and fear in your body.
2. Take A Big Breath
At midnight, take a big giant gasp of air.
You did it. You made it. You are here, now.
Notice how all that fear releases when you breathe again. No matter what 2021 throws at you, remembering to breathe will help. Remembering you can breathe, and being grateful for that, will help too.
3. Go Nuts
For the first minute of 2021, clap and cheer and scream and shout and bang some pots and pans.
It can feel so freeing to scream. Open your windows and let your neighbors hear you, a throwback to the ritual of cheering for essential workers at 7pm. We're here today because of them.
There are so many people to be grateful for, and so many moments worth cheering - big and small. 2020 wasn't all bad. 2021 won't be either.
A Ritual For When You Get Harassed By Online Trolls
When your world gets turned upside down, rituals help us turn it right side up again.
P.S. Any illustrators out there want to collaborate on a kids book of superheroes and heroines inspired by right-wing insults? (Captain Snowflake, Social Justice Warrior, etc.)
Bop It
First and most importantly, make sure you're safe. . Report and delete the most heinous messages. Block anyone who feels especially threatening. Then engage your psoas muscle and vagal nerve with this simple exercise from Resmaa Menakem:
Face forward and notice what's in front of you. Look over your left shoulder, using your neck and your hips to turn. Come back to center. Look up, then look down, then come back to center. Look over your right shoulder, using your neck and your hips to turn. Come back to center. Notice that despite this emotional assault, you are physically safe.
2. Flip It
Flip that hate into love.
Post screenshots of the harassing messages.
Ask your friends and community to drown them out by filling your comments with love and positivity.
You are not alone.
3. Spin It
Something about you scares them immensely. Their aggression is a sad and desperate attempt to feel strong again.
So take their fear as a sign of your power.
Whatever they were trying to make you feel bad about, celebrate it. Be proud of it. Create a symbol, and fly that flag even higher.
4. Release It
Even when you think you've moved on, trauma lives on in the body. But this is their shit, not yours. You don't have to keep holding it.
So shake it out, light some candles and dance, sweat, yell, growl, take a long shower, put on some cologne, do your hair, use the expensive cream you save for special occasions.
Treat your body well.
A Ritual For Voting
I’m a nervous messy buffet table of anxiety and fear today. It probably doesn’t help that I have been compulsively addicted to the news for weeks, which, like all addictions can be toxic when not in moderation.
But “turning away” or completely distracting myself isn’t a solution either. So when the news becomes too much today, I’m channeling my civic attention and intention towards bigger ideas - wisdom from history, poetry, and good conversations ignited by interesting question.
Listen
Play uplifting music.
Let these voices remind you that you're not alone. Allow yourself to feel part of a long continuation of Americans struggling for freedom and justice that started long before you - and will continue long after.
2. Ground in Gratitude
As David Steindl-Rast teaches, we cannot be grateful for every thing, but we can be grateful in every moment. Acknowledge your many privileges. Remember to breathe. Keep remembering.
The guide has a 5min guided gratitude meditation from Zoey Belyea. I'm also a fan of this prayer from @labshul:
3. Frame
Take a brief break from the news to read some "civic scripture" - important writings, speeches, and poetry from American history and herstory. Encounter the shared words and wisdom that our democracy is built upon.
We abolished slavery, prohibited racial discrimination, and made men and women people of equal citizenship stature. In the vanguard of those perfections were citizens just like you, of every race and creed, making ever more vibrant our national creed: E Pluribus Unum (out of many, one).
Ruth Badar Ginsburg
Naturalization Ceremony Remarks 2018
How I still want to sing despite all the truth
of our wars and our gunshots ringing louder
than our school bells, our politicians smiling
lies at the mic, the deadlock of our divided
voices shouting over each other instead of
singing together. How I want to sing again—
beautiful or not, just to be harmony—from
sea to shining sea—with the only country
I know enough to know how to sing for.
Richard Blanco
from America the Beautiful Again
4. Reflect and Discuss
Momentous occasions give permission to ask big questions of yourself and the people you're gathered with. Today is an opportunity to go deep. Some of my favorites from the guide:
"What are you willing to change your mind about?"
"What will be needed restore our faith in our fellow Americans and in our country?"
"What is the role of a citizen in a democracy?"
5. Symbolize
Action is the cure for anxiety. If this election has stirred up emotions, what are you going to do about it? And how are you going to hold yourself accountable?
Oaths can be a useful tool to symbolically externalize your internal commitments. Inspired by the naturalization oath, the guide includes a "sworn-again oath" to recommit yourself to the responsibilities of citizenship. Get ritual-y with it.
A Ritual For Cleaning Out Your Desk At Your Old Job
Part of an ongoing series of ritual design sprints to imbue my own work-life with meaning and purpose. These are descriptions, not prescriptions. Utilize, customize, and remix these if you’re not sure where to start when crafting your own.
Losing a job sucks, whether you liked working there or not.
So what can you do to leave feeling grounded in your values, feeling good not necessarily about leaving but about HOW you left? What can you do to help process the inevitable hurt, confusion, anxiety, and fear, so that you might move forward without excess emotional baggage that won’t serve you?
Doing this ritual didn’t magically make up for a sudden lack of health benefits. But it did allow me to come to terms with the reality of what was happening, to be present to the emotions that arose, and to put a little bit more love and positivity out into the world, even at a difficult time.
Past/Remember
Even if the meter’s running on the car downstairs, take a moment before you dive straight in.
Stand and face your desk, relax your shoulders, think of one good memory from your time working at this desk, hold it in your mind, and allow yourself, maybe, to smile.
Then, take a "before" pic.
2. Present/Clear
Time to clean. Outer cleaning helps with inner cleaning, so be thorough.
Bring headphones. Listen to good music. Maybe something new?
Inevitably, it might occur to you: “Not my problem, the next person can deal with this.” Remember in those moments the karmic value of leaving things better than you found them.
3. Their Future/Bless
Leave a handwritten note and some presents for whoever will take over your desk. I chose objects that symbolized my hopes for them, which I then described in my note.
- Stress ball
- 2 candles
- Cute succulent pot
- A pretty stone
- Thank you notes from community members which hung on my bulletin board to reminded me of my purpose for working
4. Your Future/Release
Take an "after" pic.
Flip back and forth between the before and after, back and forth, sensing the movement of time, sensing the beauty of impermanence, sensing the reality of this change.
Then delete both pics. Make space for what's ahead.
A Ritual For When You’re Trying to Zoom With A Friend But The Wifi Sucks
After three dropped calls and two attempts at different platforms we were both about to lose it. It has been months since we last talked so Rev. Micah and I were super excited for out virtual coffee date, but tech challenges were wasting precious time.
Rev. Micah joked, “Do you have a ritual for when the wifi sucks?” But I took it seriously, of course.
I closed my eyes, invited us to both take a deep breath, and said something like: “You know, though our virtual connection is weak and unreliable, I’m grateful that our human connection continues to be so strong and resilient. May we always remember which connection matters most.”
And then we kept talking, surprised by the smiles suddenly on our faces, a little less preoccupied with what wasn’t and a lot more grateful for what was, letting go of the time that was lost, embracing the time we still had.
Nothing causes collective panic and existential dread quite like someone freezing on a Zoom call.
Notice
Pause for a moment whatever conversation you’re trying (unsuccessfully) to have. Notice any irritating or unwelcome feelings that might be present.
2. Breathe
Take a big long breath. Good News is you don’t really have to see or hear each other to share in this together.
In through your nose
hold for a few seconds
out through your mouth
3. Shift
Remember that there are worse things in the world than bad wifi.
Someone say something like this:
“You know, though our virtual connection is weak and unreliable, thankfully our human connection is strong and resilient.”
A Ritual For Leaving Your Job
Part of an ongoing series of ritual design sprints to imbue my own work-life with meaning and purpose. These are descriptions, not prescriptions. Utilize, customize, and remix these if you’re not sure where to start when crafting your own.
When I did steps 1-4, I thought the fact that I did a ritual would mean that *poof* all fear and anxiety would disappear. But that’s not how it works, apparently. So I designed a way for the ritual to live on as a tool to ground and uplift me whenever I found myself cycling again through unhelpful thoughts or emotions.
Grieve
Stand outside during a torrential downpour on top of an ancient stone altar surrounded by a circle of eight massive rocks.
(yes, actually)
Though it might feel a little scary or crazy at first, notice that you're actually safe.
(same as leaving your job)
2. Ground and Uplift
Imagine the rocks are symbols for your ancestors.
Ask for advice. Listen for any words or phrases that come up in your gut. Take your time.
Imagine you have two gorgeous cream colored wings unfolding from your back. Open your
chest, spread them wide. Feel your power expand.
Use what arises to set an intention for letting go.
I will lead with my values no matter how others treat me
3. Release
Burn something.
(safely)
Maybe old files or notes you don't need anymore?
4. Celebrate
Drink champagne and eat fancy cheese on a rooftop during sunset with your best and oldest friends.
Toast to freedom.
Toast to how lucky you are to have luxuries like a cup full of champagne and friends who love and support you. Toast to life - mysterious, unpredictable, abundant, ever changing.
There's no such thing as instantly letting go.
5. Return
As you move on, moments of doubt, fear, confusion, bitterness, and regret will continue to appear and reappear.
Don't shame yourself.
Simply open your chest, spread your arms wide, take as many breaths as you need, remember your intention, and reconnect with your power.
A Ritual For Wearing Your Mask
Wearing your mask is not a political act - it’s a sacred act of respect and care for your neighbors. But I get it, masks can be irritating, especially in the summer. When the breath feels constricted, or you feel hot and muggy, or your glasses get fogged up, it’s normal for resentment to build. And all that resentment can lead to resistance, even subconsciously. So here’s a quick six second ritual you can do each day to help reframe your relationship to your mask from resentment to gratitude. A little intention can go a long way.
Pause
After putting on your mask, pause and take one deep mindful breath, bringing all your attention to the inhale and exhale.
Even when you're rushing, you always have time for a single breath.
Say outloud or in your head, "I can breathe."
2. Remember
As you go about your day, inevitably you'll have moments of frustration and discomfort. When those thoughts arise, come back to your intention: "I can breathe"
Remember what a privilege that is. Think of how many people are no longer breathing because of Covid. Think of how many times BIPOC have had to tell police "I can't breathe."
Now keep breathing, with gratitude.
I can breathe
What a gift
I can breathe
What a privilege
I can breathe
What an opportunity
I can breathe
A Ritual For When You Reach Your First 100 Followers on Instagram
Part of an ongoing series of ritual design sprints to imbue my own work-life with meaning and purpose. These are descriptions, not prescriptions. Utilize, customize, and remix these if you’re not sure where to start when crafting your own.
How can we use rituals to shift from a purely capitalist transactional relationship with our instagram followers to one of genuine gratitude and giving?
Frame
My free association on the significance of the number “100” led me down a Wikipedia rabbit hole through the history of the $100 bill to Benjamin Franklin (who yes, no surprise, owned slaves, though he did eventually become an abolitionist), and which also revealed this surprising little nugget:
Big Benjamin was an avid vegetarian who was so excited by tofu that his letter to a Chinese trade expert asking how it was made is believed to be the first recorded use of the word “tofu” in the English language. True story.
2. Spending Time
So I spent all night designing an $100 bill that replaced Benjamin Franklin with a piece of magical flying tofu, and then sent it to my first 100 followers as a small symbolic token of my genuine gratitude.
With rituals, the what is often less important than the why.
3. Connect to Something Bigger
Finally, I donated $100 in their honor to the Pulitzer Center’s 1619 Project Curriculum, which is equipping teachers with resources and lesson plans to reframe U.S. history and explore how the “societal structures [that] developed to support the enslavement of black people, and the anti-black racism that was cultivated in the U.S. to justify slavery, influenced many aspects of modern laws, policies, systems, and culture.”
A Ritual For Purchasing Your Domain Name
Part of an ongoing series of ritual design sprints to imbue my own work-life with meaning and purpose. These are descriptions, not prescriptions. Utilize, customize, and remix these if you’re not sure where to start when crafting your own.
Securing my domain name kind of felt like settling land out west (shout out to everyone who grew up playing Oregon Trail). What would it look like if we welcomed visitors to our website like we welcomed guest to our home?
1. Materialize
Make the intangible tangible.
Write your domain on a key that unlocks nothing.
Cradle the key in the palms of your hands, holding it hopefully, like a fistful of soil from a farm. Take a few breaths. Smile.
Add it to a key chain, maybe a meaningful one. Keep adding keys with each new domain.
2. Imagine
Gently close your eyes and allow yourself to be comfortable. 3 long deep breaths, in through your nose, out through your moth. Imagine your new domain is the door into a big beautiful house. You open the ddoor and gathered inside is everyone that will ever visit your website - every single person, whether on purpose of by accident, all together, all at once.
It's a party. Everyone's having a blast, mingling, drinking, laughing, eating snacks. As you walk through the door everyone turns and gives you a huge round of applause. Someone calls out for a toast, and they all quiet down.
What do you say to all your guests?
How do you want them to feel?
What's a simple toast you can offer?
(there's no wrong answer)
“May you feel empowered to make meaning in your life.”
Now however many people you’re imagining, imagine even more. And notice how that feels.
A Ritual For When You Get The Email From Legal Zoom That You’ve Been Officially Registered As An LLC
Part of an ongoing series of ritual design sprints to imbue my own work-life with meaning and purpose. These are descriptions, not prescriptions. Utilize, customize, and remix these if you’re not sure where to start when crafting your own.
1. Pause
Before you move straight on to your next email, take in this moment. Yep, this one, right now.
Where are you?
What sounds are in the room?
What’s the light like?
A business, your business, will have many beginnings and many firsts. This is one of them. Take it all in, as if embossing it into memory.
2. Zoom Out
Who are 3 people that helped you get to this point in your career journey? Teachers, mentors, listeners, supporters, meal cookers, shoulder rubbers, etc. There’s no wrong answer.
Send each one a short and sweet text or email. An unexpected little note of gratitude:
“Hey! Officially an LLC! Quick note to say xyz. Thank you for all your help, support, and xyz. I hope you continue to be an integral part of the many more milestones hopefully soon to come.”
3. Zoom In
Maybe it was just some typing and clicking on a screen, then poof an email, but it’s actually one big symbolic step towards brining something new into this world.
Picture in your mind one dream of yours that this LLC might help make possible. Really see it. Next, imagine one person that this LLC could help.
Open yours eyes. This email you’re looking at now means you’re one step closer to both of these dreams. Keep walking.
