Rituals

I’ve come to appreciate rituals more.

I have never been sentimental or cared much for ritual or tradition. And I still do less than the average person. But as I’ve gotten older, I have come to appreciate life transitions more and understand the profound mental struggle that can come with it. I have found rituals useful, meaningful, and even necessary to close out one chapter and open another.

I think humans still don’t know how to use language. We can write and speak, but our brains contain so much more than we know how to process verbally. Symbolism becomes necessary to process what we cannot with logic and language.

I’ve learned to let myself celebrate wins more, take a minute to process losses more, and even engage in symbolic actions to make a kind of ritual out of big transitions of all kinds. Even if I don’t fully understand why, it works to make my life better.