Rituals Not Resolutions

"And now we welcome the new year, full of things that have never been." Rainer Maria Rilke

Muted sunlight comes through the misty morning. A Robin sits on a bare branch. There is very little color in the garden during these winter months, save a rich red Cardinal who swooped down to one of my feeders. As I make my coffee, I gaze out the window on the world. I notice a chubby round sparrow waiting patiently for a spot at the feeder.

This past year has been difficult, heartbreaking and exhausting for many reasons. I have found myself overwhelmed to the point of losing my sense of wonder. Wonder and hope have almost seemed naive in a world with so much suffering and, yet, without both I have found myself exhausted spiritually, physically, emotionally and mentally.

Every new year, I find a word rise up within me that will be my word for that year. The coming new yearI find that this word is “devotion.” It’s why, instead of making resolutions, I will focus instead on creating and nurturing daily rituals. Indeed, I will root myself in them.

Rituals, unlike resolutions, require dwelling in the present moment and giving it ones full attention. It takes one out of ordinary time and places one in symbolic time, where one is not frantic and busy but engaged in acts of full and sustained attention. Rituals transform the ordinary into something more meaningful. Ritual is transformational; in that rituals help the one performing them transform ordinary experiences into something more sublime and meaningful. Rituals become a part of ones being.

Rituals “…can bring the quiescent back to life; it can open your mind and heart to what you once knew but have forgotten,” writes Robin Wall Kimmerer.

To be fully present to the moment, to notice something clearly, to not be distracted but open oneself completely to the ritual, is creating the sacred. This does not have to be a religious act, but can be as simple as preparing one’s coffee and taking the time to both enjoy it and, as I am doing each morning, being present to the natural world and its rhythms outside my window. To notice the changes in light and and weather. Or to begin and end each day by reading a poem as a way to frame the day in beauty and wonder. To imbue the present in the perceptiveness of a poet’s seeing eye.

The Rabbi Abraham Heschel once wrote, “Our goal should be to live a life in radical amazement… to get up in the morning and look at the world in a way that takes nothing for granted. Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible; never treat life casually. To be spiritual is to be amazed.” Ritual takes one out of spiritual dormancy into amazement.

Rituals is a way to infuse and foster meaning in our daily lives, which are too often lost amidst the cacophony of noise and productivity, the din of doom scrolling, hyper attentive to the information while starving ourselves of wonder, awe, delight, and beauty. The world is full of communication but not community.

Ritual is a way to escape the frenetic pace of informational overload, rushing from one sensation to the next, without any grounding or rootedness to the point of utter exhaustion. Ritual is a way of finding a way to root oneself in something more than oneself, more than the banal communication of emails, texts, and social media. Rituals are not about creating ourselves, but about being and authenticity.

For me, I am finding myself disconnecting more to be in silence and solitude. In the mornings, I don’t instantly pick up my phone but sit at the table, being present to the bowl of yogurt and berries, to the cup of coffee, to the quiet of the morning hours and allowing this to be a time of silent meditation on the taste of the berries or the coffee. To be grateful for these, for this single moment before my day becomes hectic with teaching, with responsibilities, with taking care of an aging parent, and all of the unexpected things that will happen in a solitary day.

I will read a poem and reflect on it throughout my day. I let it form and shape me, how I see the world or myself. I let the poem speak to me.

Recently, I have begun canceling subscriptions to streaming services. I find that I am using the time I once wasted on watching mindless programs to reading books that nourish my spirit, including the French philosopher and mystic Simone Weil. She wrote, “Attention, taken to its highest degree, is the same thing as prayer. It presupposes faith and love. Absolutely unmixed attention is prayer.” Rituals require this kind of attention.

Ritual is stepping away from this world with its emphasis on productivity, rampant consumerism, and information overload to taking moments to unplug, slow down, focus and be. Rituals are symbolic acts in an age where we have lost the meaning of deep symbolism for shallow consumerism and the intoxication of distraction. Rituals require of us because repetition is not mere routine but creating acts of intensity and focus. Repetition deepens attention.

So I will look for ways in my daily life to create these sacred spaces for rituals. Be it sitting in my classroom in silence before the students begin to arrive.

Rituals, whether communal or personal, help awaken us to the holiness of the present moment - in all things, in ourselves. That everything contains a profound meaning and purpose. Rituals help create a sacred rhythm to our day.

Rituals connect us to more than ourselves, in an age where so much is focused on creating a self and a presence, especially on social media. But ritual removes us from these false selves to get in touch with our true identity. It takes time, attention, silence, and solitude even when one is in a crowd. Returning to Simone Weil, she wrote, “To give up our imaginary position as the center, to renounce it, not only intellectually but in the imaginative part of our soul, that means to awaken to what is real and eternal, to see the true light and hear the true silence.” To reach our true selves, as spiritual beings living human lives.

Rituals are not rigid rules. They are not simply adding more tasks to our days. Instead, they are ways of forming sacred expressions to them.

It can be as simple as lighting a candle, taking some deep breaths and reading a poem.

It can be a nightly walk with being present to one’s surroundings, without the distraction of one’s phone. Walking in silence. Listening to the sound of ones breathing, ones heartbeat, ones steps along the path. Noticing the world about oneself.

Rituals are meant to be a safe resting place for our souls. It is allowing for ourselves to be changed by beauty, by quiet, by seeing the greatness in small things, the marvels of the commonplace, to see the infinite in a moment.

And I will be curious to see how this new year unfolds in such focused attention.