Rituals Roundup

This is my IndieWeb Carnival “roundup” post. I honestly didn’t know what to expect, as this was my first time hosting the Carnival. I’m amazed that 25 people read my topic and felt compelled enough to write something on their blog and send me a link. What an amazing thing it is to have this opportunity and to get to direct people’s minds to write on a topic. The results are below and I strongly encourage folks to click each submission and read it in its entirety. They’re all lovely and my notes are merely my attempt to shine light on what they struck in me. Thanks to all 25 of you that took time out of your lives to write the posts and the email that shared it with me.

Andrea’s Rituali

Andrea’s ritual of a couple’s massage with Noemi whenever traveling may be one of the best ideas I’ve ever heard for how to make experiences abroad even more soothing and relaxing. Chef’s kiss for this one.

Chris’s Rituals

Chris contrasting “working life” morning rituals with those that took hold once not working was fascinating. Once I’d read the post, I wondered what my “post-work” rituals will look like. Something tells me that my coffee ritual will persist, but so many other portions that are mere routine today could elevate to ritual status once time is less dictated by the corporate overlords.

Sara’s No Internet Ritual

When I first received Sara’s post, I didn’t immediately recognize that her referring to the ritual being “negative” meant a ritual of reduction or removal of something. Once I grasped that, I found this post fascinating. My wife recently discussed that we’re going to be doing “phone free weekends” from time to time with our entire family. I’m looking forward to it because I share some of Sara’s feelings from her “no internet” weekends. I hope she gets back on track with her rituals and they bring her the peace she seeks.

V.H.’s Assorted rituals

My favorite thing about V.H.’s post is the various angles of approach to the topic of rituals. That wasn’t merely my flight simulation pun, but a genuine appreciation for the underlying concept that rituals are about the process more than the output. In some cases, the only visible artifact of a ritual is the output, and therefore to another person’s eye, that’s all it represents. My kids see me drinking a cup of coffee and they say to themselves “Dad really likes drinking coffee,” but to understand the ritual is to understand the value of process.

Ken’s New family traditions

Ken took rituals in the direction of family traditions. I enjoyed the take and reading it makes me want to write about some of my family traditions growing up. I somehow differentiate rituals and traditions in my head, but I’m not sure how to articulate the difference.

Juhis’s Rituals build community camaraderie

Juhis nailed something so meta and ironic that I am a little ashamed of myself for not seeing it earlier. The IndieWeb Carnival is itself a ritual framework in many ways. I’m so glad someone pointed out what may have been so obvious to many of the other participants. I was also intrigued by the thought that “free thinkers” may push against rituals as they may feel limiting. I would define myself as such a thinker, but didn’t make that connection until Juhis highlighted it.

Manu’s Rituals

Manu was not the only person to refer to the Japanese tea ceremony this month. The mention of it has me not only wanting to learn more, but also makes my mind seek out other examples of ceremony that could serve as inspiration for how to hold a ritual in its highest regard. This could be in order to preserve it, or merely to further honor it beyond the simplistic term that it brings “joy.” I can also relate to the feeling Manu shares of feeling like life is a table ready to be flipped. Sometimes chaos leads to cleansing.

Chuck’s Rituals

Since Chuck’s ritual and mine both touch on coffee, I’ll share that I actually have a hand grinder ritual of my own. When we travel (just about anywhere), I bring my “kit”. I have a small hand grinder and an Aeropress for those brews. The feeling of the hand grinder is, I agree, meditative in its rhythmic processing of the beans.

Antonio’s Morning Coffee Ritual

Antonio’s morning ritual sounds luxurious to me. My ritual was based on making coffee but his is about experiencing coffee along with something mentally stimulating.

Bob’s Rituals

I respect both stances that Bob outlines. I think that his ritual of limiting variation in his life resonates with me as I’ve often wanted to create such boundaries for myself to simplify. I also like that he’d be open to a new ritual that looks to stretch himself, from time to time.

Jeremy’s A Dearth of Ritual

When it comes to the ritual of death, I agree that it is more for those left behind than for the person that has passed. That being said, I’d caution Jeremy to consider prescribing the rituals that are to be conducted. Not for himself, but as a final act to simplify the decisions they’re having to make in that hard moment.

Tracy’s Ritual Creation

Tracy’s submission was such a lovely way to remember someone who made an indelible mark on her life. After reading this, I feel a sense that the kids that got to be part of Coach Taylor’s rituals were overwhelmingly better for having the experience.

James’ Saturday morning reading

James hits so many great points in this post. His ritual is reading fiction, and this post highlights how he fell back in love with that act and then turned it into a ritual. I can relate as I’d loved reading as a child, but fell out of habit and last year started to read fiction at night as a way to “wind down” and it’s something I now look forward to throughout the day.

foreverlikethis’s VHS to Digital

What a trip down memory lane this post was for me. Not because my family has a vault of memories locked away in some form of media. My mom and dad never made home movies or recordings. We were a 35mm camera clan and so my memories of VHS centers around two realms. Taping of and then re-watching an uncomfortable number of times to admin the show C.H.I.P.S. is the first. The second is my 2 years of employment at Blockbuster Video during the end of the VHS era. DVDs took up only one aisle in our store, but the end came quickly after I left the gig.

Lindsey’s Rituals

I’m so glad Lindsey participated in the Carnival for the first time during this month. The phrasing of “there are no neutral practices” really hits for me. This is a phrase I couldn’t have put my finger on when coming up with this topic nor when I wrote my own. It’s the compliment to the statement around intentionality. Seeing so many mentions of religious context and then an expanded concept of rituals from this exercise has also been a joy for me.

Martín’s Rituals

Martín touches on something I’d not thought of when mulling over rituals as a topic. I definitely thought of the corporate project management connotations of “rituals”, but never the very clear connection to the world of sport. There are so many fascinating examples of rituals that teams or individual players/athletes perform. Sometimes they are rituals of luck and other times they are simply the rituals that set forth the mentality to achieve (in this case, to win).

Soren’s Rituals

Great to see another blogger jumping into the Carnival mix during my month! Soren’s researching of those terms feels very familiar. I will admit that it wasn’t a topic that I landed on easily for my hosting duties, but posts like this one have made me so glad that it was not only well received by the community, but so many amazing posts have come from it.

Marisabel’s Rituals: then & now

Parenting is hard. Like really hard, sometimes. I love that where Marisabel has landed is such a pure distillation of why being a parent, for me, has been the single most rewarding thing I’ve done with my life. I feel like printing her ritual quotable on cards and handing them without judgement to all the parents I see at events with their kids, yet mindlessly scrolling on their phones while they are missing out on something they can never get back.

Mel’s Rituals

One of my favorite parts of the IndieWeb Carnival is that it shines light on parts of this world I knew little to nothing about. I had to do a bit of research just to be able to come back and understand Mel’s post. Finding rituals that connect to importance in your life seems like a win for all involved.

Barry’s Routine

It is ironic that Barry talked about the “typical” version of parents wishing their kids would return to school. I was just talking to someone at work and telling them that I missed my kids being home and I was dreading the return of school. That routine is much less zen for our household, but it is a necessary evil. I can’t wait for them to be back home when I come out of my office during breaks.

Dario’s Rituals

Dario speaks of rituals and ceremonies relating to Scrum project management methodology. I thought of this when I picked this theme, because I often hear the terms used in that context at my day job. I agree with the concept that these are examples of “illusions of control.”

Paolo’s Lack of Rituals

Rituals may not be for everyone and this post by Paolo distills that nicely. I would, maybe, are that Paolo has a ritual of reduction that is thinly masked as habits or previous rituals falling away. It is beautiful in a way because as we have things we do regularly that no longer fit our lives, it is like trimming away branches that no longer need to be on a tree and pruning them away leaves the tree free to grow further in another direction.

Britt’s Rituals

When reading Britt’s post, I came away realizing that our similar ritual of preparing tea or coffee is almost equivalent to a breath. I never would have seen the analogy so clearly had it not been for this lovely submission.

Rees’s Rituals

I’m so glad that Rees decided to start submitting to the Carnival this month! A word that has come up in several submissions is intension. Choosing to derive things in life that are worth designing rituals around by looking through the lens of intentionality is great.

Zinzy’s Rituals

Zinzy nails a feeling I struggle to write about. The feelings of failure from rituals you wish you could break. She also really challenged me to think about how easy it is to hold up the “golden rule” when thinking about how you treat others and how you’d encourage them to treat you, but we rarely hold ourselves accountable to the same standard in how we treat ourselves.

Carl’s Rituals

Carl’s description of savoring that first sip of coffee sounds so familiar to me. The smell and the warmth plus the taste all create a symphony of experience.

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