How Rituals Shape Your Life

Welcome to Day 8/30 of this newsletter challenge.

Over the next 30 days, I’ll send out a daily email featuring someone who I think has found ways to Set The Pace in their life (shameless plug) and share the unique ways they go about their work, life, and everything in between.

The email will be divided into:

• 3 insights into our guests’ life

• 2 quotes that leave you a little better than they found you

• 1 podcast recommendation

3 Insights

Hannah Rose Gray 💫

Welcome Hannah, we are so glad to have you on this challenge. Hannah Rose is a leading expert in wedding photography and event storytelling, known for her unique approach to holistic wedding planning through her company, Wedding Wellness.

With over 12 years of shooting weddings, she has photographed weddings in 7 countries and 30 states, garnering recognition from prestigious publications like The Knot, Green Wedding Shoes, Zola, and Brides.com.

Hannah knows a thing or two about rituals; having captured them on camera for years and also creating her own. I love the way she’s found rituals for any stage of life she’s in and how they have given her experience to hold on to and also make space for new ones.

So, let’s get dive in:

1. Why are rituals so important to you?

   Hannah: ‘Rituals are important to me because have been the light that has guided me through the dark during uncertain times. They are the source that keeps my mind grounded and my heart attached to the change that is happening in my life. Rituals have given me experiences to hold on to; otherwise, I wouldn’t have words for them. Routine is the what in life, what we need to get done. Rituals are the how in life, how we do things in life. I have performed rituals for big moments of my own and friends’ lives, helping us transition from death, miscarriage, leaving a home, buying a new one, changing a last name for a marriage, and also one for a divorce. Rituals usually help us through life transitions like these.

   All life transitions start with an ending, have a middle neutral phase, and end with a new beginning. Rituals in each phase of a life transition help us grieve what was and make room for what will be.

   Rituals are all about relationships and community for me, bringing us back together in a shared experience. They are also a very personal thing. I have daily rituals that no one knows of but they help hold me together, giving me intention and a how.’

   For example in my own life:

   I have a ritual that during changes in life I write. I write poems, I write short essays, I write to understand what is happening. I was awake all night while my grandmother took her last breaths. As Titanic was playing on the tv in the room and I sat next to my grandmothers bedside as she took these deep awful sounding slow breaths in and out, I wrote. I wrote of my life with her, how I am changed because of her, what her love has done for me. I wrote what I would say at her funeral a few days later. I wrote of her legacy and life. Writing is a ritual for me I do weekly if not daily in my own life since I was a child.

   Another example of a ritual for me would be:

   Prioritizing our wedding ceremony. As a wedding photographer, I have photographed over 600 wedding ceremonies. And I knew when it came time to Ian and mine wedding it would be the focus, not the party, not the dress, not the hoopla. We wanted to focus on the ritual of getting married- the how. We asked ourselves where in the world would this meaningful ritual take place? What would happen during it that would feel like a commitment? What words would be spoken? Who would be there? What elements would play a role into this ritual?

2. How can you create rituals for big changes in your life?

   Hannah: ‘In my favorite ritual book called Hello, Goodbye: 75 rituals for times of loss, celebration, and change the author, Day Schildkret, says this, “Rituals can’t be thought; they must be done. With your whole body, hands, feet, mouth, and belly. With fire, earth, wind, water. Alone or with witnesses. Doing them is the only way to keep them alive. Especially during threshold moments, a ritual can slow us down and gather us in to all that has been scattered by the speed and busyness of our days, re-collecting that time into some semblance of understanding and meaning. When the season shifts, a ritual can align us with the greater cycles, marking and remembering what it is we’re leaving behind and where we’re arriving.”

   To create your own ritual it simply takes intention. Depending on the big life change I’d say get clear on the thing that you are leaving behind and what you are entering into. The exiting and entering. The death and life. The old and the new.

   Here are a few reflection questions to better help you craft a ritual of your own:

   1. How can you honor the season of life you are leaving through a physical form or using an element like earth, water, wind, fire? Is there a physical representation that you could bury, burn, or let float away?

   2. Who do you want to be apart of this ritual of releasing what once was? Who will be with you during this neutral phase or even during the new beginning? Who has supported you or walked this season of life with?

   3. What is this next season of life asking of you? What do you need to radically accept or radically release to help you move into the new?

   4. Where is important to you? What location has meant a lot for you in the past season of life and where is this new season of life taking you?

   5. What are the ways you move your body or practices you use to set intentions in your life? Journaling, running, swimming, yoga, etc. Use these during a big change happening in your life but be more intentional about each movement, invite others into these rituals with you, or be mindful as you are practicing them. Let them serve you in this season..’

3. What advice would you give anyone getting married?

   Hannah: ‘My advice to a couple getting married would be let yourself be in this life transition together and not to let the wedding planning overtake your focus. Give your energies towards preparing for your marriage, not just the wedding day. Set your values, vision, and ventures BEFORE you plan a wedding. The wedding day is a gathering you are bringing people into to experience and celebrate your relationship. So before you can do that, get clear on your vision as a couple and what type of experience you are inviting people into. Think about the wedding more from a place of: how do we want to feel, how do we want our guests to feel, and how do we want the day to feel? Rather than what does it look like. .’

2 quotes

“Ritual is the passage way of the soul into the Infinite.” — Algernon Blackwood

“There is a comfort in rituals, and rituals provide a framework for stability when you are trying to find answers.” — Deborah Norville

1 podcast recommendation

See you back tomorrow!

Mar 🐙