How Can Rituals Energize You With Greater Meaning & Joy?

✨ How Can Rituals Energize You With Greater Meaning & Joy?

Creating powerful everyday practices to help you connect with yourself, others, nature and beyond.

Life invites us to explore existing rituals and create new ones.

Rituals percolate through our lives, helping us connect with ourselves, each other, nature, and beyond. Across time and place, group rituals are common aspects of human behavior, whether in cultural traditions, academics, families, sports, business, communities, the military, or spiritual traditions. And as individuals, many of us have some actions we engage in, either day-to-day or occasionally, that carry important meanings for us. These activities, whether at the individual or group level, may be imbued with special interpretations and significance that bring “mattering” and purpose into our lives (Kellerman & Seligman, 2023).

Rituals can be viewed as meaningful enlivening rhythms that carry us through our days. Rituals are different than habits in some important ways. While routines and habits are simply repeated actions, rituals have meaning or purpose beyond simply the tasks themselves (Hobson, et al, 2024; Smith & Stewart, 2011).

Creating and re-creating rituals can help us bring more meaning to our lives (Norton, 2024). With a bit of intention and understanding, we can learn to transform some, even mundane, everyday tasks and routines into ritual practices that contribute to our flourishing and well-being. In his book, The Power of Ritual, Casper Ter Kuile (2020), writes about creating meaning with rituals at four levels, including connecting with (1) oneself, (2) other people, (3) the natural world, and (4) the transcendent or that which is somehow larger than oneself.

🌻 Here are a few examples of rituals:

Individual or personal rituals:

• Meaningful or sacred reading as a pathway to greater awareness.
• Taking a beloved child out for lunch each year before the first day of school to discuss aspirational goals for the year.
• Using a special mug to drink coffee before important meetings and then taking a moment to pause and reflect about how you want to be present.
• A baseball pitcher tapping their hat a certain way three times before each pitch.
• An entrepreneur taking time out from working each week to rest and rejuvenate.

Rituals with other people:

• Connecting with others to build community by sharing food and eating together.
• Preparing dinners with family or friends at holidays.
• Celebrating birthdays by lighting candles and singing.
• Participating in graduation ceremonies.

Rituals engaging with the natural world:

• Celebrating the new moon or full moon each month.
• Harvesting fruits and vegetables with gratitude for the bounty.
• Regularly getting outside into nature by spending time in a forested area or near a body of water.
• Sitting silently with reverence to watch the sunrise or sunset.

Transcendent Rituals:

• Religious ceremonies and practices across traditions, such as lighting candles at significant times.
• Native American sun dances.
• Coming of age ceremonies to celebrate rites of passage, such as confirmations, b’nei mitzvahs, and communions.
• Funerals or other memorial ceremonies.

What are some rituals in your life?

• Individual day-to-day rituals?
• Rituals with other people?
• Rituals engaging with the natural world?
• Transcendent rituals?

Across the nuances of our lives, we have opportunities to design new practices, to adapt old ones, and to mix them together in ways that bring us greater meaning and purpose (Ter Kuile, 2020).

An inventive mindset can call us to re-create a dry habit and imbue it with a special meaning. This powerful practice creates the empowerment to rebuild a habit or task into a purposeful, meaningful, or sacred ritual. The key is how we feel about the practice and what we are thinking about when we do it.

Some rituals can be calming – others may be energizing or inspiring. For example, many people have a morning wake up routine. Is waking up in the morning done mindlessly on autopilot or with an intention to awaken, motivate, and inspire? We all breathe when we wake up. Do we just jump out of bed, or do we pause with gratitude for the breath and maybe offer a brief meditation or mindful pause, thinking about something we are grateful for? Do we quickly read a story to our children or grandchildren before bed just to get them off to sleep, or do we share a meaningful bedtime ritual that includes reading a story, discussing it and talking about its meaning?

Which rituals in your life do you find most meaningful?

What everyday activity might you want to transform from a habit into a simple ritual to bring greater meaning into your life?

What is your next step?

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. No content is a substitute for consulting with a qualified mental health or healthcare professional.

© 2025 Ilene Berns-Zare, LLC, All Rights Reserved

An earlier version of this material was published at Psychology Today.

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References:

• Hobson, N. M., Schroeder, J., Risen, J. L., Xygalatas, D., & Inzlicht, M. (2018). The psychology of rituals:
  An integrative review and process-based framework Personality and Social Psychology Review, 22(3), 260-284.
• Kellerman, G. R., & Seligman, M. E. (2023).Tomorrowmind: Thriving at work with resilience, creativity, and connection—Now and in an uncertain future. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster.
• Norton, M. (2024).The ritual effect: From habit to ritual, harness the surprising power of everyday actions. New York, NY: Scribner.
• Smith, A. C., & Stewart, B. (2011). Organizational rituals: Features, functions and mechanisms. International Journal of Management Reviews, 13(2), 113-133.
• Ter Kuile, C. (2020). The power of ritual: Turning everyday activities into soulful practices. New York, NY: Harper One.

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