RITUALS

Yesterday the spring like weather brought out a lot of our neighbors to garden or to wash their cars and walk their dogs. We all wanted to be outside and to forget about laundry or cleaning or cooking that needed to be done.

"Anthropologists have long understood that the rituals of early human society performed an important survival function by fostering, among a given clan or tribe, a sense of specialness and common destiny. Through the powers of ritual, clan members were constantly remimded that they were the people favoured by the particular deity they worshiped, and that they were in some sense, chosen."

Rituals and family traditions bring us together whether it is for a holiday or a birthday celebration, a sporting event, a convention political or busness related.
We come together to immerse ourselves in something greater than our individual experience.

Buddhisum is a bit different as the aim of meditative rituals is to encounter the ultimate oneness of everything by defeating the limiting sense of self generated by the ego.

Music can be the uplifting sound of an organ that fills a church, or the beating of the drums or a simple guitar but music has soul power with it's rhythmic beat. We love to sing joyously and as we listen to the sounds outside our windows we hear nature calling as birds chirp and bees buzz etc. The ocean waves have a rythem as they crash somethings gently and other times with great energy upon the shore.

We have rituals about how we greet one another, a nod and a smile, a handshake, a hug or the exchanging of gifts, are a few. Other traditions may include bowing or hands placed together as if offering a prayer or a simple high five that all the children know. Animals have their courting rituals that they seem to be born knowing.

"Our rituals are about something; they tell stories that can react the past,or meet specific cultural needs or remind us of our potential, and these stories give them power and meaning." We can feel the emotion that comes but the brain is also responding and processing as has been noted with a drop in blood pressure and the creation of positive changes in the immune system etc. etc.

Rituals like washing your car, or gardening or even shopping have the ability to make us feel better. In the sense the ritual of gathering togther at church is to help us neurologically as we hear stories that have the power to bring us closer to a divine being. I forget what I was advised to call God but whether He is the ground of our being or the source from which all life flows we are ALL looking for a way to return.