[Kristina]

Thank you for the question, Stephen.

It’s so wonderful to be part of the COHO community again.

For me, the purpose of myth (whether personal or societal) is to feel our lives. And ritual is as meaningful as myth. The intention of ritual is to invite the relational presence of the divine into our lives. To appreciate the sacredness – the reverence of human life – and all that is holy. We need rituals because they structure the sacred.

But we can’t rush rituals or rites of passage. Personally, I require lots of coffee and a slow start in the morning! I need quite a long runway to propel myself into lift-off and full flight! My morning coffee and pottering around is just one way where I can sense the sacred threads in my days (and my life). Too often there’s only external stimuli demanding a reaction or response and so my morning ritual is an intentional crafting and a conscious fostering of my dawn to dusk experience.

Also, if we’re solely focused on the future, we forget our ancestors. And in our external busyness, it’s common to forget the threads from which we come from. I feel that we can only reclaim ourselves by also reclaiming and restoring the biographies of our ancestors. When we can lean back on them – the ground they paved for us and their strengths – we can move forward in life. I’ve made a shrine to my forebearers in a corner of the living room, which I visit each day: photos of them, some sandalwood candles and a few leaves of this season’s nature. I honour their memory – our lineage – in a ritualistic way and promise my tribute to my ancestors will be in my living.

Rituals give our left brain a break. They give the gods and goddesses room to speak, move and act through us – we let them alter us. The autumn equinox is coming up in the northern hemisphere on September 22. A suggestion is to offer your present troubles to a piece of paper, and then offer the paper to the ritual fire so that the words and papyrus can be reduced to the elements. And then allow the elements to be reformed into new patterns so that they can nurture and comfort you. And most crucially, bow down and pay homage to the Great Goddess. Allow her to reshape, recast and remould you for the coming season.

Put quite simply, do whatever you need to do, so long as your head falls below your heart. It’s the quickest and finest type of ritual to move you from one state of being to another.

I look forward to being in conversation with you this week – Kristina.