Rituals

It’s my Nameday today which means I am celebrating the meaning of my first name. The importance of this day is close to my heart because of someone else, a person close to my heart, who also celebrates their Nameday the very same day and who had the most significant (and very positive) impact on my life. I have a little ritual on this day: I look for a black rose and bring it home, but oftentimes it’s quite hard to get. Black, in this case, stands for endless – endless love, endless family history, endless life. I have decided this year to switch to a white rose (white is the opposite of black and yet also equally endless and much more practical too).

I know, feel, experience the value of rituals in our life but today I looked into the research about it. For now, I did not find a good book or study yet, but I’m not going to give up.  According to this Scientific American article, rituals are known to bring relief in grief and I am studying a lot of cultural rituals surrounding death so I guess I think about it a lot. I hope that I can deepen my knowledge a bit later, as our new life in Bristol, still demands a lot of my energy at the moment. I want to study the history of mourning but also the impact and mechanisms of rituals.