What wants to be seen, honored & held in beauty?
What might be possible once you and your experience has been witnessed, held and honored?
What opening might be created? What connection might emerge?
What door might be closed?
What might you call in to support you that you had not known was there?
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Ceremonies allow us the experience of acknowledgement. Acknowledgment and being witnessed is its own medicine. The purpose of Ceremonies is not to heal but to transform. Offering anything sacred attention is an act akin to alchemy. Ceremonies do not need to be big or elaborate to create profound reverberations within a body, heart, relationship or community. Personalized ceremonies are for people who have something happen in their life or inside of them that desires attention, reflection, witnessing, tending to.
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Ceremonies often fail us when they are prescribed, rote or when they are handed to us by dominant culture, tradition or religion but don’t feel fully aligned with the particularities of the person they are meant to support or the situation they are meant to honor. The process I engage in allows individual(s) and their lived experience to gently guide us to the emerging ceremony.
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Here are a number of life events & transitions I have or often work to support, celebrate and honor. If any of these call to you we would begin the process with that in mind but the each process is unique; beginning with a conversation to uncover the specifics of your story, situation and the longing that is guiding you to Ceremony.
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the resting place
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daily ritual
A daily ritual is a small personalized ritual created with the intention of offering you protected sacred time in your day. The ritual can be thought of as an anchor, a buoy, a mirror, a resting place. Your ritual may be used to connect you to a specific intention; a daily ritual can be a form of accountability to your higher self and your deepest desires. Or your ritual may guide you back home to yourself or to connect you to mystery and the unnamable. Regardless of your intention for the ritual, we will work together to create a small sacred container for you to step into and exist within on an ongoing basis.
The process: This offering begins with a 45min conversation, guided by questions to support you in articulating your intention for the ritual. With the information gathered during this conversation, I will create a personalized ritual in the form of a written document, which will be sent within a week's time. I also offer some structures of accountability to support people in creating the practice of performing their daily ritual. Daily rituals may include mantras, invocations, altars and/or specific acts of care. Some rituals are performed in a specific location, in or outside, or at a certain time or even hour in the day. The specificities of the rituals are a reflection of the person I am composing for and the needs they carry within them. Daily rituals tether us to something beyond while also calling us back into presence, in a way we often have trouble accessing in our day to day lives. If you are going through a life transition or navigating hard emotions, a daily ritual can offer your stability and hold you tenderly in beauty, reverence and connection.
Below are just a few of examples of life transitions or seasons in which people might benefit from a daily ritual Becoming a new parent: a daily ritual may support a new parent in connecting with parts of themselves that feel forgotten while accepting what is. This acknowledgment and acceptance may allow them to experience more joy in the day to day life of child rearing, which can be challenging. After a heartbreak: a daily ritual may support a heartbroken person in connecting with their own worth, lovability and sense of trust in the unfolding unknown future. During a period of grief: a daily ritual can support a grieving person to connect with their grief in an intentional way, as it evolves and changes. The sacred time of a daily ritual offers a container for the range of emotions that arise when one is in period of active mourning. A career change: a daily ritual can support a person making a change to remain connected to their vision and values as they navigate a transition. Entering a new year: a daily ritual started on new years, a birthday or any other auspicious occasion, supports a person in articulating what they hope to manifest and live into, in the coming months.
the threshold
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personal ceremonies
A personalized ceremony is created and performed to honor and support a life event or transition. These ceremonies are born out of the desire within the individual(s) and the process unfolds based on their needs and desires.
The process: The process that unfolds when we work on a personalized ceremony begins with a conversation. I consider this conversation to be as sacred as the ceremony itself. It is the articulation, translation and naming of that which the ceremony will be for. What you are moving through? What questions are guiding you? What desires are you holding in your heart? Anecdotes and small details can be influential to the nature and structure of the ceremony. In this way, an open, expansive and associative conversation is essential. The conversation is a collaborative creation, as we together work to communicate and discover the essential qualities of that which the ceremony is being composed for. After this meeting I compose a ceremony from what was gathered and generated during the conversation. The composition is a written document which is sent within a week’s time and includes a proposed series of events and ritual actions, as well as all the other elements of the ceremony ie: what to gather, how to prepare, the list of participants etc. This document is worked on, refined and altered until the written ceremony feels complete. The ceremony is then performed, with or without me as the guide, with or with guests or participants. All of this is also determined in the process based on my expertise and guidance.
the circle
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gatherings & events
Individuals convene to form a group that can last anywhere from an afternoon to a lifetime. Groups are formed by choice, by need, and by circumstance. Ceremony in a group, regardless of the reason the group has gathered, can be powerful and transformational. A group has the collective power to witness, to unearth, to connect, to support, to find new sources of resilience and purpose.
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Ceremonies created for gatherings or events are similar to a personal ceremony in that they are often performed to honor and support a life event or transition. These ceremonies are frequently, but not always, folded into a larger gathering or event; a wedding, a memorial, a house warming, a birthday party or baby shower.
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Alternatively, ceremonies can be a way to honor and acknowledge a preexisting group or a self-selecting group that meets to process a certain shared experience (new mothers, survivors, artists, or grievers etc.) or a formed group (co-workers, families, neighbors etc.) Ceremony can be used as a means of inauguration for a group, or ceremony can be called upon to acknowledge something that has arisen in the group that requires tending to.
The process: We begin our process together with a conversation so that I may become clear on the nature of the gathering and the social landscape in which the ceremony will exist. From here I will create a proposal for our process. Some ceremonies require a number of conversations to create the ceremony while others may follow a similar process as the personalized ceremonies. (see above)
the companion
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conversations
Ceremonial Companionship consists of hour long monthly conversations. This durational process offers depth and breadth and is created for people who are interested in engaging with day to day life with attention, reverence and care.
These conversations can be as fluid or as structured as the individual desires. The content of the conversation also varies widely but below are some of the ways people have engaged with this container.
* to consider how ceremony & ritual may be incorporated into your daily life * to discuss creative or life project * to be witnessed in 3 to 4 areas of your life (ie: career, a relationship to a specific person in your life, health, spiritual life), which are articulated and determined in our first session and then explored monthly * to hold space for a transition you are moving through or an initiation you are undergoing * to intentionally look at something in your life through the lens of process, beauty and ceremony * to uncover the ceremony inside of you that you can sense but might not be clear yet on what that ceremony is or what it is honoring * to take a slower and more integrated approach to creating a ceremony Regardless of the intentions an individual brings to this process or what is explored in the conversations, monthly calls inevitably offer a sense of accountability and consistency. Whatever you put your sacred attention on will grow and evolve. After each session, I pull threads of language and wisdom from the conversation to create a poetic document. This document grows with each passing month, becoming an archive which honors process as its own place to reside and its own medicine. Sometimes, but not always, these conversations culminate or intentionally are meant to move toward the creation of a ceremony. Ceremonies born of this process often reflect the deep exploration of conversations that have traversed time. Working together over a number of months helps clarify intentions and allows for a ceremony to be a reflection of the bordered landscape of the individual's life.
be your own Ceremonialist
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Sacred Bridge
Sacred Bridge is a 5 week course which will provide the tools of ritual and community to help you hold a life transition you are undergoing.
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Previous taught in partnership with Poetry Forge in January 2023 and The School of Making Thinking in June 2023
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Here for more information on the course + upcoming dates