What is ritual?

My definition of ritual, influenced by David Whyte’s definition of poetry.

Mosaics

For something as vital to our individual and collective experience as ritual I do not strive to have a set definition with clear boundaries. Like the word “sacred” I see the definition of ritual as something of a mosaic, with many individual expressions making a beautiful expansive whole. (Thank you to UK celebrant Rosalie Kuyvenhoven, in a workshop I did with her she talked about definitions as mosaics.)

That said, for both “ritual” and “sacred” it’s important for me to have a working definition because they are central to what I create as a minister, coach, and officiant.

My definition of ritual

Ritual is an act through which you feel and accept a change. A ritual causes change to occur on multiple levels—physically, emotionally, spiritually, mentally, etc. I used to believe that ritual was made by intention, but I now believe that ritual occurs with or without setting or naming intention. The meaning can be a confluence that we did not intend to set in motion. However, intention-setting may elevate a ritual to the level of ceremony.

Both ceremony and tradition protect and elevate ritual, and this is the realm we’re often referring to when we consider wedding rituals.

Some examples of rituals that occur in life without intention-setting or ceremony.

• Picking the keys when you purchase a home: once the keys are on your hand, you have now become a homeowner.
• Picking up the last of your stuff from your ex partner’s house: for many, that is the final act that makes them feel how they have fully separated their life from the other person.
• Having “the first” of something you associate with a season, for example here in New England people feel like fall has arrived when they have their first Pumpkin Spice Latte, or first take their sweaters out of the drawer.

These are acts whereby the change is experienced and processed on multiple levels of being, and it cannot be undone. While you can sell your house, you will never not have been a homeowner. While you can start again with an ex partner, the break up has now occurred.

David Whyte’s definition of poetry

My thinking about ritual this way was highly influenced by hearing David Whyte’s definition of poetry. He says, “poetry is language against which you have no defenses.”

He goes on to offer real world examples—not examples of works of poetry as we typically think of them. “So poetry” he explains, “is that moment in a conversation where you have to have the other person understand what you’re saying. And sometimes, it’s when you’re delivering terrible news, news of a death or an accident, and you have to tell the other person, and they have to hear it. And you have to say it in such a way that it’s heard fully.”

“You have to say it in such a way that it’s heard fully.”

I was so struck by this definition. And how it meant that we live in, and utilize poetry without meaning to be poetic. I thought so much about the transformation of poetry by this definition. It’s the thing you have to hear, and—David didn’t say this exactly but this is my commentary—and, it changes you. After you hear or say the poetry you are changed.

He did say, later in the same On Being interview: “You can turn your face away from what was said, but when you turn your face back, it will still be waiting for you.”

The nature of change

So if poetry is the language that transforms us, it made me think: ritual is an act that transforms us. You can look away after the act has been done, but when you look back, the new reality is still here.

Just like David’s definition of poetry means not all “poems” are poetry, I adapted this to consider that not all acts of ceremony or tradition are ritual. We can all think of an act that was socially expected to mean something and it meant either something else, or meant nothing.

David says with poetry, “you have to say it in such a way that it’s heard fully.”

I say of ceremonial ritual: you must do it in such a way that it’s fully felt.

Meaning of wedding traditions

Separating ritual from ceremony helps us begin to see the complexity of the 21st century American wedding day. Ceremony itself is massively decentralized and devalued as many couples don’t even work with professional officiant, but instead ask a friend to piece together a ceremony with only Google for a guide. Few couples take time to craft the rituals and language of their ceremony with care, rendering their ceremony a once-in-a-lifetime lost opportunity.

On the other hand, the day still abounds with ritual. From the way people get dressed to when they encounter certain company. Gift giving, letter writing, heirlooms, processions. From toasts to dances there’s ritual—and even ceremony—at every turn and within every hour of the timeline. However, people are not aware of when a ritual is occurring and they may not agree on its meaning.

Disagreements about rituals

In fact, misunderstandings about ritual are one of the central reasons for intergenerational tensions—aka couples arguing with their family. We don’t know enough to envelope certain rituals with the protection and added meaning of ceremony. We don’t know enough to be able to say why a certain ritual means so much to us since we don’t even know it’s a ritual. Where certain wedding traditions come from is not much more than trivia (by the way, Queen Victoria did NOT wear a white wedding dress to symbolize purity).

One person might see a champagne toast as just one of dozens of options for elements of the day, no more important than which flavor of cake they pick. Someone’s parents might feel, “It’s not a wedding without a champagne toast.” That’s ritual and tradition. Raising the glass of champagne = wedding, for them. But others might feel you can raise a glass of anything. Meanwhile the couple might feel they don’t want any glasses raised because it’s just more unwanted attention.

The key to crafting a meaningful wedding is to know when you’re looking at a ritual, and what it does or could mean. Consider if it’s a tradition. Consider if it should be enacted with any degree of ceremony.

Ritual will occur with or without your knowledge of it, but a nuanced understanding of ritual gives you a chance to employ intention, thereby creating and deepening meaning at every stage of wedding planning and during every hour of the wedding day.

Check out my impromptu IG Live reflection on ritual.

More from the blog