You’re stressed. You’re working hard in your career and not receiving the pay or the recognition you deserve. There are personal-life fires you feel like you’re always putting out, and you’re never fully at ease when you’re sitting on the sofa scrolling through Netflix. I’m not clairvoyant; these are tenets of modern living, made worse by the fact we’re juggling two lives – one of which exists purely on your screen. Who can switch off when life is happening in 2D technicolour 24-7?
Rituals in a Digital World
Social media is a yardstick against which we measure everything, and simultaneously, the insistent tug at your elbow to grab your attention away from intentional living. The solutions aren’t as simple as they seem; ‘turn off your phone’ is simply not a serious thing to ask in a world whose gears are turning behind the second screen. Which is why the ritual is a potent, pertinent rebuff to the ever-increasing volume of the digital world.
Ritual As Anchor
Rituals, affirmations, manifestations… These new-age words have infiltrated popular culture in a huge way, to the bafflement of a fair few – but there’s more to these terms than the ‘woo-woo’ that often accompanies them in witchy Tik-Toks or self-appointed self-care specialist spiels. They could, in fact, be crucial to identifying exactly what we need from today’s world.
Rituals in particular are a powerful way to reclaim some agency over your day-to-day. Whether daily, seasonal, or entire life-stage rituals, invoking something repeatable and unique to you can provide structure, meaning and a sense of control where digital life often feels chaotic.
Travel As Ritual
A ritual, really, can be anything. Provided it is repeatable, enjoyable, and grounding, you can use pretty much any process or experience as a form of milestone for you to touch back in with your physical self and move forward with more intention. It should come as no surprise, then, that travel is a popular form of ritual for many of us.
Travel is a broad church, though. If you want to make ‘getting away from it all’ a part of your return to intentional living, it needs to reflect your interests in an active and repeatable way. Ski holidays put you in touch with your physicality, with your emotions, with the biting cold and with the warmth of a vibrant apres-ski; likewise, a solo trip to a favoured European city can remind you exactly what it is that you’re working so hard for.
Offline Rituals In An Online World
There’s a little caveat to that ‘rituals can be anything’ idea, of course – and you might have guessed it. Rituals can be anything, provided they are real. Anything that requires you to engage with yet another screen for a meaningful length of time could technically be a ritual, but would certainly not be the ritual you need. Let’s put it this way. Digital culture encourages constant connectivity, but it’s stepping into real environments and engaging with your senses that brings the most meaningful experience.
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