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Practice
Designing a Ritual:
Some previous considerations
One of the biggest problems for the newly autoinitiated is posed by the rituals. Generally, each of us start using some taken from the books, but it comes a time when we don't find them satisfying. Or even worse: we have no book, but anyway we want to perform a ritual. What can we do?
The answer is obvious: design our own. This might sound a bit scary at the begining, but we'll see that in the end it's not that difficult. For a start, we need to have our purpose for having a ritual clear. Is this a seasonal celebration? Lunar? Are we willing to do something a tad more complicated, like a spell? Writing these down might help us focus our minds so that the ritual starts taking shape. Trying to bring the symbology of what we want to do into light also helps.
The next step is to start the designing of the ritual itself. We must keep
in mind there are several steps that are basical, and should always be present,
while others are elective but add "colour", others are as basic as
the election of the place, clothing, date and time, whether we'll be celebrating
on our own or with others, whether we want silence or music, and if the later,
what we want, live or recorded. Let's analyse each of these:
- Place: the ideal would be a forest or garden, park, square or any other place where we're in touch with nature. But not all can do it, so the main thing here is to find a quiet place, where we won't be disturbed for the time the ritual lasts.
- Time: the celts started counting the day from the sunset. And just this, or dawn jsut before the sun rises, are excellent moments. The time also depends on our time availability, so we must adjust ourselves so that we can do whatever is needed at ease, without the need to rush.
- Date: the seasonal sabbats used to be celebrated on the respective day, or else on the full moon following it. The full moon rites are of course held then, and some magickal rituals depend heavily on the phase of the moon. It's not a bad idea to check a lunar calendar and verify phases and times of moon rising and setting.
- Company: a difficult decision, but my advice is that if in doubt, work alone. Better alone and focused than enduring a mate that might not have all their senses focused on what he's doing. Another option is to invite someone as an observer, and after a while inviting him to join our rituals, when we're sure he won't have his head into anything else.
- Music: depends on personal prefferences. If we choose to have it, we can either produce it ourselves (flutes and percussive elements are the traditional) or use pre-recorded music. In any case it must be rhythmical but quiet, to help us enter into the state of conscience necesary to perform the ritual.
- Clothing: there are two schools. One considers clothing bother, and hold rituals "skyclad", that is, naked. Another considers that by using particular clothing helps our minds enter the apropriate state. If we're going to hold the ritual wearing clothes, it's not necesary for us to have a tunic, because sometimes things like long skirts or very wide sleeves can be a pain to move in (not to mention more likely to catch fire without us noticing). That is, the style of the clothing doesn't really matters, as long as we're wearing comfortable clothing made of natural fabrics.
