Bruce Feiler

We are held.

you know empathized with we are supported and uplifted in this moment of change and confusion because we know when there's a wedding suddenly everybody has to do a slightly different role in the family when there's a death often the the roles that the deceased played have to be reassigned to everyone else and so that's what the rituals do they reduce the stress

They make us feel seen, respected, loved, and heard, and then they allow us to reconstitute ourselves.

So it is the human response to the pain and confusion around change that turns, as one ritual designer told me, that the most important thing is to change fear into hope.

Yeah, I might actually somewhat push back in the way that you're gently pushing back on me.

I think that rituals mark time.

So if you are putting up the Christmas tree, you're looking at the old ornaments, you're reconnecting to the past, you begin to realize that maybe someone's getting a little older, okay, or maybe someone is experiencing this in a different way, and that is a way of marking time.

So a lot of what goes on in a ritual, and this may be one of the most fascinating and surprising and to me satisfying things I learned, and that is, sure, they connect us, sure, they create togetherness,

But also, rituals reduce conflict.

There is conflict in any one of these occasions, okay?

Someone wants to put the mistletoe on this way.

Somebody else wants to do that.

Someone wants a natural tree.

Someone wants an artificial tree.

And the ritual forces us to broker those conflicts, okay?

You and I are getting married.

You want a big wedding.

I want a small wedding, okay?

I want outdoor.

You want indoor.