Rituals - consolation in mourning times?
Even if people are otherwise shy away from traditional ritual acts, such as Christmas with the same actions, so many return to rituals in exceptional situations.
For example, when a beloved person has left them. The regular walk to the cemetery can be such a ritual, for example, to which you previously meet with shaking your head - until you mourn yourself for a loved one yourself and then realize that it can have a calming and comforting effect.
Such socially recognized rituals such as going to the grave or the regular ordering of services, as is still common with members of the Catholic Church today, people in such exceptional situations give a feeling of belonging and external security to do something right. You don't have to think about it, but you enter paths that have already gone many generations before. And everything was right there, so it's right for me too.
Relief from rituals
Rituals can therefore offer a healing and relieving platform in mourning. I don't have to worry about what is right and wrong. The traditional ritual invites you to join a borrowed symbolism of people who have suffered the same or similar fate, in front of me, with me and also long after me.
In this context of sense of community you will find consolation and support. At such moments you are not alone, you feel almost all the people who have already rely on this ritual in exactly such moments of loss and deep sadness.
You simply do certain things at certain moments
What you usually do is certainly what is right. You can be sure that you don't have to accuse yourself of anything wrong - with such a socially recognized ritual, everything has been said and everything that needs to be done - and point.
Rituals are not just habits
However, not everything is a ritual just because something belongs to the habit like brushing your teeth in the evening or setting up a tea for the bathtub. We may call it ritual - but it is not because some important features of a ritual are missing.
For example, a ritual should be an interruption in the daily routine. It is not simply done by the way, but forms a turning point in the daily routine. Certain symbolic actions are expressed, which explain the ritual from the process and at the same time show the situation that the actor needs the ritual.
It also takes a coherent staging. For example, when the coffin burial is buried, it is placed in such a way that the head of the deceased is once again averted to all mourners. After that, the coffin is first carried out of the tapping hall with the feet.
Even in a somewhat more solemn clothing you go to a burial than in everyday dresses and a burial usually takes place during a normal working day. This rests all daily work. Everything is left and lying down to show the deceased that he was important for his own life and to give him the last escort.
Are rituals suitable for coping with mourning?
Such rituals known to us serve to make the transition very consciously. The deceased is no longer part of the world of living, but belongs to the world of the dead and stays in the cemetery or in another place, such as the Friedwald, while the living returns to their world after the ceremony.
All in all, a ritual can stabilize emotions and thoughts in such funeral moments. Rituals can stop when everything has come into chaos and confusion and you have no idea whether and how it could ever order again - but does not replace a dialogue with dear people or a specialist.
Create your own rituals
Rituals have a boom. No question. Whether you grew up or you only meet them in very specific situations. In certain moments of life, they simply make sense.
Especially in mourning times, however, it is also coherent to find very own rituals. With some, a grieving one goes for many years - some are unique or no longer important after a certain time.
I still remember a woman who had lost her son to an incurable illness at the age of 17. The son went to school at the time and during his illness by classmates came by in the afternoon, asked how he was doing and brought exercises and homework with him so that he was not lost too much school material.
That was a good 20 years ago and the classmates from back then have families and professions. And yet they do not miss the opportunity to visit the family on the day of their friend's death and play a few songs on the friend's beloved guitar. It is a fixed date in the year run and it is always its same favorite songs.
This is a ritual created by everyone involved and staged. Of course, it reminds of the late friend - but it has a different meaning. It combines and offers participation in a "conspiratorial" community that can only do exactly this a ritual in this line -up.
But even small rituals, such as the always fresh flower bouquet on the framed photo of the deceased or the morning little fingertip, while you are loving with your fingers past something that reminds you of the deceased, are important, bring feelings in river and at the same time give support and support.
You say: I'm with you, I am connected to you forever. You're in my heart.
Rituals are a supplement to accompanying the mourners by the environment or perhaps even through professional grief accompaniment. If it is right for the mourners, certain rituals may take part in the closest environment.
It is important to let the mourners know that you would like to give help on an important day with a ritual or just want to be there. However, it should be left to the mourners whether he accepts this support or not.
As in total in mourning processing, it is important for companions to accept what the mourners want. Because only he knows what he may endure physically or mentally. It can also be a help if you are discreet in the background as an accompaniment during a ritual and are simply there when you are needed.
Despite all the good intentions, it is important to stay in communication with the mourners and not to assume that, for example, a last year's ritual is the right one for him again this year.
Mourning changed - constant - every person. And so rituals can have existed in mourning or can adapt and also change a new life without the deceased.
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