How do you define a ritual. A ritual is an intimate, emotional interaction with a spiritual entity on a level that is beyond our physical mind’s potential.

It is not uncommon for a practitioner of the primal rituals to become lost in the emotional energy transfer between themselves and their spiritual counterparts, for once the portal is open, an enormous amount of emotional experiences may be passed between the two. Many have come to understand a ritual as a method of displaying one’s allegiance to a particular belief system or practice, however, that is not the understanding of a participated in ritual. The ritual is an emotional experience between the practitioner and the spiritual realm. Where the practitioner is exposed to the infinity of emotional experiences contained within the spiritual realm. Much more than rote physical acts, it is a personal, emotional connection to the center tree of existence, Yggdrasil. When one is preparing oneself to participate in a ritual, one must prepare an open, unprotected heart to receive the emotional exchange, and this is no easy task. This is not to say that many individuals cannot join in a singular ceremony to achieve many different rituals during the event, which could lead to a cascading effect to individuals receiving their individual ritual moments. By joining into a community ceremony, when we offer our vulnerability to the spiritual realm, we may experience a ritual moment. When we focus our attention on the others within this ceremony instead of our own journey, most will struggle to find those greatly anticipated moments.

Many who try to perform rituals will attempt to shield themselves from the perceived, uncontrollable emotional rush that occurs when connecting to the ancestors within the spiritual realm, in a futile attempt to maintain emotional control throughout the event. Multiple millennia of top-down training has instilled in us the fear of this perceived unknown, the fear of what lies out there beyond our control. Furthermore, to ensure the limitations of practitioner success, societal training has instilled doubt and fear into the thought process of entering into the ritual. This doubt, caused by generations upon generations of conformists, has undermined the intrinsic ability to focus the necessary energy needed for manifestation. When we decide to protect our heart, by placing our ego and/or shielding around it without a level of intimate trust, we find that we will never reach the emotional climax of the ritual.

The energy of the ritual is of pure, unadulterated, positive emotional energy. A passionate energy transmission between the practitioner and the spiritual ancestor. Whereas universal energy particles contain three different, distinct formations within the particles (imagery, intellect, and emotion), the emotional energy transfer within a ritual leaves the intellect and imagery alone and transfers pure emotional experiences of all of existence into the practitioner. This potentially overwhelming emotional flood into the processing center of the physical mind can cause a form of traumatic stress disorder within the processing center of a physical form. For the spiritual entities around us, including those bound to other forms of life here on Midgard such as the animals and fauna, are practiced in the management of these emotional transfers, however, even they with their experiences, can be overwhelmed sometimes, recoiling into a instinctual defensive position. The more I have participated in the rituals with my ancestors, the more I find myself an emotional trainwreck afterwards, as my heart and mind furiously attempt to reconcile after the massive influence of energies.

An analogy can be seen in much the same way as a physical sexual encounter, a buildup on energy, until the climax brings an emotional rush to the physical mind as it finds the climax. So too is the spiritual ritual, and should be considered in the same intimate understanding as a physical sexual encounter. The emotional rush that is received is very personal, and unique to every individual who experiences it, due the their life’s experiences, and the emotional experiential interpretations that have been stored in their memories. In much the same way as the establishment of trust between two individuals to obtain a sexual climax, we need to have a level of trust in the spiritual entities for our emotional climax within the ritual. During sex, this buildup of energy is referred to as “the passionate foreplay”, while during the ritual, it is called “ceremony”. We engage in ceremony as the emotional buildup occurs, leading to that emotional enlightenment or climax based on our emotional investment into the ceremony. This is truly the understanding of rituals that have been lost to time, and the “vanillization” of the ceremony to the general masses. I have small statutes of my gods that are placed on my alter in my home. These small statutes bring an excitement, very much like those touches during sex, whenever I make contact with them. When I dance in the dark out in the wilderness of Alaska, I feel as if I am engaging in the passionate intimacy before the rise to orgasm. That is a ritual. My ancestors have taught me that value of “feeling” our way through this physical existence. They have properly instructed me in allowing myself to fully experience this physical existence, and the magic of this biological life I inhabit for a while.

Often I am communicated with on the physical plane with questions about the rituals as in how to perform certain rituals, or how to participate in certain cultural rituals and the answer is always the same, let your heart lead the way. There are no pre-defined manners in which a ceremony must be performed to be effective. During the ceremony, the energy of a ritual will make contact with you, and the physiological life form you inhabit will have one of two reactions. That of “flight”, where the practitioner may abandon their attendance and/or completely shut down, or that of “fight” where the practitioner will absorb the emotional energy and attempt to control it. The more we open ourselves to the energy within the ritual, surrendering ourselves to it, the more the fight becomes an embrace. That embrace is what leads many to understand a more expansive understanding of the spiritual realm than ever explored prior to that moment. It can be mind-altering amazing, or terrifying, depending on which of the two models above the practitioner has adapted. It is not like sitting in a building on Sunday morning, listening to another human express their interpretation of what a deity may, or may not have meant from writings that succumbed to the whim of their authors. The ritual is altered, almost to an unrecognized state, when we attempt to limit, or control the emotional rush that accompanies the ritual.

When was the last time you left a ceremony physically, and mentally, exhausted? If you did, you experienced the ritual.