The Positives and Negatives of Rituals and Routines

I’ve done a bit of thinking recently on rituals and routines. The differences between the two, and the positives and negatives of both.

Because while rituals and routines—personal and collective—have immense value, they pose certain dangers as well. How can we identify our rituals and routines, recognize their value, while also watchfully ensuring that they don’t turn toxic? Limiting?

Let me explain.

Personal Rituals and Group Rituals

As individuals and as societies, we have rituals.

Writers I know start each session with a certain song, by reading a certain passage or from a certain book, or in laying out their tools on their workspace in a just-so configuration. Sporting professionals regale us with stories of wearing certain items for every game, or never cutting their hair until a certain point in the season, or even going through certain steps or motions before an activity, even if the activity doesn’t dictate the motions—such as a tennis player always adjusting a visor and looking into the sun before setting up to serve.

Societies—in which I lump communities and religious groups—have inculcated rituals that include holidays, songs, actions, symbols. Most religions have certain classic prayers or chants, for example. Most countries have national anthems and holidays that they celebrate in standardized ways. Many cultures have foods considered iconic touchstones for their members (whether their members like said foods or not).

Personal rituals soothe, calm, structure, and center—whether for writing or for a sporting event. For me, I’ve grown to really enjoy the beginning of most yoga sequences, which start with one or more of the “sun salutations” sets of poses or postures in typically a set order. Also, I start my yoga practice each morning with certain movements before the yoga class begins to get myself into the right headspace.

Group rituals serve many of the same purposes as personal rituals—with the addition of giving structure, rhythm, and meaning to a group of people. Rituals performed by groups help them feel a collective solidarity, a “doing together,” a feeling of belonging to something greater than themselves.

The Distinction between a Ritual and a Routine

A routine is a standardized set of procedures performed in sequence that combine to create an activity.

For example, maybe when you get dressed, maybe you always start by putting on your socks and working your way up, adding your shirt last. Maybe, when brushing your teeth, you address the top and bottom rows, or the inside or outsides, in a set order each time.

Routines often serve us. They streamline our days and free our cognitive processes for higher level considerations. With a routine, you reduce the mental energy required to get your everyday tasks done—freeing up energy for complex problem solving, for example.

And sometimes, rituals become routines. You always say certain words in a certain order at a certain time of the day and in a certain position. The moment you wake up, you move from the bed to the kitchen, make a pot of tea, and then move to the couch and read and sip for an hour—a calming, centering ritual to start the day. And another routine.

When a ritual becomes routine, it can move from streamlining and simplifying your life and freeing your brain for higher-level processing to limiting your possibilities and closing your horizons.

In these cases, you do something (or don’t do something) in a certain way and at a certain time because that’s “how it is for you” or “how we do it.” You stop considering whether you should or could do it differently, either because something different would be a better way to do it for you or for someone else—even if the former way suited you and everyone else just fine in the past. You cut off consideration as to whether you should even do or not do whatever it is going forward.

For example, if you “never take naps,” that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t start taking them if doing so would better serve you.

Our routines can change. Our bodies and our lives and our schedules do, after all.

If your knee-jerk reaction to the possibility of changing a ritual or routine is to refuse to even consider something different, the ritual or routine has become toxic. It limits rather than improves your life—limits rather than liberates you.

How can you identify possibly problematic routines before they become toxic? How do you stay conscious of the rituals and routines in your life, remain aware of whether and how they serve you, and notice when they no longer suit you?

The Risk of the Toxic Routine

Recently my routines experienced disruption due to visitors and appointments. Though I can’t say I didn’t grumble, that the shifts didn’t discombobulate me, I realized that a reshuffling of the order of my daily activities on an otherwise “normal” day allowed me to see the world differently. I saw possibilities for ways to do things in a different order and different fashion that might even serve me better, in fact. Maybe not every day, but on some days.

Variety is good for our brains, too.

I’d had a similar epiphany last year, when I realized that my biological rhythms seem to shift significantly with the seasons. Like a hibernating animal, I sleep more in the winter, get up later, go to bed earlier, have less interest in activity of any kind—much less when it comes to the intense or social varieties. I’d rather be under a blanket with a book. In the summer, I sleep far less than the minimum number of hours recommended, overflow with initiative and energy and excitement, and have a hard time “not doing.”

I fought these natural tendencies for years, trying to force a standard routine across all seasons—until last summer, when I realized I needed to listen to my system, tune into my biological clock, and allow seasonal changes in my habits, if something different serves me better.

Why fight with ourselves? And why limit ourselves?

I invite you to think it through right now, even: What rituals and routines do you practice, both of the private and the public nature?

Do all of them serve you?

And maybe you think you have the answer—as I did, before my recent weeks of schedule discombobulation—and maybe you’re mistaken. Maybe try shaking yourself up, even if you think what you’ve done and what you’ve been doing serve you perfectly well—just to see if they really do.