Rituals

For the transitions in life

Season: Spring
Element: Wood
Moon: New
Sense: Sight (Eyes)
External Work: Office / Workout Areas
Internal Work: Anger (Imbalance) & Patience (Balance)

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I will also be hosting a Substack Live on Thursday, June 11, 2026, from 1:00pm - 1:30pm EST for a Qi Gong Practice. The 30 minute practice will consist of a relaxing yet energizing set of movements focused on transitions. I will also be putting the video up for FREE that evening for those of you who are not able to make it in the afternoon. The video will go into the paid feed the following day, so don’t miss out by becoming a paid subscriber:

Finally, I will be hosting a feng shui workshop at The Leslie Studio, 4290 Cascade Rd. SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49546, on Saturday, June 20, 2026 from 10am - 11:30am. The workshop will feature the five elements and tips and tricks on how to apply them in your space and life. We will also be celebrating the summer solstice! Reserve a spot by contacting The Leslie Studio via phone at 616-942-9322 or their website.

Today is the last quarter moon in the feng shui element of wood and the season of spring here in the Northern Hemisphere. And looking forward into the week, the Gemini New Moon will occur of Sunday, June 14th. Gemini is a time of curiosity and change, which is perfect for this year of transformation. It is also a time for playfulness and fun, which again is perfect for the start of summer. School ended last week for us here in West Michigan and the final days were a whirlwind of events and wrap ups. Today feels officially like summer for my husband and daughter, but we still have two more weeks until the summer solstice on June 21, 2026. The ending of school and the change from spring to summer is really feeling like a giant transition to me this year. Transitions for many of us can be difficult because our brains are wired for predictability and habit and I have to say I am feeling it! So what can we do to help with the transitions and changes in our lives?

Photo by Ryan Liu on Unsplash

One thing that can really help with big life shifts is ritual. We are familiar with many rituals that have become mainstays in society — I’m talk about birthdays, weddings, baby showers, graduations, anniversaries, retirements, and funerals — but there are so many transitions in life where rituals are not common. I’ve been thinking how wonderful it would be to have rituals for things like puberty, infertility, cancer, moving, divorce, empty nesting, new job, perimenopause, menopause, or any type of loss. We seem to ritualize the events that are deemed positive in society, but not so much the ones that may be a little more messy. How beautiful would it be to share the feelings of not only the good but also the bad?

Recently, I listened to Elise Loehnen’s Pulling the Thread Podcast with Bruce Feiler entitled Designing Your Own Ritual. In it, Elise and Bruce discuss his new book, A Time To Gather, and talk through the five steps to design a ritual:

1. Create a Boundary - Welcome with joy by drawing a physical or emotional line separating sacred space from ordinary life.

2. Define the Tension - Clearly define the life transition you are gathering to address by acknowledging what is ending, beginning, or changing.

3. Compromise - Build in space for all participants to have a voice. Let guests contribute a reading, song, or physical token. Design a mechanism to navigate the conflict that arises through the ritual.

4. Empathy - Share in the experience together by supporting the journey of all ritual participants. Rituals are for “doing,” not just talking.

5. Share a Moment of Hope - End the gathering on an uplifting note to look toward the future. Give participants a tangible reminder or an actionable path forward to take with them.

In the podcast, Bruce also shares the concept of an Honor Walk which is a ritual created by Missy Holliday, organ operations director at LifeCenter in Cincinnati, in December 2017. An Honor Walk is a moving hospital ritual where doctors, nurses, staff, family, and friends line the hallways in silent tribute as a patient is transported from their room to the operating room for organ donation. It serves as a hero's sendoff to honor the patient's final, lifesaving gift. The silent procession allows for the family to walk alongside the hospital bed, providing them with emotional support from the caregivers as well as a chance for everyone to say goodbye. Hospitals also have the ritual of ringing a bell in the oncology department when cancer patients celebrate the successful completion of a major milestone in their treatment, such as their final chemotherapy or radiation session. These are beautiful shared acts that are unnecessary but that make people feel at home, which is how Bruce Feiler defines a ritual.

In Bruce’s view, “top down pre-scripted hierarchical, often patriarchal, life rituals that were forced on people are dying and in many cases dead. They are being replaced by bottom up, bespoke, individually created occasions to get together that were not previously honored.” This is our time to design rituals for transitions that we are going through when we are going through them. It is our time to be creative and bring fun playfulness or somber reflection to the hard times we are going through. Rituals allow us to process change together, to create community through transitions, and to know that we do not need to carry this all alone:

Rest Reading
Check out all of the rest reading recommendations in Resources on my Substack page.

Rest Recipe
I still have some basil left over from Green Wagon Farm so I decide to see if I could make a new smoothie to incorporate the flavor. I decided a riff on Flora’s Elder-Power Smoothie would a good start. Vitamin C is beneficial during these warmer months because its antioxidant properties are particularly helpful in protecting against sun damage and supporting skin health during summer activities. So here is my recipe for a Blackberry Basil Smoothie:

4 basil leaves
1 cup blackberries
1 banana
1 cup milk or nut milk*
1 cup water
2 tablespoons flax oil
3 grams acerola powder
5 grams elderberry crystals

Add all of the ingredients to a blender and blend until smooth.

*I use Elmhurst milked walnuts for my nut milk. Per Healthline’s article The 9 Best Foods and Drinks to Have Before Bed, “Some researchers claim that eating walnuts improves sleep quality, as they’re one of the best food sources of melatonin. The fatty acid makeup of walnuts may also contribute to better sleep, according to a study on mice.”

Rest Ritual
As we head towards summer solstice, consider designing a ritual for the transition from spring to summer and wood to fire. Here is one that I am working on for a Bonfire Ritual:

1. Create a Boundary - In my driveway, put out the Solo stove and surround with a circle of chairs. On each chair, add a stick, plate with marshmallow, bitter chocolate square, and two graham crackers, two pieces of paper, and a pen. Have the fire going when people arrive and ask participants to pick a chair.

2. Define the Tension - Ask each person think about what they are looking forward to and what they are not looking forward to in this transition of spring to summer. On one piece of paper write the “looking forward to” answer and on the other write the “not looking forward to” answer.

3. Compromise - Ask each person to consider which piece of paper they would like share with the circle. Do they want to share the bitter or the sweet?

4. Empathy - Going around, have each person share this piece of paper and then put it onto their stick. The paper can be folded and cut slightly with scissors to help ease the piece onto the stick. Once everyone has shared, add a marshmallow and use the stick to roast both. The paper should disintegrate and the marshmallow should toast.

5. Share a Moment of Hope - End the gathering with eating the marshmallow with the chocolate and graham crackers. Let the participants know that whatever was written on the paper that burned away is now in flow so there is no need to ruminate over it. Have the participants revisit the piece of paper they still have and consider if this too can be brought into flow. The s’more configuration with the sweet marshmallow and bitter chocolate is emblematic of the bittersweet nature of flow — there will be ups and downs / the good and the bad, but we need both to feel each other. End with each participant receiving a book of matches to use if they want to practice this ritual at home with their remaining paper.

Photo by Mike Erskine on Unsplash

Please pass this Substack onto a friend or family member to broaden this amazing CRC community and to give the gift of rest to those who need it. As Tricia Hersey writes in her aptly named book, Rest is Resistance.

If you would like to hold a Rest Curation in your local community, please email me at abby@cascadefengshui.com for the script and music information. Or email me if you would like to organize a private pop-up Rest Curation for friends, family, or colleagues.

And if you are interested in my feng shui and interior design services, please see my website at www.cascadefengshui.com and contact me at abby@cascadefengshui.com.