Ritual
This week's Monday Morning Check In for Connect with Enduring Love
Good morning. Take a moment to pull up a chair - or better yet - go back to bed with a good cup of something warm and comforting. Because this check-in is about the ordinary sacred.
Every ritual begins as something spontaneous. There was a moment that felt so right, and then, because it felt good, it was repeated or recreated. And then repeated again. Until one day you realize, ah, this is just what we do. This is ours.
With Lukas and me, it’s the hug. Paws on my shoulders, third eye kiss, every single reunion. It started with intention on his part, and tenderness on both of ours, and now it’s as natural as breathing. It marks the moment. It says: you were gone, and now you’re back, and that matters.
Ritual is how enduring love roots itself in the body, in time, and in the ordinary fabric of a day.
I want to ask you something this week - and I mean it for those of you loving an animal in body and for those loving an animal in spirit:
What is or was - your ritual together? The thing that belonged only to the two of you. The greeting, the position on the couch, the sound you made, the way they always knew.
Sit with it. Let your body remember it fully. If your animal is still with you in body, do it consciously this week and bring your full presence to that ordinary moment and let it be extraordinary.
If your animal is in spirit, the ritual still lives in you. It always will. That’s the thing about enduring love, it doesn’t need a body to be real.
What comes up for you this week as you reflect on rituals you and your animals created. How do you continue them still today? Or are there new ones that are arriving for you? Let me know in the comments. I’d love to play witness to love that you share with your furry, feathered and/or finned friends.
I’d be grateful if you could press the ❤️ button at the top or bottom of this email. Not only do Lukas and I love hearing from you, pressing that little ❤️, makes it easier for other people to find me. Thank you for reading and spreading the word!
With Rudy and Riley some of our little rituals were after getting my coffee we'd go down our hallway to my office - there's one of those springy doorstops along the way and we'd hit it several times - meaning let's get this day started!
In the early evening, sit on the back deck, Riley in my husband's lap and Rudy with his ball playing fetch across the deck. They would see and bark at squirrels, deer, the neighbor's dogs as needed (lol).
Another ritual was an almost daily ride to nowhere, just around our area to see what we could see - animals, people, all kinds of trucks, et all.
Writing this reminds me that part of what you miss about life with them was all the rituals and routines.