The Sunday Ritual
This post is part two. For complete context, please see the first post, “Ridiculously Small Steps and the Sunday Ritual: The Practice That Put Me Back Together.”
During my self-prescribed 8-week program — the one I wrote about in my last post, where I made my daily and weekly goals so small that I could not fail — I did something else too. I called it my Sunday ritual. I didn’t know it at the time, but what I had set up for myself was pure soul healing. I never even thought about my soul back then, not the way I do now. I didn’t know it was my soul that took the hits and needed the healing. But my soul led me anyway to the very thing that would bring me back to it. On Sundays, I carved out two full hours for a slower, deeper practice to help me. Help me with what, exactly? I’m not sure I could have named it then, but I knew these things made me feel better — deeply, not the temporary feel-good kind of thing with major consequences attached.
Let me first say that you can bring any faith or spiritual beliefs you want to personalize this, but none are necessary for it to be helpful. On Sundays, I combined these things: an identified intention, physical body work, purposeful cleansing, and journaling. This is where the emotional and spiritual side of the work happens — however the body part is integral, so don’t leave it out. For me, it was first exercise that got my heart pumping, then a form of restorative yoga, then what I call a spiritual bath, then I journaled. Stick with me here, because the details matter. You can make this yours, but understand why this worked so you can personalize it without losing the core of what works and why.
- Intention. State what your intention for this time is. Write it down and say it out loud. It might be to get an answer to a question, to figure out what choice to make, to clear ancestral trauma, or simply to allow what’s best for you to surface, or whatever you want to focus on. This is personal to you, and it’s also the place to bring in your own spiritual beliefs — pray, ask the angels for help, meditate, whatever feels right. You can also use this moment to state out loud that demons, derms, aliens, ghosts, specters, darkness, or anything else that would attempt to sabotage or distract you — has no place with you or in this process, during this time. It doesn’t have to take long. Having an intention and speaking it out loud is exercising your free will. It’s an act of taking your power back.
- Exercise. This should match where you are. It can mean you walk across the room, run five miles, or anything in between. Remember, it’s never about doing anything that feels unattainable — and in particular, on Sundays it’s about getting your heart pumping and your lungs breathing, enough to help you feel physically alive. Believe me, my original goals were embarrassingly small, but feeling alive in your body is a healing, spiritual connection.
- Body work. What I do is a type of yoga called Svaroopa. The idea behind this type of yoga is SUPPORT = RELEASE. In other words, when your body feels safe and supported, it will naturally release tightness and holding — and that spills over to emotional holding as well. It uses props like blankets and pillows so you feel so supported that you don’t have to effort to release and stretch; it just naturally happens as you relax into the support. It focuses on releasing the muscles around the spine, which in my experience would open up physical pathways to the brain, and I’d feel less brain-fogged and happier. It can be done in bed, and there are other ways to create this feeling — an Alexander Technique “lay down” is similar, or the Resting the Nerves meditation from Medical Medium could be used. Or simply take the idea of support equals release and get your body situated in any way that feels very supported, imagining yourself releasing the holding in your body. Again, you start where you are — if you already have a practice that fits this, use that. Take 15, 20 minutes, or longer, to do this. Don’t rush through this part, because that’s counter to the feeling of safety and release.
- Spiritual bath. This is an actual bath. Make it special in any way you want, and then as you bathe, do it intentionally from head to toe, taking time to imagine that you’re literally washing away anything you don’t need anymore. You can of course shower, or sponge bath, or if these are difficult, just imagine yourself doing this. Take as long as you like — probably longer than you’re used to, because rushing is not supportive of release. We are always bathing and showering in a hurry to get on to the next thing. Let this one go slow, which can in itself be uncomfortable if you’re used to rushing through all of life’s tasks. This is more than a physical bath, and with space, your soul will understand the opportunity your will is affording it.
- Journaling. Again, don’t put obstacles in your way. I was not a person who journaled — I actually had an aversion to it. If you are a journaler, this is not the time to think about making it pretty or thinking about what to write. This isn’t for you to necessarily read later, and not for anyone else’s eyes. You are letting things come out of your soul, through your arm and hand, onto the paper. You may not know what’s going to get written down until it lands. You can scribble or sketch — just keep in mind that you are in no way, shape, or form editing. You’re just getting it out. You can do anything you want with it later, but I don’t recommend obsessively reading and analyzing it later. Resist that urge — it’s a process of clearing, and you don’t want to take back on what you’ve cleared. It’s okay if this feels emotional. Let the emotions be expressed, then let them go too.
I didn’t know this back then, but I somehow managed to do it anyway: how you fuel yourself before, during, and after this time matters. It’s part of giving your nervous system what it needs to process the emotions that will come through. If you want to add a Medical Medium adrenal snack, brain shots, celery juice, lemon balm tea or tincture, B12, or a big bowl of steamed potatoes ready for you when you’re done — or anything else — please do.
When you’re done, move on with your day, and give yourself time for your body, heart, spirit, and soul to process quietly in the background. They know what to do. If a nap is called for, take it. Sometimes the shift happens right away. Some of it is more subtle and cumulative over time. Doing this once is great, but when you carve out this time for yourself weekly, and show up weekly, it builds trust that makes it exceptionally more powerful. I often find that when I’ve built this kind of pathway for myself, I’m amazed at the seemingly serendipitous things that happen to support the process.
I’ve been very specific about how and why I did this, and I know your soul will let you know how to make it yours. The healing is in the doing, not in doing it perfectly.
