Establishing Daily Personal Spiritual Practices

In my time as an Archdruid and now Grand Archdruid in the Ancient Order of Druids in America (AODA), a set of questions I see often are questions surrounding the establishment of daily ritual or daily practice question. These are questions like: how do I figure out how to do something every day and actually stick to doing it?  How do I build daily rituals into my life? What are some daily rituals people do?  Why would I want to do daily practices?  Since these questions are so common, today’s post explores the idea of daily rituals and practices for druids:  I’ll share how to begin and some considerations and also share a number of examples of daily or regular practices that you can do to deepen our druid path.

The idea of a daily ritual is, of course, that you do something at the relatively same time every day and it becomes part of your daily routine.  We have tons of daily rituals that aren’t necessarily sacred, from feeding pets to sitting down for a meal to brushing teeth.  We may also have unconscious rituals, like laying in bed in the morning and reading a book or mindlessly looking at social media every time we pick up our phone.  Some of these rituals (brushing teeth) are obviously good for us while some (social media at the beginning and end of the day) may actually harm our mental health.

Daily rituals and practices within the context of spirituality can help us achieve some of our spiritual goals: attune with nature, offer us healing, improve our mental health, offer us grounding, and help us deepen our practice and our connection to core work.  Daily rituals that are established may help us when we have times of challenge or instability (hello, pandemic!) and offer support.  Daily rituals can also help us deepen our spiritual practices–you might think of daily rituals similar to how a musician practices scales.  The more we do our practices, the deeper we connect with them and the more they build both meaning and power over time.  One of the best things you can do is to find a way to engage in regular practices and ritual work, to provide some consistency and forward momentum to what you are doing.

Setting Ritual Goals and Examining Life Circumstances

What really helped me in establishing a daily ritual was to give the practice some serious thought and consideration before I began. I didn’t want to do daily rituals because someone else told me to do so.  I wanted to do daily rituals because I wanted them to enrich my life and offer grounding and connection.  Even if the daily rituals were recommended by a druid order or study program, I wanted to find the motivation intrinsically and be motivated not because I should do them but because I wanted to do them and saw a benefit.  These are the kinds of questions that you might find helpful in finding your own intrinsic motivation and discovering what you hope to gain from such a practice:

1. What do you want to accomplish with a daily ritual?  Articulating your goals will likely help you decide what practices might be appropriate.  Here are a few ideas for you:

• Prayer or devotion
• Connecting with nature
• Improving mental health or clarity
• Deepening spiritual practice
• Staring the day in a positive / sacred way
• Ending he day in a positive / sacred way
• Preparing for sacred living
• Preparing for sacred dreaming
• Offering a daily commitment to your practice
• Taking a quiet moment in an otherwise busy day
• Simply feeling good

Come up with your own list of things you’d like to accomplish and go from there!

2. Does your tradition or order already offer a daily ritual or practice?  If so, this is a great place to start. Most traditions offer some kind of daily practice–a mediation, prayer, or energy working.  This connects you both to the tradition you are practicing and allows you to focus your practice in ways that are useful to continue to learn that tradition.

For example, in AODA we offer two daily practices and a weekly practice:  we encourage regular time in nature (at least 15 minutes each week) and we ask that all members perform a daily Sphere of Protection and also engage in meditation.  These three practices are at the heart of what we do and help strengthen one’s spiritual journey in AODA druidry, give connection to the order, and offer considerable spiritual benefit.  I always do these practices and have a few others I’ve added in over the years :).

3. How much time do you want to spend?  Do you have 5 minutes, 15 minutes or 30 minutes a day to spend?  My suggestion here is to have a basic practice that you can do regardless of whether you are in your normal routine, are traveling, have house guests, or whatever else it may be.  You can also have an extended practice one or two days a week.

Remember that you are in this for the long haul.  It is better to start small with something you can sustain rather than something that you will never be able to sustain long-term.  If you start small and have good results, you can always add more over time and feel good about your practice.  If you start big and can’t maintain what you are doing daily, it might make you feel bad and be a detriment to your spiritual growth.  Thus, small, slow steps are best.

For example, when I was doing a lot of work travel and often staying with others in various hotels, I tried a longer daily practice and found it difficult to maintain with the travel–and then it was harder to pick back up when I came home and my practices would fall off before I had to jump-start them again.  Since this happened with unerring frequency, I decided that I wanted a small daily practice that could be done in the bathroom at a hotel or while taking a walk in a city.  Thus, I kept it pretty basic (SOP, walking meditation, and some observation of nature), knowing that I could always do that practice regardless of what was happening in my day.  And I built in regular once-a-week larger practices that I could do when I had more time or was home.

4. What time of day is best for you?  Another factor here is to find a way to build your daily ritual into your routine at a time of day that works best.  For example, if you are exhausted at the end of the day and are non-functional for the last hour or so before bed, it’s probably not a good idea to try to meditate for 15 min because you’ll fall asleep (not that I have ANY experience with that, haha!).  A better option would be to build a daily meditation practice into your lunch break and/or morning routine.  If you are a busy mom and the only time you have is early mornings or when you take a bath, consider how you can build that in. You might have to test out a few things to see what works for you.

I will also note that some people are working in different traditions at the same time, and those traditions are not always energetically compatible (or it is too much to do it all together at once), so it may be necessary to split the practices.  If this is the case for you, you can do one set of practices in the morning and another in the evening.  For example, I also practice the Celtic Golden Dawn tradition, and I prefer to do those practices in the evening to compliment my AODA and druid practices in the morning.

5. Do you have existing routines that you could extend or daily practices that could be altered? Another way to think about building in daily spiritual practice is considering what you already do that is required and/or habituated and that you could extend into a daily spiritual practice.

For example, I am responsible for our morning animal/homesteading chores, which usually take about 30 minutes each day.  I have to do these chores rain or shine, snow or sun, because our animals need let out of their coops, fed, watered and tended.  This gives me a great opportunity to be outside and to take an additional 15 minutes a day to do my Sphere of Protection, drink a cup of tea, and do some light nature observation or meditation or a short walk on the land (pending weather).  This is what works for me now–what worked for me before I had such responsibilities was different, and thus, you should always recognize that if your routine changes, you may have to adapt to a new routine.

Testing and Habituation

So you’ve done the above and have developed a good plan for your daily ritual or practice–great!  The next thing you want to do is test it out.  Why?  Because what you have may not actually be workable, or only partially workable.  One of the things I see new druids do is use their enthusiasm and excitement to build in a ton of practices that they can’t necessarily sustain once that initial enthusiasm is over.  It is better to have a simple practice, 5 or 10 minutes a day, that you can commit to rather than an elaborate practice you can only manage to do once in a while. Thus, spending some time testing the practices to get the right timing, the right time, and the set of practices that work for your best is important.

I suggest trying out the practices for a few weeks or one lunar cycle.  Give yourself time to really dig into them and if they haven’t worked for you, try another set of practices until you find what does.  Developing daily work takes time and its important to give yourself time and be patient.

Once you are happy with the practice, then you want to work to habituate that practice. Habits are things we form that become something we simply do (often without thinking) and we almost never miss.  For most of us, brushing our teeth before bed is a good example of this kind of habit.  You don’t really think about it most times, you just go into the bathroom and do it.  Ideally, you can get to that level of habituation with your own daily practices–they are just something you always do and benefit you.  But that’s not where many of us start, and it takes a while to get into that rhythm for two reasons: first, habits take time to form (the 21 days is actually a myth, research shows that it can take anywhere from 15 – 200+ days to form a lasting habit depending on what it is and your own circumstances).

Another thing to realize here is that a major change in life circumstances may lead to a necessary change in your daily practices–and that’s totally ok.  A new home, new job, move somewhere new, new baby or family member, or any number of other things may require you to re-evaluate what you do, when you do it, and how long you do it for.  And that’s totally ok.  Always remember that these spiritual practices are for you.

Finally, be prepared to be flexible.  I like to take a morning walk on our land, but I might shift to a cup of tea on the porch if we are having a downpour.  Recognize that small variations in your daily ritual (depending on weather, if you are sick, etc) are also ok.  This practice is for you and only you.

Examples of Daily Rituals and Practices

There are so many good rituals that you can do.  I’m going to offer a few options for you to spark your own ideas.  Remember that daily rituals don’t have to be formal–they can be simply time spent in nature, a quiet cup of tea with the moon, anything that helps you with your own spiritual practice.

Daily Prayers and Altar Work.  Daily prayers and altar work are probably what most people think of when they think of daily ritual work. Your altar can be a center of your spiritual practice and tending it each day and spending time there can provide you a focus for everything else you do.  Consider any of the following:

• Leaving a daily offering for spirit/deity/guides/etc.  I like to offer spring water as I can then offer it to a plant the next day (double offering for the win!)
• Burning incense or lighting candles for a period of time
• Doing daily divination or tarot card draw
• Offering prayers or speaking affirmations (e.g. I always say the Druid’s Prayer and the Druid’s Prayer for peace in addition to a prayer that I wrote that reminds me and affirms my path as a land healer and being in service to the living earth)
• Doing short meditations
• Daily ritual work, like the Sphere of Protection, mentioned above.

Altar work will often evolve as you do in your spiritual journey or may change as circumstances require.

Greeting the Sun.  Whether you wake up at dawn or later in the day, it is a useful practice to greet and honor the sun (similar to the idea in Yoga of the Sun Salutation, many cultures have done this work in honor of the sun, the giver of light and warmth).  This greeting takes no more than a minute but is a powerful way of connecting you with the giver of life for our beautiful planet.  I like to do a simple greeting.  I face the east and put my arms in the air and simply feel the sun’s rays on me.  I observe the sun’s rays hitting the leaves and landscape. If its an overcast day, I still honor the sun and clouds/rains.  I raise my hands to the clouds facing east and thank the spirits for the rains.  After raising my hands, I bow my head and cross my arms in honor, and chant an “Awen” (Ah-oh-en) for inspiration for the day.

Communing with the Moon. The phases of the moon present another opportunity for daily ritual.  You can get or make a moon calendar (my moon calendar is wood burned and in the PA Dutch tradition).  While you can’t always see moonrise depending on the weather and time the moon rises, you can take an opportunity to acknowledge the moon.

For this, what I do is brew a cup of lunar tea (using lunar herbs like violet, mugwort, ginger, passionflower, clary sage, or hibiscus) and take my steaming cup of tea outside (unless it is really frigid, and then I’ll sit in a window instead).  I hold my cup of tea so that I can see the reflection of the moon in the tea, and wait a few minutes, feeling the connection between me, the moon.  Then I drink the tea, saving a bit in the bottom to pour on the earth as an offering.

Tree energy exchange. Go to an accessible larger tree (accessible as in you can easily get there). Place your back to the tree and allow the energy of the tree to flow through you (particularly if you are feeling tired or depleted). If you have an excess of nervous energy, place your front to the tree and allow it to subside.  (You can tie this to my “tree for a year” challenge from earlier this year!)

Mindful Eating and Honoring the Harvest. I like to build this daily ritual in for at least one meal to help connect me to the living earth and have gratitude for what the land provides.  Choose a meal where you can be alone or eat in silence (which may not be possible every day!)  Ideally, take this to a nice place where you can look out upon the land or be in the sun.  Place your hands over the meal and express your gratitude in your own words (I like to express gratitude to the land, to the farmers who grew it, and to anyone who prepared, packaged, or shipped it. If you grew it, even better!)  Now, really be present with this meal and dedicate yourself to simply being present and enjoying it.  Chew each bite and savor the taste.  Engage with your senses.  When you are finished, offer gratitude.

Observation and a Druid’s Anchor Spot.  Another really great way to honor the changing of the seasons and to connect with nature is the practice of the Druid’s Anchor spot. I think this is one of the most powerful ways of attuning deeply with a local place.   More on the Druid’s Anchor Spot can be found in this post.

Daily Divination. Using an oracle, ogham, or tarot deck can offer you insight into your day, offer themes for meditation, and be an excellent way to really learn a divination system.  Doing a simple one-card or one stave daily draw is a nice way to start or end a day and can be combined with many other practices.

Candle Meditation. One of my favorite daily meditations is a simple candle meditation.  This meditation not only encourages calm and rest, but it also strengthens focus and cultivates inner vision (which is necessary for most advanced journey or shamanic work).  I like to do a candle meditation before I go to bed, sometimes burning some mugwort to encourage vivid dreaming.   A dark room is best for this practice.  Light a candle and place it before you.  Spent time staring at the candle, affixing how it looks firmly in your mind.  As you do this, quiet your breath and settle into a comfortable position.  After you are calm, close your eyes and keep the flame burning in your inner eye.  Breathe and focus on the flame.  If you lose your focus, simply open your eyes, affix the candle flame in your inner eye, and close them again.  Even five minutes of this practice a day will yield results.

In conclusion, I also want to remind you that in addition to daily work, you might have seasonal work that varies by the season–you can read all about that here.

Also, dear readers, I hope that you will share additional ideas for how to build daily rituals into your spiritual practice!