One of my favorite days of the year

Last Thursday was one of my favorite days of the year, and it made me think💭 deeply about why and how I can cultivate more days like that. 

I took a day out of work for a Friendship Ritual. 

A friendship ritual is a regular occurring friendship date or tradition to deepen your relationship and increase your life satisfaction and joy. 

Here are the details… My dear friend Lisa and I had our 13th, 12th, or maybe 11th annual friendship ritual.  There is debate over when our friendship ritual actually began. This is now a hilarious part of the ritual-  picking a number and telling everyone who will listen about how it’s our… 12th year. The next person might be told it’s our 13th. 😂

Every year, in February, when we both have birthdays, we head to our local fancy resort spa and spend the whole day there. And when I say the whole day, I mean we (try to) get there when it opens, we are the last to leave, and then we get dinner on the property. It’s about a 10-hour adventure. Because we book a massage,💆🏼‍♀️ we can access all the amenities- like valet parking, steam, sauna, jacuzzi, outside pool🏊🏼‍♀️, snacks, water, and the spa cafe. Besides feeling like we are on a fancy vacation, we spend the whole day talking. We laugh hysterically, we go deep, and at some point, we usually cry. We hold space for each other and stand as sacred witnesses and testament to each other’s lives over the past year and now well over a decade.  It is an incredibly special day in our friendship. 

We look forward to, anticipate, savor, and prioritize doing it. 

I’m sharing this with you because rituals and traditions that prioritize connection and create deeper relationships are important to cultivate in our world right now.  They counteract the hard parts of being human. 

Friendship rituals can vary in their frequency and length of time. They could include a yearly weekend trip, a quarterly-themed dinner, a monthly trip to the farmer’s market,  a weekly ☕coffee, or even a regular walk around the block. 

Spending time supporting, holding space, and checking in with each other is an intentional choice.  To be able to ask and honestly answer the question- how are you doing, really? Connecting it to an experience you both enjoy and look forward to makes it even more meaningful. 

I know firsthand that with an already full plate and lots of life responsibilities, it’s challenging to have the capacity and bandwidth to invest in developing friendships. But the quality of our relationships improves the quality of our lives. It’s worth the effort to create friendship rituals, especially when we are busy. 

Thoughts on getting started with friendship rituals:

1. Take what you already do and add intention. Now that I’ve brought this to your attention, you can probably think of some friendship rituals you already have. Next, add even more commitment and intentionality to them. Start calling it an annual, weekly, monthly tradition and really show up present and ready to connect. 
2. Take what you’ve done before and make it a ritual. Think of a friend you’ve done something fun with and consider how you could increase the possibility of it becoming a regular tradition. Set it up and ask. 
3. Start one with a baby step. Set up a hopeful 1st time friend date, and if it goes well, talk about doing it again. 

If you’re reading this and sadness is coming up, I understand.  Maybe you’ve lost a friend, had a friend break up, or don’t have a close friend right now. I want to acknowledge and honor your heart and the grief you are feeling.  As you sit with the sadness, can you also feel the love and longing underneath? Acknowledge the desire for connection and friendship rituals. Visualize your future self with a friend, starting a new nourishing friendship ritual.

Set an intention to create it, and then go start a friendship ritual with yourself. You never know who you might meet. 

Do you have a friendship ritual? I’d love to hear about it or hear your struggle with it. Hit reply and let me know.