New Year Ceremony: Gathering the Wisdom of the Year
When we move into a new year without properly digesting the prior year, we miss a chance to capture the year’s lessons and release what is no longer needed.
This ceremony is perfect for performing on or around New Year’s Eve. You can do it alone, with your family, or with some cherished friends.
Intention: Gather the lessons fro the year, process and release them, and enter the new year open and ready for what magic lies ahead.
Steps:
Create a quiet and contemplative space. Make sure you have enough space around you to spread out some papers. If you have a group, form a circle, ensuring each participant has enough room to make a little circle around them within the bigger circle.
Breathe, become centered, play sacred music, and light some blessing herbs or incense to encourage a contemplative state. If you are with a group, take three long, slow, deep breaths together.
Take some index cards or paper and write a title on each that corresponds to an aspect of life you want to acknowledge. Some examples are: body, mental health, self, love/relationships/marriage, family/children, profession/job, dreams/goals/aspirations, finances, community, creativity, growth/learning, Nature, spirituality, home. You can create as many categories as you want to acknowledge. Place the index cards around you in a circle, where you are in the middle.
One by one, take each paper and reflect on that aspect of your life in the past year. On each page, answer these prompts: What notable events happened? What changed? What did you learn? What are you releasing? Write down all your thoughts and highlights, and at the bottom of each page, write down what you learned and what you are releasing. Move through each paper and aspect of your life.
When you have finished each page, breathe deeply and soak in the lessons and experiences of the year. Let them wash over you. Now, summarize the key lessons and take-aways from all the pages in your journal to serve as a summary of the year.
If you are in a group, create time for each participant to share a few highlights or lessons from the year. Finally, take each piece of paper and review it one last time, speaking the lessons out loud. You could say something like: “In my family, happened this year. This iswhat I learned. This is what I am releasing.” Then place the paper in the burning vessel, light it, and say, “I am releasingand making space for something new. I carry forth the realizations and desires of how I want this area of my life to feel in the new year.”
Once you have burned all the papers, put away your items from the year. Sit in the middle of your now-cleared circle and reflect on the space you have created around you. Breathe in the promise of the new year, knowing you have gathered the lessons of the year and released all that is no longer needed.
Celebrate with a meal, a walk, or whatever feels like self-care to you personally or to your group.
In the coming days and weeks, take your time filling then space you have created with new projects, ideas, or resolutions. Allow the space to be void and pregnant with opportunity for a while. If you feel inspired and excited by new ideas, fantastic! Write down what is coming to you, dream about bringing the new projects to life, but pause a bit before rushing onward. This is the magic of winter—the quiet, the stillness, the void. You can metaphorically plant the seeds of your new idea, but know that seeds take time to germinate and blossom. The germination period may last through January and February until spring starts to activate something you planted in the darkness. Allow yourself to become comfortable with this not-knowing and see what begins to bubble up.