Rituals and the old reptillian brain

AN ARTICLE OF JEAN HOUSTON I MUST ADD THIS COMMENT: It depends whom are the persons who are leading the ritual. It must be a spiritual person caring for spiritual progress and not persons acting as ritualistic robots. "Rituals actually key off parts of the brain. The old reptilian brain is a ritual brain, and it needs that level of repetition to go on to the next stage. I went to 29 schools before I was 12 years old, because my father was a writer for the Bob Hope Show, and we were always on the road. What kept me more or less sane is that regardless of whether I went to school one day in Bemidji, Minnesota, and the next in Biloxi, Mississippi, in school we always had the pledge to the flag, singing of the anthem, and collecting the milk money. That was ritual. Many rituals in America are rituals around sports. Eleven young heroes carry a holy egg through the womb of the goal post, while ersatz virgins dance and scream on the side. And then, of course, in baseball you have the great diamond to traverse, and when you hit the ball out of the field you can go home again. People who are bereft of ritual tend to be bereft of meaning because the more ancient parts of the brain, the parts that are accessible to ritual, are not engaged. How many billions of people have gone from childhood with no period of adolescence to full adulthood? That's one reason why you have so much suicide and so many drugs in adolescence. I think suicide and drugs are directly related to the lack of rituals of transition in our society. I have worked with many counselors in high schools to help them initiate practical but vital rituals of transition for their young clients. When these are employed, it is remarkable how the suicide rates and drug use decline." Jean Houston