Creating Spiritual Rituals for the Highly Sensitive Child
Many of the highly sensitive parents I work with consider themselves in the “spiritual not religious” category. They may have been raised in a certain religion, but as they grew into adulthood they found new ways to focus on spirituality. Some have deliberately left their religion (I’ve worked with a number of self-proclaimed “recovering Catholics,” for example), while others have kept aspects of their religion but added on new practices such as meditating or joining a secondary religious group. At this time of year in particular, many HSP’s feel pressure from their families or friends to participate in religious activities, so it can be helpful to take the time to identify the traditions and practices that are most meaningful to us, including those that we want to create and pass down to our own children. This helps us cut through some of the holiday noise, prioritize from the inside out, and support our children by providing them with rituals in which they may find comfort and belonging.
As a medical intuitive, I tap in daily to the spiritual realm through my own meditations and in my coaching with clients. I believe that when HSP’s connect to our inner wisdom and intuition, this is a spiritual exercise. I am always excited to support highly sensitive children, teens and adults in connecting with their higher selves, as our spirits are there to offer validation, love and clear guidance, which we all need! In the Intuition Medicine® model, this is how we achieve optimum health: we attune inward, listen to our intuition, and connect with our spirit to heal our body, emotions and relationships. This is a very internal and personal spiritual practice, and yet, as social beings, our highly sensitive children also need communal rituals which support their connection to family and friends. Rituals help highly sensitive children feel they are part of something larger than themselves, they help them feel like they belong to their people and community, and they help them find meaning and purpose. They can be simple or complex, last a few minutes or a few days, with the key element being that they are repeated each year. Depending on how your highly sensitive child deals with groups of people, visual and auditory stimulation, and changes in their daily routine, it is important to provide them with rituals which foster connections to others, while also maintaining a grounded connection to themselves and their inner world.
When developing rituals for your highly sensitive child and family, it may be helpful to consider the timing, types of activities and values of your family and how these interact with your respective sensitivities. I usually start with looking at values, as these tend to inform the other aspects:
1. Consider the values you have and how you want these expressed and/or fostered in your rituals:
Some value-based examples include:
· Service: perhaps you volunteer as a family to serve meals to others, or your child provides a service in your community. I know one highly sensitive child who recently created a flyer offering low-cost gift wrapping for busy families and distributed it around her neighborhood! I thought this was a lovely way for this child to be of service in a quiet way that didn’t require extended interactions with others, which would have been overstimulating for her.
· Compassion: how might you show compassion to yourselves and others through your rituals? Do you take time to rest instead of pushing through the busy-ness? Do you create from the heart when giving gifts? How does your child express kindness? I know another highly sensitive child who decided to make vouchers for his family, giving each person “special time” with him to do whatever they wanted. In this way he showed his awareness of others’ needs and desires, and offered his support of them in a kind manner. I also know a sensitive family who takes an annual beach vacation during the holidays as a way to get away from the bustle and extended family expectations. This is a true act of self-compassion, as it honors their need for down time and self-care.
· Generosity: how and what does your family give to others? Are material gifts important? Money? What types of generosity do you want your child to focus on? I know a highly sensitive family that decides to only make their gifts for each other, whether for holidays or birthdays, rather than buying things. They are devoting regular time to sitting down and creating together and individually throughout the year in preparation for this. I know another family that focuses on generosity of spirit, welcoming others into their home and sharing food, songs and stories together.
· Environmental Care: how much do you honor the earth and environment in your practices? I know some families who plant trees, give to environmental causes, adopt sites to keep them clean, or take on activism. I also know a child who saves money all year and makes a donation to a nature conservation agency on each birthday.
· Creativity: how much are creative acts a part of the ritual? For some, that is the entire focus, for example when people gather to sing or make gifts for each other. Cooking, writing/speaking, even talent shows are a feature at many holiday gatherings! In my own family, music and singing are always part of the action! My daughter enjoys making up new songs and dancing, so we often do these spontaneously and invite guests to participate. This year, to honor my mom who passed away recently, we played her favorite music and I shared stories about her work in the arts with our guests.
Once you are clear on the values you want to express in your rituals, consider these additional topics:
2. Discern what elements of your own childhood traditions you may want to incorporate and what new traditions feel in alignment with you. For example, are there songs, texts, foods, or activities that you enjoyed as a young person which you may bring into your current rituals? Are there things you always admired other families doing, or things you wished you could have done that you may incorporate now? In my own family, I grew up celebrating Christmas as did my husband. We still get a tree and now have added a celebration of the winter solstice as well, which includes child-focused activities such as measuring our shadows, making foods that are shaped like the sun (think a bowl of guacamole surrounded by a circle of sun rays [i.e., chips] and “sunshine cupcakes” with yellow frosting), reading books about the seasons, and talking about wishes for the coming year.
3. Consider adding elements to rituals to reflect change in your family. Do you have new members of the family or have you lost members over the past year? How might you incorporate them or their memory into your traditions? I know one HSP who lost her father when she was young, and her family still plays dad’s favorite music after Christmas dinner and shares stories about him. I know another HSP who has had multiple children and is part of a blended family with multiple religions. Each year they have “initiated” the newest family members into the various traditions in their family by explaining the traditions and inviting them to participate, as well as inviting them to share what their traditions are and participating in those.
4. Decide what values/topics you want your children to learn: will you read religious texts together, talk formally about values, share stories, talk about goals? I know one family in which all of the members look for a quote that is meaningful to them, and they light a fire on New Year’s day and share the quotes and what it means, as a way to start the new year off in a thoughtful, intentional manner. Another family likes to attend church on the holidays to hear the sermon, even though they don’t go at other times during the year.
5. Talk about your and your children’s sensitivities and how these will be honored in your rituals. This could look like choosing certain activities over others because they are more manageable for certain family members. It could also look like planning downtime after chosen rituals if you know that they might be a lot for any of your sensitive family members. For example, for our family’s solstice celebration, we decided to just invite one other family, because a large party was too much for me, and even then we planned for the event to end just before naptime so that we could all have some downtime afterwards.
I hope you will get in touch with me and let me know some of the rituals you are creating in your own sensitive family! At this time of year and always, I wish you joy, connection and emotional regulation.
Carolina is an active and proud member of the Sensitive Empowerment Community! Learn more about this wonderful group through Julie Bjelland’s website at https://www.fatfreecartpro.com/ecom/gb.php?cl=342244&c=ib&aff=383793. There are numerous free and paid resources designed to support Highly Sensitive People on this site!
