Drawing Together #12: Rituals

In case you were unable to join us for our 12th Drawing Together event, here is a recap of the exercises we did together.

Our host was MK Czerwiec, a GMIC board member, nurse, and cartoonist. She is a co-author of the Graphic Medicine Manifesto,  the creator of Taking Turns: Stories from HIV/AIDS Care Unit 371, and editor of the forthcoming Menopause: A Comic Treatment.

---

Our warm up exercise came courtesy of Marek Bennett’s Comics Camp (highly recommend!)

Set a time for  five minutes, put on some music that you love, and draw as many smiling faces as you can.

Vary the size and shape of the heads, the eyes, noses, ears, eyebrows, the other features. Try to make as many faces smiling back at you as you can in five minutes.

Enjoy meeting all these faces who are now regarding you with happiness.

---

For our main exercise this week, we focused on RITUALS.

What are rituals? “An act or series of acts regularly repeated in a set, precise manner.” – Merriam Webster

Why do humans perform rituals?

• • • to mark transitions
    • to move us forward
    • to make and invoke meaning
    • to set intentions
    • to alleviate anxiety
    • to boost confidence
    • to create community
    • for self care
    • to care for others
    • to evoke the beauty in us and one another
    • to create feelings of safety
    • to bring comfort
    • to provide structure
    • to pass on tradition
    • to teach and to learn
    • to remind us – repeatedly – what is important

What are some of the elements of ritual?

• • • objects with special meaning
    • music, sounds
    • intentional movements, actions, behaviors
    • deep breathing
    • special aromas or scents
    • special words, language, sacred texts
    • belief systems, socially formalized or very personal
    • feelings of respect
    • special places
    • special people or sacred alone-ness

Rituals can be formal or casual. They can be performed daily, annually, as necessity arises, or as life events require them.

A ritual can be the way you make a cup of coffee in the morning, how you set up your tools to make your art. It can be how you mark a meal time, sit down to write, welcome a child into the world, or mourn a loss.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, we have lost and/or adapted many of our rituals: religious gatherings, graduations, funerals, births, marriages, birthdays, holidays, commutes to work, marking seasonal changes, many more.

And many of us have gained new rituals. We began new daily or weekly practices, such as this one, or perhaps an online exercise class, or a new hobby, or a new approach to your work, or how you make your art, or taking regular walks, changes around our mealtimes, Zoom gatherings with friends or family. applauding health care workers at a set time each day, playing music on the hospital overhead when a Covid-19 patient is discharged, music played from balconies,
even perhaps new rituals associated with wearing masks, social distancing, protesting, supporting, grieving, responding.

How has ritual found it’s way into your Covid-19 pandemic response life? Are there special things you do now that have become newly important to you, that serve the roles of rituals, as described?

Let’s take three minutes and make a list of five things that come to mind for you when you think about the terms ‘ritual’ and ‘Covid-19’. Just jot down a few notes about what comes to mind, you don’t even need full sentences, phrases are fine.

From that list, choose one of those five that seems most interesting to you – one that you’d like to explore a bit.

Now reconsider the elements of ritual. This is not an exhaustive list, but take some notes with relation to these aspects about the ritual you will focus on now. Again, phrases okay, don’t need full sentences. This is a travelogue of your thoughts as you consider that ritual, notes you will use in a few moments.

What are some of the elements of your ritual?

• • • objects with special meaning
    • music, sounds
    • intentional movements, actions, behaviors
    • deep breathing
    • special aromas or scents
    • special words, language, sacred texts
    • belief systems, socially formalized or very personal
    • feelings of respect
    • special places
    • special people or sacred alone-ness

Finally, let’s draw for 15 minutes about that ritual.

You could draw a multi panel comic or single drawing. Try to bring in the elements of the ritual that are essential to you, consult your notes. Consider using this drawing or comic to explain this ritual to your best friend. Or whatever you are moved to create.

If you would like to share your work on social media use the #DrawingTogetherGM so we can all appreciate it.

---

CLOSING:

This gathering has become an important ritual for many of us. We have heard this from you and we share that feeling.

We initially developed this activity to help combat the social isolation of lockdown, and for us to take this time together for all of the reasons we do ritual: to mark transition, move us forward, make and invoke meaning, set intention, to alleviate anxiety, create community, self care, caring for others, honoring beauty in us and one another, for safety, comfort, structure, creating tradition, teaching, learning, reminding us – repeatedly – what is important.

As we move forward, we want to respect the change of season with summer unfolding, as well as opening up time for families, our other possible Sunday rituals. At the same time we also want to continue our engagements with one another here. So next week we will meet again, and then moving forward we will move these gatherings to monthly. Next week we will do a poll on this event and via social media to help decide the best timing for our monthly gathering.