Blog
This is where we share resources, rituals, education and stories from our community to showcase how ritual and ceremony can be woven into moments and milestones across the life cycle.
Rituals to Embrace the Autumn Equinox
In this blog post, we’ll explore the significance of the Autumn Equinox and share some secular and universal rituals to help you acknowledge this beautiful time of transition.
A Celebration of Life Fit For A Matriarch
When Nan’s mother died, she was not only losing a mother but the matriarch of a four-generation family. She wanted to create a ceremony that would bring the family together to celebrate her mother’s life and legacy in a meaningful way.
A Wildfire Grief Ritual To Connect Us
Here’s a community ritual that can help acknowledge what people might be holding in the midst and aftermath of a wildfire.
How To Be A Travelling Ritualist
Kate Love, our Director of Learning, shares her top four tips when it comes to bringing rituals into a travel experience.
How Moon Rituals Can Boost Your Well-Being
Our newly launched Moon Ceremony inspires you to choose rituals that can be beneficial for your overall well-being, offering a much-needed sense of grounding and connection to the natural rhythms of the universe.
A Reclamation Ceremony After An Organ Transplant
Ali Hiebert shares the story behind her post-organ transplant ceremony, where she reclaimed her voice and her power, and how her work with Be Ceremonial inspired her to become a Transplant Doula.
3 Rituals To Quiet a Busy Mind
Kate Love, our Director of Learning and Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying) shares 3 rituals that take five minutes or less to quiet a busy mind.
The Science of Awe and the Power of Ritual
Discover the science behind the power of awe — and how you can experience more of it through rituals and ceremonies.
Why We Need Celebrants
Learn what a celebrant is, why they are needed, and how can they can help us personalize and create rituals that honour the moments and milestones we face in life and in death.
Complicated Grief and Father’s Day
William Turner Heath, a funeral director and end of life doula, shares why he’s holding grief this Father’s Day surrounding the estrangement from his father.
The Neuroscience of Ritual
What is the connection between neuroscience and ritual, and how can we draw on rituals to calm and reset our nervous system? Alix Dunham of Grit Meditation explores these questions and more.
Grief and Father’s Day ~ A Bereaved Father’s Perspective
While Father’s Day can be filled with love and celebration, for those with more complex experiences of fatherhood, the day itself can hold many complicated emotions.
How to create a Summer Solstice Ceremony
Celebrate the first day of summer on June 21 with our customizable rituals, creating a solstice ceremony that’s unique and meaningful.
The Role of the Death Doula
Learn how death doulas are transforming the end-of-life experience with compassion, companionship and ceremony.
A Celebration of Life after MAiD
Christina Andreola from New Narrative Events shares how Be Ceremonial supports her with ritual ideas when she creates celebrations of life for people around the world.
6 women-led companies disrupting the funeral industry
These 6 women-led companies are disrupting the traditional funeral industry and re-imagining how we approach death and dying.
A TFMR Birth Story
Ali Hiebert explores the connections between life and loss within the context of ritual and ceremony, following the loss of her son Paris.
Motherless Mother’s Day
Our Director of Learning and Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying) Kate Love shares her ritual inspirations for a Motherless Mother’s Day.
Mother’s Day Grief
For many people, Mother’s Day is filled with celebration and joy as they honour the mother figures in their lives. Yet, Mother’s Day can be complicated, especially for those who are grieving.
The Unspoken Grief of TFMR
How can ritual and ceremony offer a framework for grief when it comes to terminating a pregnancy for medical reasons?
The Power of Ritual in Grief
In times of loss and uncertainty, find ways to honour your grief and your gratitude with the power of ritual.
How to Host a Grief Walk
Helen Grymaloski explored the rituals offered in Be Ceremonial and created a unique and meaningful Grief Walk Ceremony for the Dryden Regional Palliative Care Committee that she volunteers with.
Direct Cremation and the Way We Think About Death
New innovations in death care, including direct cremation services, promise to change that and open up new conversations about death and the end of life
The Importance of Ritual in Organ Transplantation
We explore the role of ceremony in transplantation and how rituals can help support a more holistic approach to care before, during, and after an organ transplant.
4 Rituals to Celebrate Spring Equinox
Learn about the Spring Equinox and step into a new season with intention and gratitude with the help of these customizable rituals.
A 40th Milestone Birthday Ceremony
Nicole Sammut created a Closing the Year ceremony to say goodbye to her 30s and welcome her 40s in true ritual style.
Reclaiming your birth story
Reclaim your birth story by taking the time to pause, reflect, and be intentional with how you remember and share your birth experience. It can be very beneficial for your own mental health as you transition into parenthood.
A Liver Transplant Ceremony
With the support of Be Ceremonial, Ali Hiebert created her own liver transplant ceremony, complete with rituals that helped her heal and release what she needed to let go of before, during, and after her surgery.
The importance of a divorce ritual
This is our guide to creating a divorce ceremony that feels like you, including rituals that will help you let go of what was, find contentment with what is, and plant seeds for what you hope will be.
My Virtual Crone Ceremony
Helen Grymaloski is an End of Life Doula and Artist in Vermilion Bay, Ontario. She used Be Ceremonial to create a Virtual Crone Ceremony to acknowledge the importance of a milestone birthday and to help initiate her into this next chapter of life with friends from afar.
A Memorial Do-Over
For Nicki Elischer, co-founder of With Love Grief Gifts, it was important to honour the one year anniversary since her grandma died with a do-over memorial that was intentional and meaningful for all those who loved her.
My End of Year Ceremony
RoseAnne DesMarais created a Closing the Year Ceremony with her husband, drawing from our rituals to let go of 2022 and move into 2023 with intention, connection, and authenticity.
The Most Popular Rituals and Ceremonies in 2022
In 2022, we had thousands of ceremonies created from people in 14 countries around the world. We thought it would be fun to see what types of ceremonies and rituals were the most popular!
New Year Rituals: From resolutions to intentions
This year, we invite you to forget about resolutions and instead focus on setting positive intentions, identifying your values, and creating meaningful rituals.
Winter Solstice Rituals
Draw inspiration from these rituals to create your own Winter Solstice ceremony and acknowledge this time of transition as we move from darkness into light.
Rituals for grieving this holiday season
Grief during the holidays can be especially challenging. Take extra care of yourself and those around you this holiday season with these grief rituals and self-care invitations.
4 Rituals To Help You Close The Year
Before you set intentions for the new year, consider how you want to wrap up 2022. Draw from our curated rituals to create your own Closing the Year ceremony and acknowledge the end of the year in a way that feels right to you.
Coping with the death of a pet
Memorialize the life of your pet and weave their legacy into your daily life with meaningful rituals and intentional ceremony.
Remembering Death Anniversaries
A death anniversary ceremony is designed to help mark an anniversary, holiday or special date connected to a loved one’s death, giving us the opportunity to slow down, pause, and acknowledge what we’re holding.
Johanna’s Fairy Door
As the anniversary of the loss of our daughter approached, we both knew we wanted a way to express our grief, and do more than survive the day. But we had no idea where to begin, or even whether it was normal to want to acknowledge this moment.
Breaking the silence on death and grieving
In a culture where death is often surrounded by silence and denial, acknowledging what is both deeply personal and universal in grief helps give voice to both the joy and sorrow of our lives, connecting us with our shared humanity.
Creating a Grief Ceremony
Be Ceremonial turned me into a confident ceremonialist. The app gave me the structure, language, cadence, and confidence I needed to host this important grief & remembrance ceremony for my Mother-in-Law.
A Guide to Planning a Celebration of Life
Whether you’re planning a Celebration of Life for yourself or a loved one, we’ll go through everything you need to know about how to make this ceremony unique and meaningful, including a few samples of the hundreds of secular rituals we offer.
Rituals for Pregnancy & Infant Loss
In honour of Pregnancy & Infant Loss Awareness Month, we are sharing four rituals we hope will help grieving parents navigate through the devastating, complicated, and traumatic experience of pregnancy and infant loss.
A Ritual Story for a Celebration of Life
Be Ceremonial’s Legacy Jar ritual gave me new insight into the power of ceremony as I helped plan a Celebration of Life for a friend. This is a fantastic resource, especially those who work in the end of life space.
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by Jo-Anne Haun, Death Doula Network of BC
Cold Water Rituals: 4 Benefits of Cold Plunging
Cold plunging, also known as cold water therapy, is an ancient ritual that is widely practiced by many cultures and gaining popularity for its wide variety of wellness benefits. Learn how to turn cold plunging into a ritual that nourishes your mind, body, and soul.
5 Rituals to Mark the Fall Equinox
Here are 5 rituals that you can incorporate into your own Fall Equinox Ceremony
My Crone Ceremony
We live in a culture that has reduced the archetype of Crone to a scary and solitary figure of a woman past her usefulness. We have also lost much of our knowledge and capacity for meaningful ceremony and ritual to mark life transitions.
A Pet Loss Ceremony
Losing both of my cats just four months apart led me on a journey to find peace, acceptance, and healing through ritual and ceremony.
A Stillbirth Ceremony
We moved through the ceremony creation process slowly, giving the parents time to sit and connect with each section and choose rituals that felt meaningful and right for their baby and their living children.
Appropriation or Appreciation?
How can you ensure that the rituals and ceremonies you’re participating in aren’t causing harm or appropriating from another culture?
Holding Space For Grief
I believe we all know how to show up for people at the end of life, we just need to be reminded. I want to empower people to really trust themselves, to trust that they intuitively know how to do this.
Our Ceremony Acknowledgment
As white, cisgendered settlers, we acknowledge the complicated history and relationship people have with ritual and ceremony. We acknowledge the harm that has been caused by white colonizers and we commit to unlearning and relearning how to be in good relationship with a ceremonial practice.
