University of California Irvine Personal Ritual Essay

On the first page describe a ritual that is already part of your life. This ritual can be an unconscious or semiconscious element of your life. Perhaps you’ll only become aware of it by looking deeply. It could be an activity or series of gestures that you’ve inherited, it could be something that you’ve seen or heard that has inspired you, or it can be a ritual that you yourself have created for yourself and the circumstances of your life. Please write with as much insight and detail as you can. Perhaps there is a ritual you’ve created in response to stress, panic, or a moment in your life where you needed to break through to deeper meaning, to a different kind of fulfillment, in the face of failure, or abandonment, or despair. Perhaps this ritual is crucial to your survival, your wellbeing, your self-confidence and your sense of direction. Perhaps it is a shared ritual that joins you to family or friends or to a supportive community. Perhaps this ritual is organized, regular, repetitive, cumulative, and consistent, or perhaps it is random or something that you’ve only done once in your life. Please write with as much insight and detail as you can.

On the second page please describe how you will transform, adapt, or repurpose your existing ritual to address one of the topics on your private list( aspects of yourself/life that you would like to change). Please write with as much insight and detail as you can.