On Christmas Eve, our church sanctuary is lit and warmed with over a hundred flickering candles, in eight foot tall iron candelabras, secured on the ends of the pews. And the people, for a time, also hold little individual candles.

The service is conducted with the warm, golden, dancing light of candles over everything, and everyone.

But wouldn’t our overhead LED lights that we normally use in the sanctuary be more efficient on Christmas Eve (a night-time service, after all) than candles?

Brighter? Easier for reading the hymn book?

Absolutely.

Would the LED lights be better than lighting the sanctuary with candles?

Absolutely not.

For the Christmas Eve service, candles are BETTER.

Effective versus Efficient

A large room flickering with the light and warmth thrown off by candles, puts you into a certain mindset that no electric lighting can put you in. Using candles instead of overhead lights transforms the experience.

Candles are neither the most efficient nor the most practical way to light this large room.

What they are, is effective. Candles are ceremonial objects that make this service feel special.

Ceremonial objects transform your experience. This is why old churches use candles and incense (effective) rather than fluorescent lights and Febreze (efficient).

You, as an individual, can also make use of ceremonial objects to influence your mindset and transform your own experience.

Choosing and using a ceremonial object can help you do hard things that are important to you.

When Ordinary Objects Become Ceremonial Objects

Go into any sacred space, and you will see ordinary objects which have been crafted to be more beautiful, more luxurious, than strictly necessary. Plastic and paper cups hold liquid just as well as a ceramic goblet. But we signal that something special is happening when we use an artisan-made goblet instead of a plastic cup.

In old church sanctuaries, we do not use plastic, paper or plexiglass for lights, plates, goblets, seating, books, windows, and tablecloths. We use candles; metals; ceramics; carved wood; stone; stained glass; embossed and gilded books; embroidered fabrics.

Every bit of this signals nonverbalized meaning to people’s bodily senses; which then shapes their mindsets.

Every object in an old church sanctuary communicates the intent to be a place that is separate from home, from work, from Walmart.

Furnishing a sanctuary with ceremonial objects instead of purely functional ones, is part of what turns a big empty room into a place where people hope to encounter the Divine.

Decorating a room, perhaps because this pursuit is closely associated with women, has often been dismissed as frivolous. But your surroundings and the materials you handle and touch, impact your thoughts and feelings powerfully.

Architects, designers, decorators, and the clergy of liturgical churches know this power very well: and we use it.

Individuals can tap into these mind-shifting powers of design by using ceremonial objects, as well.

Change Your Behavior with a Ceremonial Object

If you want to change your behavior, find a ceremonial object you can make use of, in your process. Use something connected with the change you want to make, that is much more beautiful, more luxurious, than it strictly needs to be.

So what is a change you want to make? Maybe you want to do less of something.

Maybe you’re observing Drynuary* and want to cut back on alcohol. Maybe you habitually have had something alcoholic to drink around dinner time and don’t want to feel dependent.

Consider dedicating a ceremonial glass for yourself, that you reserve for drinking something non-alcoholic, around dinner time. This does not have to be expensive: Thrift shops and vintage and antique mall shelves are brimming with crystal and silver and ceramic glassware.

Or — maybe you want to do more of something.

Maybe you want to write more, or journal more, or get serious about organizing yourself with a good planner.

If you are looking for an excuse to get the handmade leather planner cover, the imported thread-bound lies-flat notebook, the buttery-smooth index cards with the bespoke box and stand, a pen or pencil you might have to budget for… this post is an argument for why this might actually help you write more, and plan better.

Draw Yourself in, By Delighting Your Senses

We don’t just think with our minds. We think through our bodies.

You’re not just a brain. Your brain is part of your body; your mind is entwined and knotted into the physical world. Your body takes in all kinds of nonverbal sensory information that feeds and focuses — or scatters — your thinking.

This is why taking your body out for a nice walk, will usually clear your mind.

And this is why aesthetics and design matter so much. How a room is furnished and decorated can literally change your thinking. The objects you use, can literally change your experience.

Our rational capacity — the home of all our good intentions — is the most evolutionarily recent. But the older functions of our body and brain — the emotions, the senses, our faster-than-thought automated reactions — can grab the keys, slam out the door, rev up the car, and peel out of the driveway, while the rational mind is still fumbling for its flashlight and bunny slippers, wondering what the hell just happened.

Strengthen your good intentions with material objects that have some ceremonial heft to them, that bypass the rational mind and speak directly to your body and to your emotions.

Find objects that attract your senses, and draw you toward using them.

Your Ceremonial Objects Signal to Your Body That Your Intention is Serious

Treat your body as if it were sacred; because it is. If you want to drink less or eat more health-giving foods, use ceremonial vessels. Put the mocktail (or the iced tea, or the water) into a sumptuous glass that you use only for this: a glass that delights your eye and hand when you use it. And if it’s crystal, it might delight your ear, as well. I love hearing the ring of a good crystal glass.

Maybe you intend to snack on carrot sticks more often than Doritos. Lay the carrot sticks on a beautifully broken, beautifully repaired kintsugi plate.

Maybe you intend to write more, or plan your time better.

Treat your thoughts and ideas and plans as if they are sacred; because they are.

The way we show to our own minds that something is important, is by using ceremonial objects when we engage with it.

Pour your thoughts into a resplendent notebook that is hard for you to stop touching, using a pen or pencil that, when you make marks on the page with it, feels to your hand like a key clicking smoothly into a sensory lock.

It is a sacred act to care for your body, which allows you to be alive in this world. Care for your body by using objects that spark your senses.

It is a sacred act to record your thoughts and develop them to deepen your own life; and maybe even touch the lives of others. Care for your thoughts by using objects you can’t stop picking up and touching.

It is a sacred act to organize yourself: to consider what, of all the things that are important to you, and all the problems and opportunities your life offers to you right now, which of those you will — or will not — do today.

So: use sacred-feeling objects to help you carry out your important intentions.

Use objects that speak to you, body and soul; objects that are more beautiful than they strictly need to be. Objects that tell you that what you are doing is special, and important, and deserves your time and effort.

Delight your eyes and hands and ears and nose with the objects you use, when you decide to make changes in your life.

. . . But Ceremonial Objects Are Not a Magic Fix

I wish they were, though. Wouldn’t that be cool?

I have seen people make dramatic, sudden, significant, and lasting positive changes in their lives. It happens, but it’s rare.

Back in the 1900s, I managed a clinical trial site testing a product** to help people quit smoking. On average, people quit smoking about eight times, before they stay quit.

For most of us, most of the time, making a life change is full of stops and starts and dead-ends and backtracking. Real change depends more on your willingness to get up again, learn a little more about what worked and what didn’t, and try it again. That’s the real heroism, the real magic.

Using a ceremonial object to help you change something you want to change, is just that: it’s a little help, a little nudge you give yourself, to get going in the direction you want to go. It’s not the solution; but it can be one more tool in the toolkit.

It’s a little bit easier to snack on carrots instead of Doritos, if you put the carrots on a plate that you reserve for this purpose, that makes you smile every time you use it.

It’s a little bit easier to make yourself sit down and review your calendar, if you have a beautifully made planner that you love to write in.

So, ceremonial objects are not magic — but they can surely help.

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References

* “For long-term, daily, heavy drinkers, [Drynuary] can cause some dangerous health effects.” (see link below for more)

Drynuary: What is it? Should you do it? (no date) SalemHealth. Available at: https://www.salemhealth.org/you-matter/post/drynuary-what-is-it-should-you-do-it (Accessed: 6 January 2023).

Notes

**We tested the 4 mg. Nicorette patch. Our record-keeping systems for that clinical trial were what got me interested in organizing skills… and got us through an FDA audit.