you’re built for purpose, prepare accordingly.

This would have been handy to start this wānanga but it found us eventually, here’s a definition for rites of passage;

“Ceremonies that mark important transitional periods in a person's life, such as birth, puberty, marriage, having children, and death.

Rites of passage usually involve ritual activities and teachings designed to strip individuals of their original roles and prepare them for new roles.”

In previous posts we’ve reached the same conclusion but I really like the last line here, ‘..[activities] designed to strip individuals of their original roles and prepare them for new roles,’ which begs the question,

what are you preparing for?

Or perhaps, what are you being prepared for?

If you could design it yourself, what would a ritual, an activity or ceremony look like to help you prepare for what’s next? Actually, park up right now and envision what that could look like. Who’s involved, where does it take place, what are the steps… get as vivid as you can with it.

Try not to get caught up in tikanga or worry about what’s ‘right or wrong’, if you’re allowed certain things or any of that jazz, don’t worry about formalities — we’re in the comfort of our own minds for a moment so let yourself dream.

Ka pai, and when you’re ready to flow back in with the wānanga, I ask you to consider if any experiences you’re going through or have been through tick any of those boxes in your ideal rite of passage. Think adversities, challenges, ‘failures’, missed opportunities, feeling stuck and stagnant..

Could any of these moments be a type of initiation to prepare you for what’s to come? For your deeper, true purpose? Or maybe just the next phase you’re evolving into..

After all, these as well as our ancestry, are the whakapapa that contribute to who, where and what we are today— so surely they all culminate to serve as rites of passage in their own way?

How have you been stripped of your role i.e. how has space been cleared away to allow for new growth, new perspective, new māramatanga, new life to flow through?

On this train of thought, my shoulder injury back in 2015 served this exact purpose. It stripped away what and who I thought I was, descimated my attachment to external roles and acted as the catalyst to transition me into a new phase. So according to the definition above, a rite of passage. It sure as heck didn’t feel ceremonial or ritualistic at the time! Ha so maybe those parts of it we often associate with rites of passage were missing, but so what?

Does it diminish what I went through? The learnings, teachings and transformations that occurred during that time or since then?

Sure, there are some rites of passage that are deeply spiritual and have specific steps to them that fulfil a particular function. But we also have our own which we initiate and experience all the time - some without us even realising until after (or ever) that prepare us to serve our purpose.

Which brings us back to the pātai, if you’re built for purpose, how can you prepare accordingly?

Tēnā tātou,

Hana.