Writing Prompt - rituals, traditions, and practices
a year end creative writing prompt reflection
Rituals, traditions, and practices often bubble up towards the end of the calendar year. For many, holidays are afoot, and we find ourselves elevating familiar celebrations that have become tradition over time, or we may find that we amplify rituals that hold meaning beyond mainstream expectations, or even may find that we have developed shared practices with found community – friends forming family bonds.
As writers, we should consider then what are some of the rituals, practices, and traditions that we might find some of our characters practicing at the end of the year, conclusion of a season, or at the close of a significant period of time. If there is not a particular character we have in mind that we want to do a deep dive around, then, it may be a reflection of ourselves, as a character (or in more a journaling format) to think about what some of the recurring habits we have at the close of the year.
What are some of the repeated rituals? How does this traditions tell and tear into the truths this character holds? Where is the point of origin of these practices – who passed them along to this particular people, how have they changed over time, and what does this peculiar person add to this line of practices?
As you mediate and marinate on this idea, explore a scene with this character—as a child, as a teen, as they are now – and the rituals, practices, or traditions that they explore come the year’s end. This may place the character outside of a timeline that your story explores them in or it may capture practices around the character that you have yet to conceive.
What are rituals, practices, and traditions as a writer that have informed your character development?