Time for Kickoff events

Rib eating contest at Slope's BBQ to kickoff the Roswell High School football season with the community.

Back to school

Around the country schools have either started or getting ready to start.

[Sidebar] I wish the first day of school was the same around the country. It would make for easier planning for vacations and coordinating of calendars.
Maybe it never was all the same, but I felt like we all started back around Labor Day at one time in our country history.

Communities plan parties around events celebrating. One example is while the kickoff football games for college come this weekend the parties have already begun.  This is a chance for the cheerleaders, football teams and bands to get out in front of their fans and help start the rally cry early.

Importance of Ritual

In creating and experiencing personal ritual, you can find strength and comfort in your life, gain perspective, and move deliberately into your future. People engage in rituals with the intention of achieving a wide set of desired outcomes, from reducing their anxiety to boosting their confidence, alleviating their grief to performing well in a competition – or even making it rain.

Ritual and ceremony provide a sense of “before and after” and people come away knowing their lives have been positively touched by the experience.

This year my daughter celebrates her first time with High School rituals as a Freshman. Each year she celebrates them it will be done as a way to count down and help her move towards her future.

Create your own rituals

Going out for ice cream is something that has been done in our family. My earliest memories are with my grand parents and all of us getting in the car and going to get some ice cream.

Honestly from a miser perspective it makes no sense to drive to an ice cream shop and spend on one ice cream cone what you could have bought a few for if you had gone to the grocery store.

Doing this with family created lasting memory for me. Another memory I had with my grand parents was my grand mother making popcorn on the stove.

The one I cherish the most was our family devotion time. I remember all of us taking turns reading the devotional and reading all the missionary names that we would then pray for as well as for our own family and friends.

To be a ritual it must be done more than once and preferably all the time.

Rituals for business are how we deliver performance. You most likely already have some rituals like coffee time, lunches, and other things that are part of your daily routine.

Maybe you need to create some big events each year to help your company grow. A simple birthday celebration of the company is a way to have a party and maybe take a moment to commemorate the growth from the previous year.

Successful sports coaches typically use rituals to build social bonds between team members. It brings team members' external networks into the family.

I know many companies give out rewards at annual meetings [Rituals]. They invite the spouses to these events often so the spouses may see the rewards and encourage their spouses to work hard so next year they can win the cruise.

What is your kickoff event for this year?

This is the question that I am asking myself. I don't have any formal rituals and therefore I don't really take the time to celebrate what I have accomplished and then taken the time to formally make the necessary changes for the future.

This will be the 32nd year of me covering football. What will be different this year? Stay tuned this week as I tell you how I plan to do some things the same and some things differently.