

Rituals have long been humanity’s secret tool for navigating uncertainty, healing emotional wounds, and fostering connection. From ancient ceremonies to modern practices, rituals offer a powerful way to ground ourselves, find meaning, and access deeper states of awareness. They’re not relics of the past—they’re essential tools for modern living.
Whether in the rhythmic dances of North Africa’s Gnawa, the vibrant movements of Italy’s tarantella, or the profound ceremonies of the Huichols in Mexico, rituals hold universal appeal. Today, science helps us understand why: rituals shape emotions, regulate focus, and connect us with others. Let’s explore how ancient wisdom and modern psychology meet to create transformative practices for therapy, personal development, and leadership.
1. The Ancient Roots of Rituals
ituals are deliberate actions designed to shift states of mind. As Victor Turner described, they create liminal spaces—thresholds where individuals step outside their normal reality to undergo transformation. Similarly, Mircea Eliade’s The Sacred and the Profane emphasized rituals as tools to connect humans with “sacred time,” where they could tap into profound truths.
Rituals Across Cultures
Huichols in Mexico: Their peyote ceremonies involve fasting, chanting, and consuming sacred cactus to achieve insight and renewal. The journey, both physical and spiritual, symbolizes moving closer to their gods and themselves.
Bwiti of Central Africa: The iboga ceremony involves ingesting the iboga plant to access spiritual clarity and confront personal challenges. Participants often emerge with a sense of resolution and self-discovery.
Gnawa of North Africa: Through hypnotic music, repetitive rhythms, and dance, Gnawa healing ceremonies connect participants to spiritual forces and induce trance states for emotional and physical healing.
Nordic Seidr: In Viking traditions, seidr rituals used chanting and altered states to seek guidance from spirits and explore future possibilities.
Italian Tarantella: This healing dance, thought to cure the “bite of the tarantula,” evolved into a communal expression of catharsis, releasing participants from emotional and physical tension.
What unites these rituals is their use of repetition, symbolism, and sensory engagement to alter consciousness and foster healing. These ancient practices were not only cultural expressions but also psychological tools for emotional regulation, bonding, and meaning-making.
2. Modern Insights: Hobson’s Research on Rituals
In modern psychology, rituals have become a focus of scientific inquiry. Nicholas Hobson’s 2017 paper, The Psychology of Rituals: An Integrative Review and Process-Based Framework, outlines why rituals are so effective:
Emotional Regulation: Rituals provide predictability in uncertain situations, reducing anxiety by creating a sense of control.
Performance Enhancement: By focusing attention, rituals improve outcomes, whether preparing for a speech or tackling a difficult task.
Social Connection: Rituals bond individuals through shared experience, signaling commitment and fostering trust.
Hobson’s second work, Minimal Rituals and Bias Manuscript, reveals that even simple rituals—structured, repetitive actions without deep cultural roots—can elicit similar effects. Whether it’s a pre-game routine or a morning meditation, these actions engage both bottom-up processes (through sensory stimulation) and top-down processes (by imbuing actions with meaning).
Rituals, it turns out, are tools for transformation that work regardless of complexity. They are accessible to everyone, everywhere.
3. Power of Rituals in Hypnosis Therapy, Coaching, and Leadership
In modern applications, the power of rituals in hypnosis is profoundly effective in addressing emotional knots, guiding introspection, and fostering growth. The names in the examples below have been changed to protect the consultants' identities.
Therapy and Healing
The power of rituals in hypnosis therapy helps externalize emotions and provide a structured way to confront inner conflicts. Take the example of Anna, a senior manager struggling with work-induced anxiety:
Objective: To help her let go of overwhelming self-doubt and guilt for her perceived failures.
The Ritual: Anna wrote down her self-critical thoughts on small pieces of paper, placed them in a bowl of water, and one by one dropped them into a candle flame. As each paper burned, she recited: “I release this burden.”
Why It Worked: The sensory act of burning the papers created a vivid, symbolic release, while the repetition and structure of the ritual grounded her emotionally. She later shared: “It was as if my thoughts had been weighing me down like stones. Watching them disappear felt freeing.”
Coaching and Leadership
Rituals help leaders focus, build resilience, and foster clarity. Marco, a director at an international NGO, faced decision fatigue and emotional exhaustion:
Objective: To enhance his decision-making clarity and emotional resilience.
The Ritual: Every morning, Marco journaled three reflections: one thing he was grateful for, one challenge he would face with courage, and one action he would take to inspire his team. He ended the practice with three deep breaths and recited, “Today, I lead with purpose.”
Why It Worked: The structured reflection and affirmation aligned Marco’s mental and emotional states, helping him start his day with confidence and focus. His colleagues noted his increased decisiveness and presence.
Why Hypnosis Fits the Ritual Model
Hypnosis, like ancient rituals, engages both symbolism and sensory processes to create transformation. The hypnotist guides clients into a liminal state where symbolic acts, metaphors, and visualizations reframe their experiences. For example, it was very easy for a burned-out entrepreneur to be guided in hypnosis to visualize a “control room” filled with levers and dials representing his stressors.
Adjusting each lever symbolized reducing specific stress triggers. The client described the session as “a reset that made everything feel manageable.”
Both rituals and hypnosis leverage repetition, rhythm, and symbolism to engage the mind and body, creating profound emotional and cognitive shifts.
4. Power of Rituals in Hypnosis: From Ancient Wisdom to Modern Application
Rituals, whether ancient or modern, tap into universal human needs: the need for meaning, connection, and transformation. Science now shows what our ancestors intuitively understood—rituals regulate emotions, decrease anxiety, and enhance well-being. Engaging in rituals, along with introspection, meditation, and exploration, empowers individuals to navigate life’s challenges with clarity and strength.
Conclusion
Rituals bridge ancient wisdom with modern science, offering tools for healing, introspection, and leadership. I have long been fascinated by these mythico-ritual approaches and look forward to collaborating with groups eager to explore these transformative techniques.
For those in leadership, therapy, or personal development, incorporating rituals provides a structured, meaningful way to inspire change and foster growth.

The author
⫸Mourad - Ericksonian hypnosis practitioner, trainer and founder of @morpheose
⫸ What I offer
1:1 sessions, in Geneva (17 rue Charles-Giron) and Online
trainings in hypnosis
workshops and introspection retreats, for individuals and corporations
⫸ former physicist and political scientist, former BCG consultant, sportsman and living being fascinated by consciousness.
⫸ founder of morpheose, for individuals, leaders and organizations in fast-paced and demanding environments.
Sources
Hobson, N. M., Schroeder, J., Risen, J. L., Xygalatas, D., & Inzlicht, M. (2017).The Psychology of Rituals: An Integrative Review and Process-Based Framework.Personality and Social Psychology Review
Hobson, N. M., Gino, F., Norton, M. I., & Inzlicht, M. (Preprint).When Novel Rituals Impact Intergroup Bias: Evidence from Economic Games and Neurophysiology.(In press at Psychological Science).
Turner, V. (1969).The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure.Chicago: Aldine Publishing.
Eliade, M. (1957).The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion.(Trans. Willard R. Trask). New York: Harcourt, Brace & World.
Rouget, G. (1985).Music and Trance: A Theory of the Relations between Music and Possession.University of Chicago Press.
Kapferer, B. (2004).Ritual Dynamics and Virtual Practice: Beyond Representation and Meaning.Social Analysis, 48(2), 35–54.
Hell, B., & Howell, J. (2017).Gnawa Ritual and Music in North Africa: Trance, Sound, and Cultural Practice.University of Chicago Press.
Labate, B. C., & Cavnar, C. (2014).The Therapeutic Use of Ayahuasca.Springer.
Metzner, R. (1999).Ayahuasca: Human Consciousness and the Spirits of Nature.Thunder's Mouth Press.
Wafer, J. (1991).The Taste of Blood: Spirit Possession in Brazilian Candomblé.University of Pennsylvania Press.