When I travel, my first action upon reaching my hotel room is to look out the window. Lots of people check out the accommodations first; not me. I have to see what part of the world is spread below and beyond my room. With way too much frequency, I look out on a parking lot or some hotel space tunnel where the heat, air conditioning or a laundry vents. The windows I cherish have a view that I find to be magical.

Usually, the windows are big and locked (great precautions have been taken to prevent a dive onto the asphalt I guess). Occasionally, they are smallish with a dreary view of another of the hotel’s walls. Infrequently, they pose a delightful challenge. I recently had a room with a dormer window. In order to see out that window, I had to negotiate a narrow area where I could pull up a chair, lean across a two-foot casement and twist my head at an odd angle. Balanced thus, I could see the shops three floors down. Loved it!

I am not certain what this need is to check out the universe the minute I walk into my hotel room.  Perhaps it is the utilitarian blandness of most hotel rooms or the frustration with discerning how the on/off switches have been disguised on the lamps that pushes me toward the windows. Perhaps it is a simple habit that I have developed.  Nevertheless, be it Berlin, Salt Lake City, Copenhagen, Tobermory, or Houston, I enter the room, put my suitcase on the bed, and walk to the windows.

After a good deal of thought, I’ve decided that it is less a habit than it is a ritual. It is a ceremonial and spiritual process for me. It acts as a means of grounding me in an unfamiliar city, it gives me a sense of place and it dispels the feelings of estrangement. So, when I look out the smallish window in my Budapest hotel and see the atrium glass over the hotel reception area, I smile, relax and embrace the newest adventure.

Although ritual has never been a pleasant word in my vocabulary, I found that it took on new meaning when I began to sort through just how present ritual was in my life. I discovered that my rituals heighten the moment for me. They also seem to connect me to that which is bigger than I am. And, they do, indeed, ground me.

Hmmmm! Now that I have come to a new awareness…. Well, I just might say that ritual has climbed the ladder of my empowerment from the bottom rung to one toward the top!!