As a child, I strived to create traditions for my family to make our lives feel less ordinary. I remember watching Disney TV shows and movies growing up where the main character had traditions that were unique. It made me feel like I was boring, when in reality I hadn’t quite understood what my traditions were.
It took me until high school to realize that I had traditions all around me. Listening to the same country playlist every time my dad and I would run errands, my mother and I ordering crème brûlée every time we had to stay at a hotel for a dance competition, the yearly watching of “The Family Stone” on Thanksgiving day to start off the Christmas season: they all were traditions.
It was the events in my life that I became so fond of that I hadn’t realized were traditions. They were special moments of the year that I waited for and looked forward to their arrival. Traditions are important because they give you a sense of being, allow you to feel a part of a community and help you create connections with those around you.
Having traditions in your life can create a feeling of being, or a state of mind, where there are little and big things that remind you that you are living, not just existing. Some traditions I have as a reminder that I am alive are taking my parents to Honest Abe’s every time they visit or going downtown in my hometown to traverse the sculpture walk at the start of summer. I use traditions as something to look forward to, a remembrance of what I have done and what I will get to do again.
They can be as little as treating yourself to your favorite coffee spot once a week, ordering a takeout meal once a week or they can be festivities or movies you only watch with certain people. Every fall, I binge watch “The Twilight Saga” when the weather matches the movie’s mood, and I look forward to it every year.
Traditions can help provide comfort to a person when life can get crazy. With time flying by and days getting busy, having something that gives you motivation to keep going is helpful.
For me, having traditions in my life is a reminder that I am alive. Even if you don’t have something like this in your life already, try and find something that is meaningful to you and make it your own tradition. A consistency of having things on certain days such as special activities to look forward to, can be viewed as traditions no matter how big or small.
Another important aspect of traditions is that they can make you feel like a part of a community. For some, this can be with their family, their friends or a place where they feel included. When it comes to belonging, I — as well as others — have struggled with connecting in different ways, but traditions give us a way to feel we are included in something bigger than ourselves.
The University of Nebraska-Lincoln has many traditions that make students feel a part of something huge. The tunnel walk has grown the hype around the Husker football team and is something students get excited to see each home game. The game days themselves have become a tradition because of the energy that fills the stadium and the festivities that students get involved with, such as holding up a shoe during a kickoff.
If you aren’t into the Husker football scene, that does not mean the university doesn’t have other activities as traditions. You can view your RSO as a tradition, whether it be meeting up once a week/month or events that they hold each year. Traditions can be anything you want them to be as long as they are special to you.
Traditions are important because they remind us of life’s joys and the comfort of being part of something. They also allow you to establish closer bonds with those you share them with. They can bring individuals together as a group, which allows people to connect to one another in ways they weren’t sure were possible.
They can connect us with previous generations, such as our grandparents or parents, or create special moments for groups of people. With traditions, I feel I can and have grown closer with my friends and family because there is a shared bond that only we have.
Granted, traditions can sometimes be negative or have a bad connotation for a person. These can be religious, cultural or ancestral traditions that one chooses not to celebrate. They may not be in a person’s best interest, so a person can change or redirect the traditions so it better suits them; after all, traditions are something a person wants to celebrate and what keeps them going daily.
All around us are traditions. Whether yours look the same as others or not, traditions are ways for us to feel a part of something, and they allow us to create memories that we will never forget. I felt bad as a kid trying to force traditions, but looking back they were already being formed without having to try so hard.
Alexis Goeman is a sophomore journalism and ADPR major. Reach her at [email protected].
