A freshness celebration is a encounter with freshness itself.

1. Host or join a freshness celebration.

2. At the party

We celebrate birthdays, epic stories, scenic vistas, seminal ideas,and important people. Why not freshness? 

To celebrate something is to acknowledge that it is special and to acclaim what it is that makes it so. We celebrate to refresh our shared appreciation of, and to renew our shared dedication to what is worthy, that is, worth wanting.

In such a celebration, freshness is not only guest of honor but the life of the party. This involves acknowledging what freshness does, addressing what freshness is and acclaiming the project freshness is engaged in. 

Here’s a format:

  1. assemble at a time in some place;
  2. consciously put grievances, worries and distractions aside;
  3. explicitly invite freshness to attend. “Come, freshness from deep down things; freshness from where depth opens up to breadth; freshness billowing in from beyond.”
  4. enthusiastically engage altogether in some playful activity–physical, social, constructive, imaginative, from serious to light-hearted, formal to whimsical, familiar to fanciful. “Join in.”
  5. acknowledge, in pause or in passing, the manifestations of freshness in the activity in the moment: spontaneities, for instance, or hilarities or other strong feelings, improvisations, themes arising/swelling/circulating, a sense of release, unison expressions such as songs or dances. “It’s you, freshness, here among us!”
  6. address freshness: “It’s you, freshness, ever potent, ever active, ever a presence, in our life experience hitherto, here and now, and going forward.”
  7. acclaim the scope and scale of the cosmic project we have been invited to. “Whatever it is you are bringing about in the transcendent is beyond imagination, yet palpably real now in our gathering here.”
  8. gratefully offer one another simple gifts: a word, an image, a link or connection… “Take this that freshness has given me.” 
  9. bid farewell. “Thanks, freshness, for the chance to celebrate you. Meet you soon in our next encounter.” 

Freshness is ever active but never self-aggrandizing, never calling attention to itself. It’s for us to recognize and acknowledge what freshness is and does, and to acclaim what is coming to consummation, encounter by encounter, in the transcendent.  

3. Reflect on the encounter

a. What kind of experience was the celebration? How and where did it move in the play space? What were the takeaways?

b. How is celebrating freshness in a group different from meeting freshness in an encounter with one or a few concrete others? What parts of us do these different experiences speak to?

c. How does celebrating freshness change our appreciation of the actual, active potent presence of freshness in our lives and our worlds? What do we think now about freshness and the future?

If you have tips, stories or suggestions, share them here.