community spotlight: ANDREW

Nearly a year ago, Andrew joined Ritual. At the time, he was just looking for a way to care for his body. “I joined Ritual with the sole intention of giving attention to my atrophied muscles and rigid bones,” he says.

But as he continued showing up, it became clear that something else was pulling him to practice. He was carrying the quiet weight of grief after losing a close friend. Even a year after his friend’s passing, the sadness was still there, lingering in the background of his daily life. “I’d sit alone and look for my sadness,” Andrew reflects. “Wallowing in the haunt—a deserved penance, and consuming.”

What started as physical movement began to feel like something more. The ritual of showing up, moving with awareness, and staying present became a form of meditation. “Maybe it’s an escape, or maybe it’s yogic,” he says. “Meditation in movement—stillness—listening.”

Then one day, during Savasana after a Yin class, something shifted. A quiet realization surfaced. “An answer, out of nowhere, was there with me,” he says. He had been holding onto his pain because it was the last thing he’d felt with his friend. “The pain, that feeling, was the last thread of our connection in some way.”

The insight didn’t change the facts, but it helped shift the heaviness. “It seems obvious now,” he says, “and it didn’t change reality, but the days seemed a bit brighter after that.”

Since then, Ritual has become more than a yoga studio for Andrew. “I’m grateful for what Ritual has become for me—a place of refuge and reflection.”