****Rituals are the social expression of emotions Those seemingly conventional ritualistic actions are precisely the means to transform the surging, abstract emotions within us into concrete, perceptible, and witnessable moments. Let's look at the classic rituals below. Ritual 1: The "crossed-arm wine" and "ring exchange" ceremonies at weddings Both rituals visualize the emotions of "connection" and "covenant." Crossed-arm wine ceremony: Two people cross their arms and drink the wine in their glasses. This action makes the abstract promises of "you in me, me in you" and "sharing joys and sorrows" incredibly intuitive. Wine is passionate and stimulating, visualizing the aspect of love that is intertwined, shared, and ceremonial. The crossed posture also symbolizes two independent individuals whose life paths become intertwined from that moment on. Ring exchange ceremony: The ring is a circle, without beginning or end, the perfect symbol of "eternity." Placing it on the ring finger is the quietest and most solemn way to declare: "I encircle you in my life; from now on, you belong to me, and I to you." It visualizes the permanence of commitment, the certainty of belonging, and a private yet solemn entrustment. If the crossed-arm wine is the dynamic, passionate "joy of union," then the ring exchange is the static, serene "weight of the vow." One dynamic, one still, together they compose the complex emotions of joy and solemnity at a wedding. Ritual 2: The "wish and blow out candles" ceremony at birthday parties This ritual visualizes the core emotions of "hope" and "transition." Wish-making: At a specific, blessed moment, the innermost desires are condensed into a "wish." It visualizes the "expectation" and "sense of control" for the future, as if wishes made at this moment have a higher chance of coming true. The silence in the candlelight visualizes the private, slightly anxious anticipation that accompanies growth. Blowing out candles: This is the climax of the entire ritual. Extinguishing the burning flame in one breath contains multiple layers of visualization: it symbolizes overcoming another year (blowing out the old age), possessing the power to fulfill wishes (that breath is your "willpower"), and crossing a threshold (from the moment of blowing out, you enter a new age). The cheers of those around transform this personal achievement into a collective witness of joy. The entire process visualizes a person standing at the intersection of time, with both prayers for the future and the courage to declare growth. Ritual 3: The "donning the mortarboard and throwing caps" ceremony at university graduation Visualized emotions: "coronation" and "release." Donning the mortarboard/turning the tassel: This ritual directly originates from medieval academic robe traditions. Moving the tassel from right to left, or solemnly placing the cap on the head, is essentially an "academic coronation." It turns the abstract judgment "you have passed the test and gained recognition for your knowledge" into a solemn, authoritative action. It visualizes the achievement of accomplishment, the transformation of identity (from student to graduate), and a sense of belonging and glory that is recognized. Throwing caps: This is the most explosive moment. When everyone hurls their symbolic caps into the air, it is not a farewell but a "liberation." It releases the accumulated pressure, sleepless nights, exams, and papers of four years—all the constraints and burdens—through this collective "upward throw." The caps flying into the sky visualize freedom from gravity, boundless hope for the future, and the deep camaraderie of "we went through this together" in collective celebration. Donning the cap is "gathering," taking on honor and responsibility; throwing the cap is "releasing," letting go of pressure and the past with flair. One gathers, one releases, completing the complex emotional catharsis of transitioning from campus to society. These rituals are moving precisely because they capture the core emotions at key life junctures and encode them into simple, powerful, repeatable actions. These are just a few classic rituals. Almost every scene, to varying degrees, has corresponding rituals. Rituals are the public expression of a scene's social significance, its visual expression, and the highlight moment of scene emotions. In our scene structure, we consider emotion/ritual as a pair of factors: emotion may be internal, but ritual is always external, a more intense expression of emotion with a declarative quality. ****The Social Significance of Scene Rituals The social significance of a scene is reflected in emotions, and the social expression of emotions is reflected in rituals. One could even say that seeing certain rituals tells you what scene you are in. Thus, rituals are the social expression and declaration of scene emotions, the highlight moments of scene emotions. The moment of blowing out candles at a birthday party, the moment graduates throw their caps—these are memorable moments in life. Therefore, studying scene emotions reveals the social significance of scenes; studying scene rituals allows scene emotions to be expressed. 1. Rituals turn the personal and implicit into the expressible. Personal emotions are implicit and cannot be directly perceived by others. Rituals provide a standardized set of externalized actions. The crossed-arm wine, the blowing out of candles—these turn private feelings like "I love you" or "I wish you health" into behaviors that everyone present can see and confirm. Without these actions, personal emotions remain private and implicit. With them, emotions gain social visibility. 2. Rituals turn the "coerced" into the "voluntary." Scene emotions (like the joy of a wedding or the solemnity of a funeral) are essentially external norms that individuals are forced to follow. But the presence of ritual transforms this compliance into active participation. When you blow out candles, you "actively" blow; when you drink the crossed-arm wine, you "actively" drink. Ritual provides an illusion or experience: I am not following rules; I am expressing myself. This is the brilliance of ritual—it converts social coercion into emotional volition. 3. Rituals synchronize the scattered individual into the scene. Scene emotions require group resonance, but physically present crowds do not automatically synchronize. Rituals provide a common focus, a unified rhythm—everyone watches the couple drink the crossed-arm wine, everyone sings the birthday song together. At that moment, the scattered crowd is integrated into an emotional community by the ritual. Ritual acts like a conductor, bringing everyone's emotions to the same peak at the same time. Thus, scene rituals are also the highlight moments of scene emotions. Rituals anchor fluid, private personal emotions into fixed scene norms and amplify them into synchronized group resonance. With rituals, they are integrated into a coherent, experiential, memorable emotional event. Conversely, the reason public emotions in the self-media era are quickly forgotten and disappear is partly because rituals have been dissolved. We embrace public emotions on screens but lack ritual actions like the crossed-arm wine or blowing out candles to anchor and contain them. Emotions thus become rampant, endless, and unable to land. This may also be why, even in the self-media era, people still crave offline ritual. Because physical presence, synchronized actions, and ritual containment remain irreplaceable ways for emotions to complete their full journey. Of course, the social significance of rituals depends on whether the emotions they carry are genuine and how many people truly participate in that authenticity. The deepest dilemma of the self-media era lies here: we have unprecedented channels for public expression, yet we increasingly lack true rituals. Liking is not a ritual, sharing is not a ritual, because rituals require physical presence, synchronized actions, and boundaries of beginning and end. Crying in front of a screen for distant joys and sorrows—the emotion is real at that moment, but it never completes public expression. Because no one drinks the crossed-arm wine with you, no one blows out candles for you, no one performs the same action with you at the same moment. So, rituals are the public expression of emotions, which also implies a judgment: emotions need expression, and expression needs form; emotions without form ultimately dissipate and remain incomplete. ****The Marketing Value of Scene Rituals In those classic rituals, social and emotional jobs-to-be-done certainly outweigh functional ones. Even in common daily life scenes, social and emotional jobs are added value. When scene emotions are discovered, the next step is to think about how to externalize emotions into rituals. This is what young people emphasize as "ritual sense" (仪式感). Scene marketing emphasizes holistic thinking from the scene perspective. So, based on holistic scene thinking, how can a product/brand find an entry point in scene rituals? I believe there are two entry points. 1. Embedding/Converting Products into Ritual Props Ritual is the protagonist; the product is the supporting role. Because ritual itself is an emotional declaration, highly attention-grabbing, and shareable. When the supporting role is also high-value. Because ritual itself is a memory point and a communication point, the props used in the ritual also gain memory and communication points. At a wedding banquet, a baijiu brand can serve as the prop for the crossed-arm wine. This is embedding into a ritual prop. At a birthday party, previously a cake was used; now a large jelly is used. This is converting the ritual prop. 2. Creating New Rituals Scene emotions need to be continuously discovered. Or, as the social significance of scenes evolves, new emotions emerge. With new emotions, new rituals can be created. 1. Creating new rituals is possible. Rituals are not fixed but are consensual forms of emotional expression. When a new behavioral pattern is recognized by enough people as "meaningful," it becomes a ritual. Historically, many rituals taken for granted today were created. For example, diamond engagement rings: in the 1930s, the ritual of "a proposal must include a diamond ring" was created, evoking the emotion of being cherished. For example, blowing out birthday candles was systematically reinforced and popularized by the cake industry. For example, giving carnations on Mother's Day was promoted by the florist industry. Before these rituals were born, the emotional need that made them "must-do" did not exist. It was the ritual itself that created the need, not the need that gave rise to the ritual. Of course, once a ritual becomes widespread, the ritual itself becomes a job-to-be-done. 2. Three paths to creating new rituals. Create new rituals for old scenes. In existing social scenes, insert a new behavioral node that becomes a must-do. For example, coffee brands promote the ritual of "the first cup of coffee in the morning." It is not about quenching thirst or staying alert, but a symbolic action to "start the day." The underlying emotions are a sense of control, solemnity, and self-care. Create new rituals for new scenes. Capture emerging scenes in social changes and design ritualized behaviors for them. For example, the "solo dining" ritual under the solo economy. It is not about eating hastily, but carefully plating, photographing, and sharing. The underlying emotions are self-sufficiency, refinement, and a loneliness that is not lonely. Give new meaning to old rituals. Preserve the form of the ritual but redefine its social significance to evoke different emotions. For example, the traditional wedding "tea ceremony" is redefined as "an expression of gratitude" rather than "a symbol of obedience," with underlying emotions of equal gratitude and intergenerational understanding. 3. Four conditions for creating new rituals. Not all new behaviors can become rituals. A successful ritual creation typically needs to meet four conditions. Repeatable and transmissible. A ritual needs a clear action template—what to do, how to do it—that can be imitated and passed on. Has a symbolic carrier. A ritual needs a perceptible symbol to anchor it—a product, action, language, or time node. This symbol is the position a brand can occupy. Satisfies the need for "meaning confirmation." A new ritual must allow participants to say after completing it: I did something meaningful. It provides not practical value but meaning value. Has social visibility. A ritual should ideally be displayable and seen by others. Visibility is the necessary path for a ritual to evolve from a personal behavior to a social consensus. Creating a new ritual is essentially adding a new interaction mode at the "environment interaction" level: a new scene, a new set of role scripts, a new way of confirming meaning. When this new interaction mode is learned and recognized by enough people, it will settle into new "historical accumulation." The next generation will feel that this ritual has always been there. This is the deep power of marketing: not just to share in existing emotions, but to sow new possibilities in the soil of emotion.