Initiations downfall and triumph

Much of what we have lost with the loss of initiation rituals will forever remain unclear as it is just that: lost. The vestiges of initiation can still be found today, merely communicated differently. For example the world culture of today generally finds more of a coming of age ceremony in the acts such as: losing ones virginity, getting married, or becoming a parent. The Jewish faith has the bar mitzvah and the Japanese consider thirteen years old as the age that one is more or less fully prepared to deal with the world, but none of these things should result in as much pain and suffering, nor risk of personal demise as the more brutal initiation rituals we have looked at. Without the risk and due process of pain it is hard to say whether or not these rituals have the same aptitude of effectiveness, but with the change in perception that these ceremonies bring surely there are still things to be gained. The perspective of someone that has lost their virginity may feel more at ease around their peers just as those that completed more painful initiation counterparts. The person that marries their significant other may feel the confidence to be themselves and act with more of a candid attitude with the responsibility of another person being associated with them. The person that becomes a parent understands that they need to at least pretend to be a fully functional human being in order to set a positive example for their progeny. Each of these things seems innocuous but fulfills a role of initiation in a much less horrific and modern way, preserving what we have potentially lost with a definite degree of pain and complication that it more subtly expressed. While there is definite gain in the modern cultural melting pot that globalization has made of the cultural consciousness, there is also something missing that no one can quite signify with words. This nonexistence is hiding behind every thought and action humans have in the search for an answer to why everything is the way it is and why any action should be taken at all. In some cultures this can be answered, in some religions as well, and yet as all cultures blend more together the cultural and religious explanations for why things are the way they are seem less plausible. The lack of plausibility leads us to the thing that lacks that if we had then nothing else would matter: purpose. The knowledge that what you are doing is right beyond a shadow of a doubt is a pleasure that few can be afforded without making assumptions about the way everything in the universe works. This pleasure is primarily achieved through the use of colorful mythology and the mythology of the Machiguengas has color in spades. The comfort of having purpose on your side is one of their greatest cultural successes, especially with how they manage to merge what should be done with the most interesting, mystical and downright nebulous explanations for occurrences. An example of this is how they manage to keep the sun rising by walking (clearly an extraordinary and worthy feat) not only does this give them a function to fulfill, it also gives them the identity of those who walk, and in tandem the incident possibility to create new stories to be told to future travelers. The creation of the storyteller and the wanderer identities are things that are no longer as central in the majority of human culture, it is as though we have forgotten that these were the primary things that made us human. Communicating a communal identity though storytelling that everyone can share in, and proceeding in a processional lifestyle of traveling to create the stories to be told are the main losses in my eyes and are things that the Machiguengas are lucky enough to maintain. The loss and the gain are not reconciled in a one to one exchange but perhaps if they are more closely examined the losses can be mitigated and the gains can be proliferated in a new more potent transcended identity.