Every task has become a ritual these days. Everything is sacred now. Be it cleaning the dishes, the home, preparing for the puja, conducting it, and then cleaning up. Eating is a sacred ritual. Sex is sacred. Watching television, listening to songs, reading and writing, and speaking to others is sacred and is done fully conscious. Everything is rehearsed in the mind before it is carried out. Now I understand why in the beginning years, Agathiyar had me conduct a rehearsal on my own much earlier, even before the devotees trickle in for the puja. But these days, the Siddhas take charge of the puja, coming to conduct it.
It was in doing rituals that we became attentive. It was in practising Yoga that we became attentive too. Now it has become our nature to pay attention to the task at hand. I guess this is what the Buddhist monks do, too. Everything they do is meditative in nature, be it in just walking, simply eating, or the elaborate making of the Mandala and offering worship to it. If some doze off when the masters speak, others go into a meditative state just listening. I guess this is the reason rituals are conducted by temple priests, too, so that our eyes do not go astray, our ears are bombarded with sacred chants and the playing of traditional musical instruments, our lips are sealed, and our breath mellows to the chants and music. Ritualistic worship goes far in connecting us with the other worlds. Humanity, over generations have adhered to these practices. It was their means to stay connected. Remove the language and rituals, and we lose our identity. While the Gods are beyond time and space, we are at its mercy.