This is a follow-up to my earlier post about designing a Winter Solstice gathering that combined Rationalist Solstice traditions with local Māori Matariki practices. Here's what I learned from actually running the event.
TL;DR: People wanted structured conversation more than curated performance. Starting with collective acknowledgment of loss made subsequent vulnerability feel natural. Social coordination mechanics are harder than they look, but small-scale practice matters for larger coordination challenges.
Growing up in a religious family, I personally wasn't getting the meaningful aspects of seasonal gatherings which I fondly remember from my childhood. Living in New Zealand, I wanted to create something that honored both Rationalist Solstice traditions and local Matariki practices without falling into either cultural appropriation or forcing cringy fake rituals on people.
My design principles were:
The evening progressed through Acts from Golden Hour, Twilight, Sunset, Nightfall, through "Darkest Night" to "Dawn" with ~27 guests over 3 hours.
The evening's keystone turned out to be our opening "Remembrance of the Dead" ritual. We started by explaining Matariki/Pleiades astronomy, then transitioned to acknowledging "the company we've lost."
The mechanics: Table by table, people came forward. Anyone who wished could speak a name of someone who had died, and also open up about why they remember that person, then extinguish a lamp. No obligation to speak—silence was explicitly permitted as a form of honoring others. As each light went out, the room grew dimmer.
This worked because:
Physical embodiment: Each name visibly changed the environment
Starting with acknowledged loss made everything else possible. When we later asked deeper questions to be shared, it felt natural rather than forced.
I spent enormous energy curating music for each transition. This largely failed. People mostly wanted to chat with their neighbors, and the room acoustics made careful listening impossible anyway.
What actually worked: Structured conversation prompts that progressed from safe to vulnerable:
The progression gave people permission to open up while maintaining safety. Background music was fine, but 30% of my preparation effort would have achieved 90% of the value.
I wanted to give people the opportunity to interact with more people over the night by reshuffling table conversations a few times during the evening. The goal worked—people met new faces and practiced small-scale cooperation. The execution was clunky.
What I tried:
Failure modes:
Better approaches for next time: Random selection (birthday months, card draws, etc.) rather than requiring tables to self-select leaders. Clearer signaling for transitions—maybe a dinner bell rather than trying to speak over conversations.
I expected musical transitions to naturally guide people between acts. Instead, we had to interrupt conversations and call for attention each time. This felt jarring and exposed a fundamental tension: people wanted to participate, not perform or be performed to.
The co-hosted presentation elements (alternating speaking with a different person for each Act) worked better than solo delivery, but still felt scripted. Next time, less performance, more facilitation.
Our culminating ritual involved forming a circle, my sharing reflections on mortality and existential risk, then sitting in complete darkness before relighting candles together. [Full text of my reflection available here]
This partially worked—the content addressed real fears (AI alignment, climate change, personal struggles) and the physical darkness created a powerful shared experience. But my expectation that people would naturally share after my reflection didn't materialize. 25 people in a circle is too large for spontaneous vulnerability without more preparation.
Helen and Tessa spent most of their evening managing food service instead of participating in conversations. Hiring help would be worth it for hosts to actually attend their own event.
The most valuable insight: people wanted guided conversation more than curated experience. They appreciated framing and permission to go deeper, but they wanted to create meaning with each other, not receive it from a presenter.
This challenges assumptions about what makes events "meaningful." The structure enabled authentic interaction rather than creating it.
Beginning with mortality acknowledgment rather than working up to it created psychological safety for later vulnerability. When you've already said the names of the dead together, discussing personal struggles feels manageable.
The table mixing activities were clunky but valuable. We can't coordinate at larger scales unless we know how to gather around fires together. Even failed attempts teach us something about human coordination patterns. More could be done here.
People will remember the moment lights went out with each name spoken. They'll remember holding candles in complete darkness. The embodied experiences matter more than the words.
25+ people spent three hours in comparitively deeper discussions with their friends and neighbors, than we normally find ourselves in the rest of the year - processing mortality, existential risk, and personal struggles together. We're planning to continue annually, incorporating these lessons.
The broader question: What role should secular ritual play in rationalist community building? If we need coordination to solve civilizational challenges, we need practice spaces for learning how to coordinate. Seasonal gatherings might be one useful approach.
I used Claude extensively as a research assistant and drafting tool for both planning and writing about this event, while taking care to review and rewrite everything to ensure it represented my actual experience and values.