Riven’s Ashhold
Counters furnax, Avatar of violence and control
This ritual is for the moments when power surges through you — not as freedom, but as tension. When your voice gets sharp, your body tightens, your control becomes rigid, or your protection becomes punishment.
Ashhold is not about collapse. It is about the sacred strength of choosing not to dominate — about laying down the hammer you were forced to carry.
Symbol
A heavy object (stone, tool, metal item — anything that feels like burdened strength)
Ash (from incense, paper, or symbolic)
A piece of paper and pen
Steps
Name the Weapon
On the paper, write down a behavior, tone, or control strategy you use when afraid.
This is the tool you picked up to protect yourself.
Say aloud:
“I forged this in fear. It helped me once. But I do not need to swing it forever.”Hold the Weight
Pick up the heavy object.
Feel its presence — not as empowerment, but as burden.
Breathe slowly.
Ask yourself:
“Who must I become to carry this every day?”Mark it with Ash
Dip your fingers in the ash and smear it across the object or your hands.
Whisper:
“I bless this weight with the truth of what it cost me.”Lay It Down
Set the object gently in front of you.
As you release it, speak:
“This fire does not need a weapon. I burn, and I rest.”Final Embers
Tear the paper with the “weapon” written on it and scatter the pieces.
Let them fall like cooled embers.
Sit in stillness. Let your body soften.
End with this phrase:
“My fire does not harm. My fire does not hide.”
Mythic Lens
Furnax builds fortresses from pain.
His strength is forged in control — hard, relentless, always ready for war.
He whispers that you must crush before you’re crushed.
That softness is weakness. That power is protection.
But Riven —
Riven rests.
She does not deny power. She unburdens it.
Sh burns quietly, holding more fire than flames can show.
Her presence disarms without submission.
She teaches that to surrender control is not to die — it is to finally live.
Psychology Lens
This ritual supports the interruption of fight responses and the over-identification with control-based coping mechanisms.
By physically holding and then releasing a symbol of burdened strength, the practitioner experiences a somatic shift from tension to release.
Naming and blessing the “weapon” allows for integration rather than shame — a trauma-informed act of remembering why control was once needed, and why it no longer is.
The result is a nervous system that can begin to trust rest without interpreting it as threat — the central lesson of Riven: rest is not weakness, it is power unmasked.