Women’s Circles: An Ancient Practice that Got Lost

The Call

Every woman’s heart holds a yearning for circle. If you’ve ever experienced it, you want more. If you have never been held in the rich, safe embrace of a women’s group, you probably feel a void that doesn’t quite seem to get filled by anything, and you’re not quite sure what it is you need.

The Space

Throughout history and across every corner of the planet, women have gathered in sacred circles and women-only spaces. In ancient Greece, the festival of Thesmophoria was a multi-day community gathering, away from villages and attended by women only –no written record was kept of the festival, so the exact events that took place remain a mystery. In Native American communities, women gathered in the moon lodge while menstruating. This was a space where they could be cared for, bond with other women, and do their deep healing work. Tales also speak of similar groups in Africa, Australia, the Middle East and Mesoamerica.  

The Purpose

At the most foundational level, women have always been inextricably woven together into a network of communal support. They midwived each others’ babies, supported lactation, counseled each other on marriage and the harvesting of food, wove baskets and mended clothing together as they passed down stories and wisdom. In these spaces, they also engaged in deep spiritual and healing work together. 

When a client tells me in therapy that she’s experiencing intense emotions and that it’s “probably just hormones,” I take the time to talk about the moon lodge and how it’s not “just” hormones… because hormones don’t make you feel things that aren’t already there. 

The moon lodge did not exist because women were unclean and needed to be separated from men (though some severely patriarchal cultures saw it that way.) The true purpose of this special tent was one of sacred space for deep healing. At the time surrounding menstruation, when hormones fluctuate, they turn up the volume on the feelings that can otherwise be ignored. It’s a time of deep intuitive perception and an ability to see and understand things beyond the surface level. In some ancestral traditions, they see it as a ‘lifting of the veil.’ The moon lodge was the safe space to bond with women, receive counsel, and do the deep emotional processing of wounds and trauma. 

In these circles, women expanded their capacity to hold one another with deep presence and compassion, and to bring that to their families. 

The Dismantling

As agrarian, small villages turned more and more urban and industrial, communities became more fragmented. Our neighbors became strangers instead of close relatives and extended family. Nuclear families became the entire ecosystem where lives were lived in “private.” Which for many has turned into growing isolation.

Of course, there was also the impact of deepening patriarchal beliefs, economies, and social norms. The witch trials in Europe and America did not help matters either. Whatever remained of women’s circles became strictly either religious (prayer circle and bible groups), craft-based (knitting, quilting), or went completely underground. 

And let’s not forget the scientific revolution! Women's sacred circles are decidedly unscientific. And in the world of Newton where nothing that couldn’t be proven by the scientific principle was dismissed as quackery (and gasp… witchcraft), we regressed into more backward times where we dismissed our inherent humanity and sensitivity. 

The Void

Modern life has become extremely isolated while simultaneously being, paradoxically, more instantaneously connected. At no time in history has it been quicker or easier than now to reach someone on the other side of the planet. While we can technically connect with each other, deep meaningful connection is increasingly being replaced by surface level interactions. Instead of sharing our deep experiences, we share Instagram-curated snapshots of our lives. Birthday celebrations turn into quick text messages and posts on your Facebook wall. Long phone calls with a girlfriend are a thing of the past for most women.

We are missing the human connection more and more, and importantly we are missing our feminine circles…It’s almost like we’re a NICU baby in the incubator. We technically have all we need in our lives; just like the preemie gets all her “food” and air.  But just like the baby thrives if she’s pulled from the incubator for skin-to-skin contact, we adult women thrive from genuine, deep contact in our feminine communities. 

The Rich Growth

The truth is, our nervous systems are wired for co-regulation. Just like the baby is more quickly soothed when she feels both your skin and the cadence of your breath, we more easily relax into safety when we’re surrounded by other human beings with warm, melodious voices, unconditional acceptance, and smiling faces that tell us, “you’re safe here.”

When we’re held in that safety, we dare to venture into places that are too scary to navigate alone. We hold each other’s hands and walk each other home. We do it together and we all come out stronger, wiser, and more sovereign. Importantly, each step of the way, we know we are neither alone nor broken.