Anoushka Florence - The Womens Circle: How to Gather with Meaning, Intention and Purpose

It is a space where Women come together and sit in a sacred Circle created with the intention of making Women feel seen, safe, heard, held and witnessed on their journeys through life.

A sacred space free of judgement, competition, expectation, pressure or noise. A sacred space void of the demands from the outside world, a space just for us, to go inwards, to reconnect, to return home. A refuge for the spirit of the feminine.

All over the world, Women are returning, gathering under the moon in a small city apartment, bathing together in wild streams, holding ceremonies under ancient trees, creating sacred spaces in local parks, yoga centres, living rooms, backyards.

All over the world, Women are remembering how to hold space for each other. All over the world, Women are beginning to gather in this way.

If you are hearing the call, then you are being called to gather too.

How do you know if youre ready to hold one?

Well, the calling is the initiation. If you are holding this book in the palms of your hands, no matter how it arrived there, this is the very sign you need to know that the Circle is calling you.

So listen, pay attention to the longing within, trust where you are being led, and remember, the Circle lives within each of us.

You already have everything you need in order to begin.

I know many of you may be wondering, How will I know what to do? Where do I even begin?

Ah, my darling, there is so much to share so lets start from the very beginning.

WOMENS CIRCLES ARE ANCIENT,

DEEP WITHIN US WE KNOW THEM,

WE FEEL THEM, WE LONG FOR THEM.

WHEN WE STEP BACK INTO THEM,

WE FEEL THE WOMEN BEFORE US,

THE ONES WHO KNEW THEIR DIVINITY,

THE ONES WHO WERE FREE.

YET WITH THAT,

WE ALSO FEEL THE PAIN,

THE PAIN OF THE SUPPRESSION

THAT BROKE THESE CIRCLES AWAY.

AND THUS EVERY TIME WE STEP BACK INTO CIRCLE,

WE ARE CALLING OUR POWER BACK,

THE LIGHT AND THE DARK, THE WISDOM AND THE MAGIK.

THROUGH A COLLECTIVE HEALING,

AND A COLLECTIVE REMEMBERING, WE AWAKEN.

WE DO THIS FOR OUR GRANDMOTHERS.

WE DO THIS FOR OUR DAUGHTERS.

WE DO THIS FOR OUR SISTERS,

OUR MOTHERS, OURSELVES.

FOR THERE IS NO SAFER SPACE

FOR A WOMAN

THAN A SPACE HELD

BY THE SACREDNESS OF THE CIRCLE.

A SPACE FOR YOU TO REMEMBER, WHO YOU REALLY ARE.

AND IN REMEMBERING, WHO YOU REALLY ARE,

YOU LET GO OF WHO THEY TOLD YOU TO BE.

A Circle with a sacred centre is the oldest known form of social interaction. This is how communities would have gathered to interact, eat, commune and pass down wisdom and stories. A place where all generations could come together to share in life.

As such, the remanence of the Circle can be found in every single ancient culture; the shape that has always created space for the whole to belong.

The Womens Circle can be seen to have emerged from this; a realisation of the need to separate the energy of the feminine and masculine in order for them to come into balance. With each energy holding its own unique power, it was important for the village as a whole to create the spaces in which they could retreat.

The first Circles that were documented span back to 800 CE, and stem from African roots. Typically, these were spaces created to support Women during the time of menstruation. Living in close proximity to one another, it wouldnt have been unusual for a whole village to be menstruating at the same time. For as some of you may have experienced in your own lives, our cycles tend to sync with women we live closely with. Womens Circles, Moon Lodges, Menstrual Huts, Red Tents are some of the names used to describe these sacred spaces created for Women.

Living in alignment with both nature, and the nature within them, their bleed was a marker to retreat. Women would leave their villages to commune in a hut all together, leaving their day-to-day lives, their families and their usual responsibilities behind. These spaces were created in order for Women to rest, to support one another and to be given the space to go inwards. For it was believed that Women were at their most powerful during this time.

Communities would ask Bleeding Women to use this time to ask the spirits for guidance and messages for the wider village. Women would receive and channel prophetic visions that they could relate to their communities once their cycles came to an end. There was a deep understanding of the connection Women had to nature and the power they held, especially at this time. As such, the Red Tent was a reverent space; a space of healing, of letting go, of dreaming up a new future.

The traditions of these spaces can be found throughout many different communities, villages and towns across the world. These spaces held such deep feminine needs that all over the world, Women would unite without even knowing it, in this sacred space.

However, a Womens Circle was not just reserved for honouring the time of a Womans bleed. These spaces were community spaces, spaces where Women could gather and put the world to rights.

In some Native American tribes, they were places to discuss issues in the village, using the Circle as a safe space to hold different opinions and ideas. In Pakistan they are called Bashalis, a sacred space for women to gather, where men were strictly forbidden. These spaces created a sense of freedom, and liberation from womens responsibilities. Creating a breathing space for women to just be. In Pagan communities, they were often used to honour the moon cycles, the seasons and the solstices. In Judaism, Women would gather on every New Moon to celebrate the beginning of a new cycle ahead.

Womens Circles are still being held in many First Nations communities around the world. Having heard the whispers that Womens Circles were still alive and communing in First Nations communities, I got in touch with a Woman running them in Australia. I asked her if she would be open to sharing any insight into the traditions and rituals that occur in these spaces.

Her response helped reinforce the significance of the Circle. She shared that this knowledge is sacred, and what happens in the Circle stays in the Circle. The truth is, it was hard to research the history of womens circles, but this is simply because these spaces are, and have always been, sacred. As the Woman in Australia relayed to me, what happens in the circle stays in the circle. We do not need to document these spaces to prove they exist, for they live within each of us.

We each hold a sacred thread that runs through our female lineage; a thread that, if we go deep enough, will lead us back to the time when our ancestors sat in a sacred Circle.