Divine Feminine Rising: The Heart That Knows, and The Heart That Speaks

Finally we had the opportunity to meet again, to be in a safe circle and just to be.  Our Women’s Retreat at hOMe PYM in Reading, Pennsylvania was beautiful and healing.  Twelve women came to experience meditation, movement, and spiritual community. 

I was active in the women’s movement in the 70s and remember vividly the feeling of early women’s circles, gatherings, retreats, women’s cafe, and  especially women’s theatre groups. Reflecting on all these experiences of the past still brings up certain visceral emotions within me. Women’s movement, women’s circles  contributed much to the discovery of my Self, which I so much cherish and value. 

There  are lots of ways to discover and to explore the Self. The “Spiritual Path” provides an avenue to discover the part of self that is most hidden and precious at the same time. 

So why, then, Women’s Retreats?

When women are left to themselves a different voice emerges within. A voice often unheard, squelched, or shushed and disqualified. 

I am sure there  was a lot of material that  came up in each of the women’s individual hearts that will never be shared in the group process at all. And that is totally fine. We are not looking for a purging, but when it happens we want to be present to each other, and share as much as feels appropriate. That is what connects us, that is whatbrings the whole group to a different vibrational level.

This retreat felt like a strong deja vu experience: A group of women independently decided to participate in a women’s retreat without really knowing what to expect and trusting that it  would turn out to be what they  needed.  That is fearless behavior: to step forward into the unknown. They all knew the leader of the retreat, they knew we  would be meditating, doing yoga and dances. But that was the outer container.

The question was: How would we touch that inner space and make it transparent, communicable? How to trust, share and feel safe and held after we have made our hearts vulnerable?

At the peak of the retreat, it became a feast of different voices speaking for each other! The deja vu became an “iamU.”  Experiences that seemed familiar from the past were re-experienced in the present through “Oh my gosh,  she is just like me.”

That is one of the most comforting experiences in a women’s retreat, when you open your heart and speak what you know and what you experience, and someone else says, “Me too.”  Of course it might be that the next morning one feels like “Oh my gosh, I shared way too much and I, who was supposed to hold the universe together and stay silent, have now shown all my cards!”  Luckily the retreat guide checks in with the whole group and each of the women feels the same way: vulnerable, I shared too much, too.

And how ever much it is worth, it creates an internal relief, a feeling of belonging, a feeling  that something within was redeemed.

Through Yogic movements led by Hannah Ebner and through the rhythmic steps and melodies of  “The Dances” led by Denise Runyon, we accessed connections to ancients times of women. Space and time took on different dimensions, which is always a sign of integration, healing, and shifting consciousness. The power of speaking truth, the power of opening internal doorways of consciousness, experiences of being held and enveloped with love became shared experiences of connection and transformation. 

–Susanna

Join us this November for Susanna’s next Women’s Retreat in Ajo, Arizona: Click Herefor more information and to register!