Circle Process: potent medicine for us all

Folks are feeling so thoroughly wrung out these days. And even though we are slogging through the same slog together, the systems of domination have us deeply convinced we are going it alone in.

Circle Process is one simple yet potent antidote to this painful and rampant isolation.

And on Saturday, I got to co-hold with some dear ones and fellow facilitators, Tashmica Torok and Kiana Elkins (of the Solidarity Mail Club), what we called a “Restorative Justice Circle” as part of our Lansing local World Builders Network. Hear more from Kiana about the Circle here.

What happened was magic, and so healing.

We introduced the concept of the Circle. (More here!)

We set a center/altar.

We introduced the talking piece. (More here!)

And then we passed it. Our talking piece was a small, palm-sized hag stone that has hung on my partner’s wall for years. A hag stone = the elements have worn a hole right through that rock - aka a portal through which we can look and see the worlds we are building and the worlds we long for that are already here. It was perfect.

And just that practice round//intro circle got the tears flowing and the laughter erupting. We were on the right track. There was the magic, right there!

People sooooo badly need a space where they will be listened to uninterrupted and with respect and from the body-brain-heart. And where we each get a turn.

There's something about humans sitting in Circle; something healing about witnessing and being witnessed without interruption, something we all so deeply need and deeply know.

This is the exquisite beauty of the technology an practice of Circle. 

I learned this practice years ago (make that decades friends, let's be real) back in my undergraduate degree when I had the honor of learning from Howard Zehr, who is one of the elders inside of my own lineages teaching and practicing Restorative Justice.

In the 20+ years since then, I’ve had the honor of learning from many wise, generous and skillful Circle Keepers, including Tashmica just this past Saturday. :)

“Peacemaking circles draw directly from the tradition of the Talking Circle, common among indigenous people of North America. Gathering in a Circle to discuss important community issues was likely a part of the tribal roots of most people. Such processes still exist among indigenous people around the world, and we are deeply indebted to those who have kept these practices alive as a source of wisdom and inspiration for modern Western cultures.” 

- Kay Pranis, The Little Book of Circle Processes.

As Kay Pranis (another wise Circle Keeper) reminds us, we both get to honor the primarily Indigenous + other Black and Brown folks who have kept Circle alive through incredible cultural (and other forms of) genocide, while also noticing that some form of Circle was likely present in all of our lineages.

This cultural severance is a deep wound for most humans these days, and again, so healing to be in a reclaiming practice. (And may us White folks be especially attuned to the dupe of appropriation along this journey.)

And our bodies know - our bodies remember and feel this coming home, no matter our lineage.

So we moved into our second round of the Circle, holding that warm hag stone in our hands, letting its heaviness help slow us down, feeling/seeing the ways the oils of our hands were already burnishing the stone, bringing out its colours and shine.

And then the dreams we dreamed! The second question we carried around the circle was “What is the world you long to build?”

We fucking know, y’all. It’s right here, right here in us when we let ourselves go there. We carry powerful visions for the worlds we need, and our bodies can already taste what it feels like - which is, in and of itself, a fractal of the world to come already here! What gorgeous poetry came through.

As we traveled around the Circle, this theme arose around whether we even believe the worlds we long for are possible or already here yet or not. This contradiction of real despair and real hope was palpable. And, I was grateful at how much resource the Circle offered for holding this deep complexity with care inside of the collective.

I want to keep sharing - so much juiciness emerged!! - but this is enough for today.

So I’ll leave you with a song that was moving through me as we were in this contradiction inside of our world-building dreams: She is on her way, by my dear friend Aly Halpert. May it carry you also. 

And what I especially want to leave you with is the simple gift of Circle. You don’t have to be trained  (although training is great - definitely seek learning and training and mentorship if you can) - you can call a circle right now for your own communities!

All the links I’ve attached throughout this reflection will point you towards outlines and guidance for how. 

You can do it! You can build the world you long for right now, fractal by fractal, with Circle as one piece of that and one tool for it. 

We need Circle, we know Circle. We’re meant for it and it for us. May it hold you through this wild ride.

And if you’re needing some extra holding, explore 1-1 or group work with me. <3