A Message from our First Sophia Circle
Enthralled. Captivated. Mesmerized. This best describes my immediate response to The Sophia Institute’s announcement about launching Sophia Circles – virtual teaching and learning communities drawing on and from the core wisdom and talents of TSI’s programming. This concept was introduced during their first-annual Women of Wisdom Conference last October – which fit perfectly with the conference focus of engaging ourselves in our communities and the world – in service to the future.
This post is to share how this inspired idea moved me to action creating a wisdom circle in my community. I look at it as me moving my little outboard motorboat into exploratory waters while the mothership (TSI) is undertaking a transoceanic-sized journey with the Sophia Circles formal launch at this year’s 2nd annual conference this October.
Still absorbing the inspirational challenges of the 2010 WOW conference, by January I was itching to expand. I spontaneously sent out an email last January inviting women to my home to explore issues of feminine power. What is it? How do we cultivate it in ourselves? Express it? What responsibility do we have to own it? Some 20+ women arrived at my door on the given night. We are now in our 10th month of meeting, expanding our conversation to include a range of topics revolving around living deeper, richer, more self-actualized lives of service and contribution. We have moved to renting a community space so that all who are interested can be welcomed.
Based on my local experiment, I am confident the Sophia Circles will be well received and widely integrated around the country and, perhaps, even beyond. I believe and have directly experienced that there is a deep hunger for meaningful connection in our lives, matched by an irrefutable urgency that many of us feel. It is an urgency about the fragility of our country, the world beyond and our planet as a whole. The archetype of the women’s circle as counsel, inspiration and support never has been needed more.
I feel great indebtedness and endless gratitude to The Sophia Institute for its commitment to expanding wisdom consciousness – not to mention joining the cutting edge of seminar technology in service to the future.
Woody Winfree
Atlantic Beach, Florida
