1. Belonging

Human beings are herd animals. We are not meant to live in isolation. We are connected to each other and all of life. We are part of a whole in every aspect of our existence. Spiritually, we are part of all that is, part of Life. At the human level, we have evolved to function as part of a collective whole.

This goes all the way down to the core of our existence and the very way we see and identify ourselves. While identity has a place in our psychological development, when we get deep enough spiritually, it becomes limiting. My teacher boldly proclaimed, "The only identity that is not limiting is being one of the people."

Due to us being wired this way, being part of a community is a natural part of any spiritual awakening or emotional healing. In my work with people, I have found belonging to be our greatest emotional need. And yet, in the United States and many parts of the "civilized" world, we live largely in isolation.

So why not introduce belonging and being a part of a community right into our spiritual work. Why not do our work together? Even when we meditate and reflect on our own, why not come together and share as one of the people. Why not gather socially to support and honor each other's journeys? 

This is why I offer spiritual retreats and sharing circles. That and because it's so powerful and transformational. In the end, I always go with what works.

2. Emotional Safety

So if we are going to come together as one of the people and bare our souls to each other, it has to be safe. Really safe. For most of us, the main reason why we shut down our hearts and spiritual nature to start with was because it was simply not safe to be so open and vulnerable.

So it naturally follows that when we go to open up, heal our hearts, and expose our preciousness to other humans once again, it simply has to be safe.

And yet, this proves to be trickier than we might think. When someone shares something that feels emotionally threatening to us ous our tendency to is do something to shut them down. This tends to happen unconsciously. We may not even realize we are doing it. We may even think we are helping them.

Emotionally threatening usually translates to hearing something that makes us feel something that we do not want to feel. When we are threatening in this way, we tend to unconsciously do or say something that gets the person to shut down so we do not have to feel it anymore.

We may say something that distracts them or gets them to get back into their heads. We may give them advice or try to make them feel better.

Of course, the most beneficial and healing thing that could happen in this situation is that both person who is sharing something and the people who are listening to them are allowed to feel.

And that is my primary role in sharing circles and retreats. It's challenging because I have to keep my heart wide open in order to not shut them down myself. My role is to encourage (and make sure) people to stay with their feelings. So, in essence, the circle can only go as deep as everyone present allows it to go.

And if we learn to hold that space in sharing circle, then we can carry it in our communities and families. Now that's a type of leadership that isn't often considered.

3. Genuine Expression 

And once you feel a sense of belonging and emotional safety, it's only natural to share your heart. In sharing circle, we use a specific type of sharing to get really deep within ourselves. It's a form of spiritual inquiry. This involves allowing your share to come to you.

By the time the talking stick comes to you, it is typical that you have thought of several things that you would like to share. And these may be great things to share. But in sharing circle, we like to provide a space to see what else is in there that might be great to share. It may be the difference between what your intellect wants to share and what your heart would like to share.

So when it's our turn we pause, and let our share come to us. We do this by sitting in silence for a moment and seeing what arises. And then having the courage to share even if it does not make much sense at first. Your mind might be saying, "Hold on I had all this planned out and now you're going with this? I have no idea what's going on here."

It tends to feel really raw and vulnerable. It takes a huge amount of courage. It requires a willingness to feel your way through it. It can get fairly instinctive and primal. There may be stuff down there that just needs to come out. You end up reaching for the best words you can find to express the feeling of the space you find yourself in.

Hopefully, I haven't discouraged you in my attempt to describe it. Because it's one of the most powerful spiritual spaces that I know of. You are surrendering to what your heart wants to say, rather than what your mind wants your heart to say.

And this unlocks your intuition and your spiritual gift. and it alow our heart to heal. It reorients you to allow your heart to run the show rather than your intellect. And experiencing this l allows you to embody this in your relationships, career, and everyday life.

So what's in your heart?

4. Empathetic Support

When you're listening to another person sharing, your role is to hold space and offer energetic support. You have to be willing to allow the person to feel and be willing to feel what you are feeling in response to what they are sharing.

When your heart is open, you naturally empathize and relate with them. And this is where all the magic happens. The secret is... we human beings all have the same issues. We just have different variations of those issues.

We all have trust issues. We've all been betrayed and abandoned. We all doubt ourselves and definitely have difficulty accepting our beauty. And we all have a fear that if we truly expose how it feels inside, people will reject us or leave.

Only you're not going to leave. You're going to stay right there with them. As you empathize and relate to the person sharing, you vicariously go on their journey with them. So all the things they encounter on their emotional and spiritual journey, you are experiencing and feeling with them.

Holding this touches your variation of that issue in you. It kind of sneaks up on you. You didn't even have time to resist it. It just kind of comes up out of nowhere. And if you are willing to stay with it and feel it, it unlocks those things in you.

When participating in sharing circle, I have had some of my most powerful spiritual experiences when other people were sharing. Who knows how long it would have taken for me to get to that issue on my own? The person that shared offered me a gift I could not have accessed my own. And I return the favor by sharing something that touches their heart.

This is the synergistic, leveraged power of sharing circle and supportive community. It allows us to touch things in each other that we could not have gotten to as quickly on our own.

"Michael's work consistently helps me recognize my own truth, to actually speak it out loud, and then hear it in a new way. I am always amazed at wherever I am at, whatever I am working with, there is such great value to be gleaned from this powerful practice. Great gratitude for many years of continuing unfoldment."

SHARING CIRCLE CEREMONY

with MICHAEL HOFFMAN

A weekly interactive ceremony to speak your truth and integrate your spiritual nature into your life.

What do you want to awaken in your life?

I’ve invested the last 35 years working in the trenches with spiritually-minded people to develop a sharing circle ceremony that allows you to speak your truth and integrate your spiritual nature into your life.

Sharing Circle is designed for...

• People who are looking for a place where they can speak their truth and have it supported. 
• People who would like to receive support and guidance to integrate their spiritual nature into their everyday life.
• People who are wanting to explore how spiritual ceremony works and how to create a collaborative relationship with spirit.
• People who are seeking deep emotional and spiritual intimacy and want to enjoy a spiritual partnership.
• People who continue 

The Result Is...

An easy-to-follow Sharing Circle Ceremony that gives you a crystal clear, *can’t fail* roadmap for bringing clarity, love, and intimacy into your relationships.

Part 1: Open Yourself to Ceremony

This online sharing circle opens the ceremony by following along with me on Zoom. Each participant takes a turn sharing their heart while the others offer support, and I offer guidance.

• Participate in a Sage Smudge Ceremony: This short online ceremony prepares you for the sharing circle ceremony. The intention of smudge cermony is purification and awakening. It purifies the things that prevent you from being connected and awakens the spiritual aspects of yourself for ceremony. 
• Open Sharing Circle Ceremony. This involves calling in and awkening the energy that we'll use for the ceremony. In my shamanistic tradtion, we refer to it as "calling in the spirits." This opens us to the life-changing magic of ceremony.
• Introduce the Ceremony's Self-Inquiry Question. Sharing Circle's utilize the power of self-inquiry. This involves me (as the facilitator) asking a question for you to reflect upon and receive the answer, and share with circle.

Part 2: Share Your Heart

Your role and responsibility when its your turn is to honestly share your heart and what comes to you. It's an opportunity to delve deep inside yourself and explore what you are experiencing in your life.

• Reflect on What You've Been Experiencing this Week. Perhaps on the morning of the Sharing Circle, think back or review your journal to notice what you have been experiencing spiritually and emotionally this past week.
• Share What's In Your Heart. So you've reflected on your week, related to what someone shared, and have a sense of what you are going to say. Now let it go and let your share come to you. Sharing Circle is a ceremony. Let the magic happen and speak the things that come to you as you share.
• Consider the Guidance Being Presented to You. It might not make sense at first, but try to drink in what's being offered to you. I call it being teachable and considering an alternative view. This opens the door for insight and truth to directly come to you.
• Integrate What Came to You in Sharing Circle During the Following Week. Sharing Circle is amazing for integrating new things into your life. Try a few of the insights and new approaches out for a test drive. See what happens and then share about it in the next week's Sharing Circle.

Part 3: Offer Empathetic Support

When you're listening to another person sharing, your role is to hold space and offer energetic support.

• Allow in the Energy of the Person Sharing. Sharing circle begins with a willingness to listen. It can be challenging to just listen without offering suggestions or fixing anything. What arises inside of you as you listen to and feel what is being shared?
• Offer Support and Empathy to the Other People Sharing. The magic of Sharing Circle is created by offering support and compassion for the person sharing. Empathy is feeling with the person sharing and the guidance they are receiving. 
• Notice How the Person's Share Relates to Your Life.

  As you empathize and relate to the person sharing, you vicariously go on their journey with them. You feel and experience the things they encounter with them. Holding this touches and heals your variation of that issue in you.

Still Undecided?

You know you're ready to speak your truth and embody your spiritual nature in the Sharing Circle if...

1. You just starting to explore speaking your truth and bringing your spiritual nature into your life, and you want to make sure it plugs it into your life right out of the gates by using only the most powerful, personalized, and easy-to-follow strategies.

2. You’ve been trying to find a place to speak your truth and express your spirituality for months (or even years), but haven’t seen noticeable results in your life. If anything, the gap between being confident and what you've been experiencing has gotten wider.

3. You already KNOW the qualities you want in your life. Sure, you are open to some guidance and support in the Sharing Circle to learn how to plug it in... but for the most part, you know what you want, and you are ready to enjoy it in your life.

4. You have no problem investing 3 hours per week as long as you know that every bit of time and energy you invest is an effective step forward in having confidence, purpose, and joy in your life.

5. In fact, you’re ALREADY investing lots of time and energy doing things like reading books, listening to podcasts, and doing online workshops. 

The only problem is, without a supportive and interactive place to tie these ideas altogether, you are left wondering, “Is all this stuff really working?”

6. You want something that works: You have heard about or even tried interactive groups or counseling before. You paid your money, invested the effort, (and worst of all, got hopeful), only to land back in the same lonely and unfulfilling place.

You want a program that actually results in experiencing some noticeable confidence and self-assuredness in your life.

7. You can actually envision the confident and self-assured you that will come to life once you add some guidance and support. You can see what it would be like to feel comfortable in your own skin. You’ve always known it was possible.

8. You’re excited to try the Sharing Circle. Even if you’ve been side-tracked and let down before, you’re currently feeling a wave of renewed optimism.

You realize that by this time next week, you can be sitting around a fire with a group of men with a common goal which will begin your journey toward enjoying friendships, work, and relationships in a more natural way.

If you caught yourself nodding your head to at least 5 of the 8 points above, then I absolutely cannot wait to meet you in the Sharing Circle.