Sacred Circle Dance

Dance Camp

~ MaryG ~ 23 Comments

I’ve made my first questionable decision of 2026.

I’ve registered and paid for a five-day dance retreat in Maine in August.

I’ve been hearing about “Ferry Beach” from my fellow Unitarian Universalists for decades. This mythical coastal retreat center has transformed many a life. They’ve got retreats for everything from Yoga, to Women’s Healing, to Buddhism. My church friend Ron, who leads our monthly Sacred Circle Dance, is co-leading a week-long Sacred Circle Dance retreat. I brought the flyer home and stuck it on the refrigerator about a month ago.

With my husband’s knee replacement recovery taking for fucking ever, we have zero travel plans. Nothing booked. Nothing to look forward to. And I have no idea when or what type of travel he’s going to be up for.

This led me to Dance Camp. I tried to convince my two friends from high school that I rarely get to see to join me there, but so far, no dice.

So…I went ahead and registered for five nights by myself in the mythical UU retreat center. Dancing 5 hours a day with strangers, could be a terrible idea. I mean, I like our monthly dance, but this is going to be waaaay more than that. There’s a chance I might hate it and bail out after a night or two.

In any case, I’ll have finally experienced Ferry Beach.

Anandamayi

~ MaryG ~ 12 Comments

Yesterday at Sacred Circle Dance, a newcomer named Ananda joined us. She’s a lovely woman, about my age, who is mostly deaf but communicates well. We learned that she was named after Anandamayi Ma—the revered Indian spiritual teacher. Ananda told us that she had traveled to India as a young woman in search of Anandamayi and saw her in person after a long journey across the country.

Ananda’s main memory was of seeing Anandamayi at the end of a long hallway—a very old woman with a wrinkled face. Yet, Ananda experienced her as “the most beautiful woman” she had ever seen.

To be honest, I had never heard of Anandamayi Ma before, but others in the Circle had. In fact, Ron (the leader of the Circle) knew a dance inspired by her and named after her, which he taught to us.

My experience of the dance was very positive. I felt a real sense of peace and connection with the other dancers—and by extension, other humans.

Ananda told us that her name means Joy or Bliss. I feel like this long-deceased woman from the other side of the world brought a sense of that to our Circle yesterday.

Short bio written by ChatGPT:

Anandamayi Ma (1896–1982) was a revered Indian spiritual teacher known for her profound sense of divine joy and inner realization. Born as Nirmala Sundari in present-day Bangladesh, she displayed spiritual awareness from a young age, often entering deep states of meditation without formal training. Her followers believed that her wisdom was innate rather than learned, and she rarely identified with any particular religious doctrine, instead emphasizing direct experience of the divine.

Throughout her life, Anandamayi Ma traveled across India, attracting devotees from diverse backgrounds, including scholars, politicians, and ordinary seekers. She spoke of the importance of self-realization, devotion, and surrender to God, encouraging individuals to follow their own spiritual paths sincerely. Despite her growing fame, she maintained a simple lifestyle and often referred to herself as a child of the Divine.

Her presence was described as deeply peaceful and transformative, with many reporting a sense of peace and clarity in her company. Even today, her teachings continue to inspire spiritual seekers worldwide, emphasizing unity, love, and the eternal nature of the soul beyond worldly identities.

Happy Solstice

~ MaryG ~ 6 Comments

Yesterday I participated in a sacred circle dance where we honored Yule and the winter solstice.

AI depiction of our sacred circle yesterday, which included a 90+ year old woman and her 5 adult daughters all dressed in white for her birthday

The sun set at 4:16pm yesterday so we lit a fire in our fireplace in the evening. I had a memory of how much we really wanted a fireplace when we were house hunting. (Our first house did not have one.) We only use our fireplace occasionally, but it IS special to have an an indoor fire on these longest, darkest nights of the year.

As the embers burned down, I made myself two s’mores for dessert.

And now, on Winter Solstice morning (December 21) it is still pitch black at 6:30am and I’m awaiting the replay of the livestream of the ancient chamber at Newgrange in Ireland, which we visited in June. (I wasn’t up at at 3:40am to watch it live.) We saw a demonstration of how the sun lights up the inner chamber on the solstice when we were there, but I want to see the real version.

Finally, if you missed this year’s Lucia Morning broadcast from Visby, Sweden on St. Lucia Day (December 13), it’s a great thing to experience during these dark long nights. I watch it every year. The second children’s choir (the younger kids in the adorable wool coats and sweaters) are particularly enchanting.

Wishing all of my fellow Northern Hemisphere dwellers a light in the darkness this December solstice day. It only gets brighter from here.

🔥