Something happens when women get together and share ideas, thoughts, opinions, and all the elements of a busy life. We seem to have something in common. Our commonalities are greater than our differences. We all breathe, we all came from a woman, we share the women’s mysteries, and we can bond like no other collection of living creatures.

When we group together, we sometimes reach that peak of experience where a group becomes more than the collection of individuals. Such a group of women can reach the one-mindedness of high dialogue without losing the individuality of any one person. What follows is similar to high play, or being in the zone of possibilities. We operate as a group mind. Differences still exist but we move into the implicate order described by David Bohm, the great physicist. Then, the numinous breaks through and we are enfolded into the wisdom of the universe.

Then and there we reach our capacity for joy. When we are one, we find joy in being, joy in caring, joy in creating, joy in evolving, joy in learning, joy in working, joy in playing, and joy in loving. These eight joys are a good way to bring a group of women into oneness. Creating a ritual on the spot, you and your friends can use these joys to be in that space and time together as one. I use the eight directions to bring the joys into our bodies.

Claiming one joy for each direction, and shifting our bodies to face the compass points from southeast to northwest; from northeast to southwest; from east to west to north to south in a moving meditation makes a very good invocation to become a unit, a whole, or a system. A system is a collection of parts that hang together. A system is a whole that is more than the sum of its parts.

Mother Nature, who knows best, works in systems. She also creates by playfully messing about. So, whenever we women get together, we are able to reach high self-awareness and out of that comes great creative productivity. We have studies that show self-awareness and creativity are positively linked together. My latest bumper sticker is: “Certainty cancels creativity” so an open mind is also part of the process. Here is another piece of wisdom: “A fixed mind is broken.”

It is in our diversity that our strength is brought to life. When we are one, we will find a portion of our strengths, from which comes our power.

From Marjorie R. Barlow, Ph.D. August 24, 2003