Gather Your Gurus

August 2010

In the yogic tradition, gurus are wise spiritual teachers who help guide you on the path to enlightenment. But you don’t need to trek to India next time you need some sage advice! There are guides, mentors, and teachers all around who can help enrich your life. One informal, but venerable, version of those gurus can be found among your girlfriends. Sometimes when I’m out with a few of my friends I find myself in awe of the amount of wisdom assembled around the table. When you want a comforting connection, deep insight about something or other, or just to have fun and be reminded of your own magnificence, gather your gurus. These five creative ideas will get you started.

Host a salon.
Modern salons are a reinvention of the seventeenth-century salon movement in France in which the intelligentsia gathered in the homes of cultured women to discuss topics of the day. You can host a salon to learn something (i.e.: bring in a teacher or speaker), to address an issue in the community, or to build a network of gurus and other intriguing people. A salon differs from a party in that casual conversation and food or drink are secondary to the raison d’être—the topic around which the gathering forms. It can be a onetime event or one of a series that allows for a wider variety of attendees. Inviting new members to join each time can prolong the life of a salon series.

Join or start a women’s circle.
This is a private group of 5-15 members who meet on a regular basis for a specific purpose—for example, spiritual growth, professional advancement, or support through an illness or shared concern. The aim of the circle is to heal and foster growth in its members so they can in turn be agents of healing and growth in the world. Some circles are informal discussion groups, while others include a ritual component like lighting a candle to open the meeting and snuffing it out at the close. One element nearly all circles agree on is allowing each participant time to share without interruption, safe in the knowledge there will be no feedback unless she asks for it.

Connect with an action partner.
An action partner is a co-guru of sorts. You and she check in by phone daily (or weekly or biweekly if that’s easier) and share briefly with each other what actions you’ll take to move your lives along. These actions can be in the realm of your work, relationships, self-care, or bringing a dream into reality—whatever is important to you. Then follow up with a quick call or e-mail to share what you’ve accomplished.

Add a touch of class after class.
Ask one or more guru-level friends to accompany you to a class, lecture, or bookstore reading. Afterward go out or back to someone’s house for dinner or dessert to discuss what you heard and to share insights. Often you’ll find that you get more from this after-review than from the actual event.

Grab a gratitude buddy.
Your gratitude buddy is the person with whom you share what is at this very moment filling your heart with gratitude. I think of it as counting your blessings in the presence of a witness. Simply making a gratitude list or keeping a gratitude journal is a praiseworthy practice, but voicing it to someone else makes it all the more real.  

Adapted from 'Living a Charmed Life: Your Guide to Finding Magic in Every Moment of Every Day', by Victoria Moran, HarperOne, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, www.victoriamoran.com.