It’s 5 p.m. on a Sunday, and between the weekend’s hangover and the impending Monday blues, you’ve found yourself seated in a circle amongst strangers. Well, not everyone is a stranger. You recognize some familiar faces you’ve brushed shoulders with in the line at Usdan or in a backyard on Fountain Avenue, but no one you’ve ever really gotten to know. You are about to begin a practice called “circling,” or a practice of authentically relating to those around you.
You aren’t really sure what that means. Don’t we relate to others every day? How is this practice any different from casually chatting with someone you just sat next to on the first day of class? Isabel Hoffman ’24 unpacked what “authentic relating” truly means.
“Authentic relating is being able to shed yourself of the social scripts that we follow on an everyday basis, to peel back the layers of what we’re really experiencing in the moment,” Hoffman said. “You can express your emotions and experiences in a way that might be perceived as kind of strange or unusual outside of circling. You can release yourself of trying to be cool or trying to be perceived in a certain way. I allow myself to sit as I would sit if I were a kid, [with] no perception of other people’s opinions.”
Hoffman went on to explain circling as a space for mindfulness, connecting with yourself and sharing empathy with others. Circling strives to fight against the loneliness that can come with meditation, and instead make the process collaborative and healing for everyone involved.
“One of the main goals is to be present in your mind, body, and in the group,” she said. “You can’t really be present in the group before you’re present with yourself. And I like to describe circling as an interpersonal meditation. It’s like you’re meditating out loud. It can take away some of that isolation while still having the same benefits.”
Olivia Hoffman-Paul ’26 began circling this semester and explained that it’s a unique space on campus. She spoke about how circling goes beyond lunchtime chats and late-night study sessions with friends. It is an attempt to connect with your peers on a deeper level.
“Circling allows for a connection that you don’t get [in] other places,” Hoffman-Paul said. “You’re not talking to this person to figure out what you have in common. You’re trying to understand how they’re feeling. And you might not even remember their name. But you’re trying to see them and share where you both are in the moment, which is not the kind of experience you’re going to get at a party or at lunch.”
In summer 2021, Hoffman met a group of friends at a Jewish farming camp who practiced mindfulness and invited her to join for a night of circling. It was through this that Hoffman fell in love with the practice. She went on to introduce circling to her Wesleyan friends and began to hold larger sessions in Alpha Delta Phi. Circling is now a registered club within the Mindful Wes program.
“I was drawn to the way that people could connect so authentically without filtering themselves,” Hoffman said. “The year before at Wesleyan, I was disappointed in my interactions with people because I was having a hard time connecting during COVID. So, when I got back my sophomore year, I was like, ‘I need to start doing this here.’”
The language that participants use in circling encourages them to connect through four specific prompts: what are you noticing, what are you imagining, what are you wondering or curious about, and finally, what kinds of stories are you encountering within the circle? Hoffman related “noticing” within the circle to the communication of one’s sensory experience.
“You start off noticing the sensations in your body, your five senses, noticing what thoughts are coming up while not casting judgment on those thoughts,” she said. “[You notice] other people’s body language and how other people are taking up space, again, not judging, just noticing.”
Hoffman emphasized that imagining, the second prompt, is a key aspect of the practice. Although no one knows how others are feeling in the space or what they are experiencing, everyone recognizes that each one is living their own reality. According to Hoffman, it’s important to imagine what they might be experiencing in order to empathize and connect with them.
Nathan Foote ’24, who attends circling frequently, described the purpose of wondering or asking questions within the circle.
“‘I wonder’ or ‘I have a question’ is a way to genuinely express things that I’m curious about,” Foote said. “What I’m curious about is just a statement about my perspective. It’s not a statement about any social obligation the other person has to me.”
The final prompt in circling is storytelling. Nina Jakobson ’24 described her interpretation of stories as narratives we come up with about other people, sometimes unjustifiably. Stories have a lot of power to influence our behaviors and how we interact with the people around us. Circling can work as a way to combat that.
“A story can be if you walk into a room and immediately, for whatever reason, decide to hate someone—or the opposite, you find someone in the room and just connect with them or love them,” Jakobson said. “Our brains have this tendency to make a story that ‘I hate this person because they breathe weirdly. I love this person because [of] something about their eyes.’ Circling is an environment where you can critically question those stories and understand what is serving you and then also what’s holding you back.”
Foote explained that stories can serve to help us understand ourselves. Circling can help one learn how they tell stories, what stories they tell, and what their perspective is. However, Foote cautioned that we often tell stories or make judgments about others in real life without realizing it. He emphasized that stories are simply one person’s view, not an accurate reflection of others.
“When we’re talking socially, we are living in our stories,” he said. “We’re taking them to be true almost all the time. All those stories build up inside of us, and there’s some people who you have a lot of stories in contradiction with—you kind of feel out of touch with them. But stories are just reflections of how we see the world and not reflections of how the world really is.”
The freedom of expression can sometimes elicit conflict within the circle. As the group’s facilitator, Hoffman spoke about how she views this discomfort.
“I think it’s difficult because part of expressing your truth in the moment can often be like, ‘Hey, you’re really frustrating me right now’ or ‘I’m really irritated by that thing you said,’” she said. “It’s almost like you owe it to that person to tell them. But I think you can do it in an empathetic way, with grace, honesty, and forgiveness. And it’s not necessarily negative. Everything is in the perspective of what you’re experiencing. So instead of saying, ‘Hey, what you said was really annoying,’ you’re saying, ‘I’m feeling annoyed by what you said.’”
Jakobson elaborated on the value of confronting conflict in the practice of circling.
“I think that one of the most beautiful things about circling is learning to live inside conflict and navigate it to find better understanding and connection,” she said.
If you’re curious about mindfulness practices, looking to connect with others, or just need a safe space to center yourself before the week begins, maybe give circling a try. It’s a chance to engage in extended eye contact with a stranger, use sounds and movements to express your true self, experiment with new language as a means of self-expression, and share an intimate space with fellow students eager for deeper connections. Circling sessions are held at 5 p.m. every Sunday at Lotus House.
Dove Bonjean-Alpart can be reached at dbonjeanalpa@wesleyan.edu.
Nicki Klar can be reached at nklar@wesleyan.edu.