Stories & Wisdom from our Aura Circles, South Africa 2025

Be The Earth's Aura Programme supports Aura Circles — women holding their own women's circles to create quiet spaces for connecting, self-care, feminine wisdom and transforming communities; nurturing different ways of being in the world.

Read the stories and wisdom from the nine Aura Circles that we supported in South Africa in 2025.

Esethu Mbooi: “Aura taught me that not everything sacred can be controlled”

When I received the grant to run the women’s circles, I was so excited. I prepared everything to perfection, sent invitations, and fifteen women confirmed, but only three arrived.

I panicked at first, but once the session began, I realised that everyone who was meant to be there was there. That experience was so profound, it reminded me that the circle has an energy of its own.

As a planner, I love curating experiences. I tend to believe that a thoroughly planned event elevates the experience and that’s exactly how I approached the first circle. But Aura taught me something different: that not everything sacred can be controlled. From that first day, I learned to trust the process and allow the circle to unfold as it needed to.

I realised that I am not the circle I am a participant in it.

Each gathering since then has shown me how simply holding an intention brings the energy of the circle to life. I would plan who was coming and what we were going to do, but on the day, the circle would always take its own shape, guided by what was collectively needed at that moment. Letting go and allowing the energy of the group to move where it needs to have been deeply freeing. 

It changed my perspective, I no longer see healing as something someone does or gives to someone, but as something that naturally happens when the right space is held with care and intention.

Aura also deepened my understanding of sisterhood. I have two younger sisters, one ten years younger, the other thirteen. When they were born, my father told me that as a big sister, whatever I do, they will do too. I took that responsibility to heart and became not just a big sister to them, but to many women I’ve met along my journey.

Sisterhood has always been sacred to me, but Aura showed me that it’s not just about giving and protecting, it’s also about receiving, being vulnerable, and allowing others to hold me. In most areas of my life, I am the one who knows, who gives, who carries, but in the circle, I was reminded that true sisterhood has no hierarchy. It’s a collective act of holding space for each other’s growth.

Having my sisters join the circle was especially powerful. As I’ve been learning to see them as adults and trust their journeys, even when letting go feels hard.

Aura reminded me that sisterhood is round and collective it thrives in trust, openness, and shared transformation.

Noloyiso Mnguni: “My circle loves giving to the community”

This year, my Aura Circle has really been about giving back to the community.

When we first met, it was just introductions. I got to know the ladies. By the second gathering, I could see that many of them were going through emotional abuse and difficult situations. I’m a businesswoman, so I invited other women to come and motivate them — to speak about business, about social work, about possibilities. I also brought in social workers to support them.

By the third circle, I was in hospital after an operation. I couldn’t walk properly. But these women came to see me in hospital. After I was discharged, they came to my home. They helped me in the mornings, with everything. I don’t want to lie — they are the best people I’ve met. Every step of the way, they were there.

Even while I was recovering, we continued giving back.

There was a place where shacks had burnt down, so we packed sandwiches and handed out food. Another time, I bought pads, toothpaste and essentials for young girls preparing for exams. My circle loves giving to the community. That is what I love about them.

I’ve been in and out of hospital because I had womb cancer and went through chemotherapy. I’m done with chemo now, just going for check-ups. Every Saturday, they still come and check on me. It’s a great circle I’ve built with these women. Only two I knew before — the others I gathered from my local community, women I felt needed support.

When I first went to Aura, I came from a traumatising place near Cape Town — there are gunshots, killings, constant noise — no quietness. So the quiet of Aura scared me. I was frustrated. Why is it so quiet? But that quietness changed me.

I learned to hear my thoughts. I learned to sit with the sunrise and feel like the sun is hugging me. I learned to listen to the birds, watch the clouds, to reconnect with nature.

Aura taught me that people are like seasons. Sometimes you meet someone in winter. Sometimes in summer. It helped me understand women more — and myself. I’ve learned I’m really a calm person. There’s no need for me to be angry. Aura has changed me a lot.

Matilda Tsitsi Fakazi: “We need more stillness to experience the transformation we are looking for”

I just knew that I wanted to do something with women in a different way.

I used to work with women through gender-based violence workshops and women’s empowerment workshops. But as transitions were happening in my own life, I felt there was more. If we really want women to heal, there is more.

I didn’t know where to start, but Aura guided me.

I found a way of helping women heal themselves without having to fix anything — just by providing a safe space where they can explore their own healing in their own way.

Each circle is different. Sometimes there are seven women, and many of them are healers. Sometimes we open the circle and it becomes 15 or 20 women. We work with the full moon. We find it very empowering and interesting that all of us will be menstruating during the full moon. It’s beautiful to spend the day together — connecting to nature, storytelling. For us, it feels like a retreat. Like a red tent retreat.

We sit in nature. Sometimes we give our blood back to the earth. It has been such an amazing experience to work with women in this deeper, more meaningful way. I find it more impactful than the workshops I used to hold.

Attending the Aura retreat with Eve and Renata transformed my life. Before that retreat, I used to be somebody else. In the non-profit space, I felt life was unfair to me. I felt like people didn’t see me. But sitting there for five days, listening to Renata speak about experiences similar to mine, my life shifted.

Every day now, I make time for myself. I do simple things to keep my life as a retreat. I feel honoured to pass on what Aura gave to me, to other women. I also see them transforming...

👉 CONTINUE READING MATILDA'S STORY

Tumi Zolo: “I found my people when I joined Aura”

Before I found my way to Aura, I was going through a very hard time.

I’d broken up with the father of my kids, and couldn’t find a way out. I was alone, looking at life one-dimensionally. I was judging myself, living in the past, blaming myself. I wasn’t even in a position to take care of my kids. I gave them to their father and fell into a rabbit hole of self-blame.

In the Aura circle, I could let go of some of the burdens I was carrying — to see life in a different perspective. There were other women in different situations, and we could support each other through them.

Being around women who “get it” was transformative. I was surrounded by women 30 years older, 20 years older, five years younger. We were all there because something in our lives had forced us to look up. Because once you’re in a rabbit hole for such a long time, the only way to look is up. Everyone wanted to be uplifted, to be loved — it was a beautiful experience. 

Every time I start my circles, I always go back to that emotion. 

For the first time, I felt held with love and understanding — and it wasn’t by my family. That shocked me. But I also understood that the way I was raised was not the only way to live.

I grew up in an environment where we looked down on each other, shouted, made each other feel lesser than. In the Aura circle, it was the complete opposite.

I then went on a personal meditation for 10 days.

I went deeper into myself — and my last circle was about that. I can only say it was as beautiful experience: we merged silence with meditation and music. I’ve never had a beautiful relationship with silence, and as I cultivated that into my life and brought it into my circle, the women were so intrigued; listening to their heartbeats, their breaths, the music.

It made me realise how beautiful nothing is. 

I am so grateful for this community of women. It’s the first time I have experienced something like this — women who ask for love and return it.

It’s not nice living in the world thinking you are alone. I always knew that I wasn’t alone, but I also wanted proof. Aura came at the perfect time, when I wasn’t okay, and knowing wasn’t enough anymore. 

I found my people when I joined Aura.

Meliny Julies: “I love who I am becoming”

Together, myself and my group have come to the realisation that pain and difficulty is part of our lives — like we experience different seasons in our lives. Together, we have come to embrace and share these different seasons. We understand that every season we go through good, bad, happy, sad…forms part of our growth. Nothing stays the same. 

The most important thing for us now is that we have support in each other, and that we never have to stand alone again. 

If we look at our lives with empathy and believe that everything serves for our own good — in the end it makes the road beautiful. 

We have come to understand that there is a Higher Power who are in control of our lives and that gives us more freedom to acceptance. We try not to live with resentment but rather forgiveness. That gives us a sense of freedom. 

We look for the beauty even in the difficult things.

Aura taught me that I am never too good to get better. Whilst I live, my good work never ends…the smallest good deed, that goes unseen by others are seen by a power greater than us. 

We share what works for us, we share what helps us. We as women are powerful and have special powers to change within ourselves. We are the difference that we want to see in this world. 

Aura taught me that in everything there is a beginning and an end — even in our lives. We are born, but we are also designed to die. 

I connect to the mountains, I connect to the moon, I connect to the soil, I connect to the rocks, the river, the ocean, the trees. Everything I once saw as just…I now see as a beautiful part of myself… their change, their growth, their death has a reflection on my own lifecycle. 

The moon, the sun, the stars, I am them, and they are me.

The power of understanding and living is so much greater within me that I don’t see anything as a challenge anymore — but a way to live better and to my fullest. 

I love who I am becoming.

Jacqueline van Meygaarden: “Each woman found healing in the permission to play”

It’s been a year full of wonderful surprises, playful interactions, deep connection, and a sense of the beauty and power when women gather intentionally.

One experience where I witnessed the transformative effect of the circle of women was in a simple introduction exercise. We were 9 women, sitting on cushions under a tree. We were invited to introduce ourselves by saying our name, our mother’s name, and our grandmother’s name. We then shared what our ‘blood’ or ancestry means to the person next to us. 

Everyone shared deeply. The paired conversations deepened to the lineages of mothers and fathers and brought up deeper pain, sadness, and hurt for some. Those women shared how they didn’t realise the emotional pain they were carrying about their ancestry — but felt safe enough to open up and share in this space.

Another transformative experience was the circle I hosted in October 2025 — a playful, expressive dance and movement circle.

This 2 hour dance experience, facilitated by Sabrina, was transformational for everyone, as shared in the closing reflection circle. Sabrina brought us all into a space of feeling free to move, jiggle, leap and play.

We did free dance; we danced as different textures and colours; we clustered around an imaginary fire and roared our power; we even went on hunts for nuts as squirrels! 

What was so beautiful was that every woman felt totally free to play like a child. A deep letting go happened. The sharing afterwards was profound as each person found healing in the “permission to play”.

The Aura circles have given me a greater sense of confidence in holding these spaces of femininity. When I connect to the spirit of what we’re trying to do, everything flows with so little effort. I feel less concerned about “getting it right” and more rooted in being a container that holds space for other women to feel, connect, share, and laugh.

I've noticed that I spend more time observing the small things in the world around me — in plants, insects, how the light falls on certain objects. And my favourite: the movement of light on water. 

My relationship with the more-than-human is stronger and clearer. Having taken time in our circles to listen to plants, to our breathe, draw something in nature — I find I have more time to pause and to notice. 

It could seem like a tiny thing — but is in fact massive!

Patricia Abrahams: “We are no longer a group of ladies — we are a family”

This year, the most memorable thing in my Aura circle was when two of the ladies lost their relatives. I never thought that the circle would be so supportive — ladies who were not working stayed with the families, helping with cleaning and cooking for the grieving families. 

This made me realise that people can care for each other so deeply. Also, that we are no longer a group of ladies — we are basically a family.

It has been an amazing journey with each of the women and their families. 

Karen Sameuls: “It felt as if our souls were connected”

During our Aura Circle this year, something transformative happened. There was a moment where energy, emotion and connection flowed so naturally that if felt as if our souls were connected — speaking to each another.

My philosophy for the circle has always been about speaking to each other in stillness and openness. When we gather like that, something within shifts; layers of tension melt away, our hearts soften, and there’s a deep sense of peace and understanding.

The ladies feel it just by being present.

Aura is more than a gathering. It reminds us of the light we carry, and how powerful that light becomes when sharing in unity. We formed a bond — its like we became one. We became people the women could rely on in times of hardship.

Through my journey with Aura, I’ve also noticed a transformation in how I relate to myself, with others, and the world around me. Aura has helped me slow down listen, truly listen — not just hearing someone, but deep listening, with more compassion and less judgment. 

It’s deepened my relationships with others, allowing me to connect from a place of empathy and presence rather than action.

And perhaps most profoundly, its opened an awareness to the more-than-human world. For me, the quiet wisdom of trees, the rhythm of the wind, the calm presence of the earth beneath my feet.

When we did the Aura midwife training, we learned how trees can communicate with each other just by their leaves blowing in the wind. That made me see that everything is connected, every breath, every heartbeat is part of something greater: that sense of belonging has changed everything.

At one point this year, things didn’t go as planned. I confided in Eve, and she told me something simple: “Stand up. Do your thing. Be Karen.”

So I did.

I stepped up for my circle. And now the women talk about the circles for days, for weeks. They can’t wait for the next one.

That makes my heart full, just knowing that I do something that other people appreciate. This year, all I want is to see my ladies flourish in everything they do.

Nomalady Xujwa: “When you empower a mother, you empower her children too”

I can recall a time when I felt I was carrying inside a very heavy weight. For months I was bottling it up. I had lost my job because of mistrust in people — and ended up being betrayed.

Before the Aura opportunity came, I’d wanted to gather women, but I didn’t have funds. When you organise women, you need something — food, a place, something small to share. I didn’t have that capacity.

Then Be The Earth provided a little bit of funding through Aura, and that became a transforming moment for me. That’s where I started to blossom again, after the hope and trust that I lost. 

Being able to gather women, sit with them, look at them — not feeling sorry for myself anymore, but feeling proud to hold the space — changed me. If I could do the Aura circle, that means that I can do anything that I put my mind to.

I would also like to express gratitude for my mentor, Nowhi Nozibele Mdayi, who played a huge role in my life — training, encouraging, and empowering me. I'm grateful to be around her aura; her dedication to others speaks volumes. I love her.

I found myself laughing again. I began looking at life differently. I stopped being so hard on myself. In the circle there’s no right or wrong. You just flow and be you. There’s no judgment.

It’s a clean, sacred, safe space — that I created for the women and for myself.

We gather once a month. At the beginning, I asked the women to draw or write what they wanted the circle to become — what outcomes did they hope for? When I listened, I realised most of us were broken.

So our first phase was about loving yourself...

👉 CONTINUE READING NOMALADY'S STORY