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From August 14 through August 17, 2008, Kindred Spirits hosted its 16th Annual Circle in Hot Springs, NC. The Kindred Spirits group began when Holly Boswell “encountered several other ‘kindred spirits’ at the first Southern Comfort Conference in 1991.” I was able to spend time talking with Holly a few days after she returned from hosting the retreat in its 16th year.

After meeting other “kindred spirits” at Southern Comfort in 1991, several people used snail mail (since e-mail was not a viable option for many in the early 1990s) to create a network and plan a gathering. “We yearned to experience the power and magic of the Sacred Circle,” Boswell said. There were 13 people at the first Kindred Spirits retreat in 1993.

And Holly Boswell may well be the most likely person to have led such a spiritual movement for trans people. In 1991, Holly wrote an editorial for Tapestry Magazine, in which she argued that the term transgender should not just describe both transsexuals and transvestites, but also those who choose to live between these two ends of a trans spectrum. Holly Boswell can be credited with coining that particular usage of the term transgender – which focuses more on gender transgression and transcendence than on transversing the middle boundary between male and female.

The Kindred Spirits retreat has grown over the years, and now has its own website, trans-spirits.org, where I found an essay by Holly entitled “The Spirit of Transgender,” along with the Kindred Spirits Origin Myth. The website also provides insight into the ultimate goal of Kindred Spirits, which Holly re-stated during our time together:

“We have positioned ourselves in the forefront of service to the spiritual life of the transgendered community, supporting its leaders, teachers, healers, artists and seekers in non-dogmatic, creative, and playful ways,” she said. She went on to say that a visionary had instructed Kindred Spirits. “Your ancestors welcome you home. Your energy is needed now in the world, to help restore balance and harmony. Your lineage is older than the fall of Adam and Eve, so you can help them. Show the men and the women how they are one, and remind them that they are one with all beings. You have the power. Heal each other, and as you do so, go forth and help heal the world,” came the instruction.

And Kindred Spirits has grown tremendously over the past 16 years with this mission. This global network of trans people based in the Southern Appalachians has seen about 2000 participants since its inception.

But Kindred Spirits leaders don’t measure success by how many people attend each year. Rather, Holly said, they pay attention to “direct feedback, continuous growth, broader work, the evolution of a committed ‘core group’ that serves all aspects of our endeavors, plus the resurgence of our ancestry.”

When asked if she felt that Kindred Spirits is successful, she answered a resounding “Amazingly, yes!” Though Holly recognizes that Kindred Spirits serves a “special niche within the greater Trans community,” she believes Kindred Spirits is a successful endeavor. “As we further get the word out, there will be others who can benefit, for sure. We are resurrecting a pathway to our global Trans heritage, which has the potential of liberating those of us who need to honor those traditions, which also now speak to our new wave of genderqueer,” Holly said.

So, what happens at these amazing retreats?

The retreat convenes on a Thursday with an opening circle, which asks people why they were drawn to come and what their intentions are. It also asks if there is any particular need for healing they might have, and then expresses gratitude for blessings that they enjoy, which Holly said provided “kind of a counterbalance to the need for healing.”

On Friday, the group hikes down to a river together to get to a swimming hole and take a clothing optional dip. At first, they did it just for fun, and “then over the years we realized it’s a powerful ritual, because we’re likely to see every kind of imaginable body – all genders, all in between, every stage of transition – there are no two bodies alike,” Holly said.

“At first, everyone faces their fears, their body issues, and then once everyone does that, it’s freeing – you kind of get over all of those hang-ups, it’s liberating, and also the group feels more comfortable, you just break through those walls – shame and insecurities,” she continued.

Then begins an afternoon of teachings where people at the circle who have certain backgrounds share or teach about their special area of knowledge. Then, to relax, the group soaks in the hot tubs at Hot Springs on Friday night.

Saturdays begin with climbing up a mountain where spontaneous ceremonies occur, and which Holly said are “sometimes quite diverse.” Saturday afternoon brings more teaching and sharing sessions, and then Saturday evenings are a time of celebration – sometimes a musical jam session or telling stories around a campfire (not necessarily ghost stories, I’m told).

Holly said that during each retreat, someone wants to teach about Shamanic Journeying, which is “a little like lucid dreaming, but it’s like a self-guided inner journey that’s done in a trance state – and that’s to solve your own mysteries and get information and power from the unseen world – the energetic world.”

This spiritual part of trans-being, Holly says, is “an often-neglected aspect of being,” for all of us, not just trans people. She also said, “then there’s the emotional plane, too, that very often even in the support group there’s a certain guardedness perhaps, you get to a certain stage of sharing and that’s all good, there may be some tears, there’s certainly some laughter. The emotional sharing is definitely a good thing – the kind of open sharing we enjoy at our weekend retreats.”

“I don’t think it’s a big secret that many queer folk don’t often feel at home in organized religion because there are so many teachings against who we are and trans people especially get stigmatized – we stick out like a sore thumb – and they often get or feel turned away. We offer this [Kindred Spirits] for people who need spiritual community, which is what Kindred Spirits means – it means spiritual family,” she concluded.