Sacred Friendships: Sisterhood as a Healing Practice
February is known for romance, but becoming whole asks a broader question: who helps you heal?
Many women are strong in public, but alone in private are carrying grief, change, and responsibilities without enough places to put them down. Sacred friendship is one of the most overlooked healing practices because it makes restoration relational, not just personal.
Connection is not a bonus. Harvard Health Publishing notes that strong social networks are associated with better health outcomes, including brain health. A long-term study on friendship quality found that increasing positive friendships predicted better health over time. The research is clear: it is not simply having people around, it is having the right people.
A National Institutes of Health review describes social support as a vital health resource and a buffer against stress. That is what sisterhood can become when it is built with intention.
To practice sacred friendship, use a simple framework: safety, honesty, and reciprocity. These three qualities turn friendship into a place you can heal, not a place you have to perform.
Safety
Safe friends do not punish your truth. They can hold your joy and your mess without gossip or comparison. Ask yourself, do I feel calmer after I talk to her?
Repair move: Set a standard for how you share. Offer what is real, not what is polished.
Honesty
Honest friends tell the truth with care. They do not let you lie to yourself about what is costing you. In a conversation about friendship, Maya Angelou described friendship this way: “In a friendship you get to know the spirit of another person.”
Repair move: Choose one friend and ask a deeper question than usual, then listen without rushing to fix.
Reciprocity
Reciprocity is not keeping score. It is knowing you can ask and receive without shame. Toni Morrison wrote in The Source of Self-Regard that, “What one puts up with in a friendship is determined by the emotional value of the relationship.”
Repair move: Decide what is no longer worth the emotional cost and adjust your access accordingly.
If you want to make this practice real, create a sisterhood ritual. Choose one friend for a weekly check-in and one for a monthly “whole-life” conversation. Ask: What are you healing? What do you need this week? What are you saying no to so you can become whole?
Sacred friendships do not replace professional support when you need it, but they do restore the parts of you that heal best in relationship. Becoming whole is not only about what you release. It is also about who helps you remember yourself.
Deneen L. Garrett is the Founder and CEO of Deneen L. Garrett LLC, a Dream Lifestyle Coach, writer and international speaker. She is the creator of the Dream Lifestyle™ Collective, a curated space for Black women fifty and older to Dream, Decide/Design and Drive™ their next chapter with joy and intention. Deneen is also the creator and host of “Women of Color: An Intimate Conversation,” a 100 Best Women’s Empowerment podcast.