conscious dance – Barbara Heagy

Dancer Woman by B. Heagy

I – Dancer Woman laps up the space,

Licks the edges in gentle rolls,

Slowly stretches to full extreme,

Gathers bundles of energy In soulful arms.

II – Dancer Woman

She wades in tidal pools

And gathers miniature treasures of self-expression —

Enough to last for tomorrows.

III – Dancer Woman, oceanic,

Invites me to water’s edge

To taste her sensuous pleasures.

Hand in hand,

We wade in watery delight,

Ride cresting waves

Buoyant and bright.

I hold my breath and plunge

As she takes me into deepened shadows

Of other worlds.

As an introduction to each other at our recent Rhythmwood Soul Journey, Wendy Roman asked us to write a poem about ourselves from a basic form called “I Am From . . . “. All we had to do was fill in the blanks as we reminisced about our past and contemplated all the people and events that had formed who we are today. Here is my poem. What would your poem be?

I Am From by Barbara Heagy

I am from country farms,
From czardas and paprikash.

I am from grandma’s warm lap
like sheltering laughter.

I am from lilacs, fresh mown hay,
and bubbling creeks.

I am from hippies and hash,
From cool northern lakes and jumping fish.

I am from journals and contemplations,
From words and books and songs.

I am from breath and moving bodies.

I am from spiritual journeys danced in prayers,
laced with pain and grace.

I am from daughters to grandsons.

I am from love –
assured and unconditional.

I Have No Words – A Journey of the Soul

This past week I went on a retreat called Rhythmwood Soul Journey, led by Wendy Roman of Rhythmwood Dance Studio. For eight weeks before our retreat where we met in person, we had online assignments using poetry, journal writing, conscious dance and shared online conferences to introduce us to each other and prepare us with some basic movement principles and ideas for contemplation and discussion.

In the studio, Wendy used daily readings, journal writing, conscious dance, meditation, nature experiences and art to take us on a further soul journey of the feminine spirit.

On the last day of our wonderful week, I sat quietly and thought about how I would explain the past week to my friends and family. It was such a deep and meaningful experience that I truly had no words. But I put my pen to paper, and let the words just flow. This poem is what came out.

I HAVE NO WORDS

I have no words.

How do you explain this feeling of wholeness, connectedness, fulfilment to another?

How do you explain a journey of the soul where I, you, us, become equally important and valuable to the woven web?

How do you explain a creation of the spirit that fills and overflows through me, to you, to earth, to sky, to water, to fire and beyond?

How do you speak of the gentle care, the kindness, the deep felt gratitude for who I am, and who I become with you, and you, and you?

How do I explain the fire within, the fire without, the consuming fire that refines and invites you to new beginnings?

How do I explain the magic of dancing with another, where the flow between us becomes liquid energy that uplifts, intertwines, and releases the ‘me’ to become the ‘us’?

How do I explain the wonder of waves rushing to shore, the birds rising through song, the sky on fire, our very souls on fire?

How do I explain the specialness, the uniqueness of another? Through vulnerability and laughter and tears, and strength and weakness, through words and song and dance and art, a new creation was born.

How do I explain all this?

There are no words.

Wendy Roman is a gifted teacher and I would recommend taking a workshop or retreat with her in the future. Check out her website at www.rhythmwood.ca

The Still Point of the Turning World

This week Wendy Roman, of Rhythmwood Dance Studio, asked her Facebook readers what the phrase “Effortless Effort” means to them through dance. Another reader and dancer, Laine Magidsohn, suggested it be called “Dynamic Ease.” I like both phrases. Both phrases speak of finding that balance between active participation and passive release.

I think ‘Effortless Effort’ and ‘Dynamic Ease’, are both phrases of just stepping aside for a moment to connect with life’s energy force. Letting it flow within, embodying it, giving it room to become one with me and then moving forward together. I don’t just step aside and let it take me over. We work together, side-by-side, internally as one. One body, one flow of energy.

When I was getting my MA in Dance at York University, my thesis centered on finding the relationship between creativity and spirituality. I held a day long workshop of movement and dance, journaling and oral sharing. Later in evaluations of the experience, two of the participants spoke of finding ‘stillness’ in the ‘movement’ while they danced. A paradox. After the event, one of the participants gave me a beautiful hand-made calligraphy copy of an excerpt of T. S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets – Burnt Norton.” For her, his poem spoke of finding “The Still Point of the Turning World” and acted as a metaphor for her experience.

From T. S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets – Burnt Norton”:

“At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;

Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,

But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,

Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,

Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,

There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.”

Finding that balance of stillness and movement is a form of active release. It means standing still for a moment, breathing, centering myself, becoming deeply aware of all that is around me so that I can connect with the movement of life and its energy and begin to move as one with it. It’s becoming as T. S. Eliot calls ‘The Still Point’ so that I become the axis around which my world turns. I am integral to its being. I support it, as I become the stillness from which the movement circulates. The world rotates around me, life happens, but I am always centered and strong, actively a part of it, and deeply aware of the bonded process. It’s finding “The Still Point of the Turning World” within myself.

Rain Makes Rainbows

I was thinking about my recent trip to Hawaii where I went to dance at a week- long event called One Dance Tribe. After spending almost a year co-authoring a book about grief, I was looking for some pure joy in my life. And I did find it.

The first day, the first dance session, I was invited to dance with a complete stranger, and as we circled, and swooped and jumped around each other, I found myself smiling and then laughing out loud. Pure play. I felt the freedom of a young barn-bound colt let out to romp in the grassy meadow on the first warm, sunny spring day.

I also experienced pain, my own as well as others. On the dance floor, we were invited to consider the pain in the world, our own as well as others, and express it in movement, gesture and dance. No words. I cried in the arms of a stranger, as tears spilled down my cheeks over the death of my brother-in-law, who I had just found out the night before, via text, that the cancer he had been fighting for years, won. I wasn’t going to be there for his funeral.

Several times, after dinner, or at a quiet moment, someone would approach me and sit across from me and slowly start telling me about their lives, often being moved to tears. I just listened. It was an international dance event and, early in the week-

long event, most of these people were strangers to me. I felt honoured that they would share their lives so intimately with me.

Every day, it rained for some time, usually just a quick blast of warm drops and it was over. But the sun was always back. And with it, came some of the most beautiful, vividly-colored rainbows that I had ever seen. And there was usually more than one throughout the day. As one of the participants said, “Hawaii is a rainbow machine.”

So yes, I did find joy. But I also found pain. I found they exist on the same plate. It rained almost every day, and every day we had an abundance of rainbows. Rain and rainbows danced in the sky, side-by-side.

One Dance Tribe

I am a dancer. There have been times in my life that it was my passion and it fed my spirit. Then I danced every day. I became a full-time elementary school teacher in my late 30’s. Shortly after I stopped dancing and left it behind.

But it wouldn’t leave me.

Throughout the years, I kept returning to my dance, finding new ways to check in with my body and spirit; a weekly stretch/strength/free dance class, NIA dance workshops and retreats, yoga, sacred circle dancing and even ballroom dancing.

Last year I saw online an ad for a dance event in Maui, Hawaii called One Dance Tribe. I was intrigued. For months, I waffled back and forth about going. I began the registration procedure four separate times, but it wasn’t until the fourth time, that I persevered and hit the final ‘send’ button. Now I was committed!

In January, 2017, I flew to Maui for the One Dance Tribe, an international dance event with 80 other like-minded souls from all over the world.

The camp, rustic and simple, sat on the clifftop of the beautiful Keanae Peninsula, overlooking the Pacific Ocean on all three sides. Home for me for the week was a small 4 X 4 tent set back among the towering trees of a tropical forest, where the constant sound of the ocean waves on the cliffs lulled me to sleep each night and gentle birdsong woke me just after sunrise each morning.

We danced from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day. Six different teachers presented their styles and approaches to conscious dance, sometimes working independently, sometimes together in one common spirit. Spiritual teachers and healers helped us to integrate our dancing experiences through massage, body healing techniques, voice exercises, chanting, music and ceremony.

At One Dance Tribe, I immersed myself in new – a new land, wild and beautiful and a new dance experience where I, once again, began to listen to my body and learn from its wisdom. I learned to be spontaneous, authentic, and trustful of the process. I became deeply aware of my chi body energy and flow. Joy, laughter and freedom naturally flowed as I allowed my instincts to respond to the music and the teacher’s promptings. I began to test my strengths and my limitations and became aware of knots of pain, both physical and emotional, learning to see and understand them with honesty and clarity. For me, the Feldenkrais healing sessions and various moving meditations aided me even further in this deep awareness.

I learned of the truth that is revealed through movement by observing others move. By watching others, with focus and intent, I ‘listened’ to their ‘movementspeak.’ As assuredly as if they had used spoken words, their movements told me their story. I danced for them, capturing their essence with a movement response. “This is what I hear you say” became “This is what I see you say.” We spoke in a new language, one without words, the language of the body with its energy and flow.

I learned to care for others, to relate to them through movement. Through dance, we shared our lives, experiences and energies in a spontaneous dialogue. We played and laughed together. We cried together and held each other up.

I learned I didn’t have to know all your story to help you embrace your path. All I had to do was be there for you; to listen, hold, and love you, so that you were not alone in your pain. I learned I didn’t have to give you my whole life. It was enough to be there for just the moment that we were placed together – to be authentic, supportive and sharing of THIS moment.

I learned to show up daily; to ‘be here now’ with others. My presence mattered and contributed to the group process.

I learned to persevere and push my physical, emotional, and spiritual levels, in spite of discomfort. As I moved inward, I tested and revealed my own inner energy and spirit. As I moved outward, I shared more of myself with others, as partners and as a group.

Through all these experiences, I felt and understood my place in a greater world as part of a kindred population of people. As an equal member of creation, I realized my connection to the vast, powerful energy of our natural world.
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On our last day, we sat with a partner and repeatedly asked each other a question.

“What does your heart know?”

My heart has deep gratitude for this unique experience where I retreated from my everyday world to this movement sanctuary. Here I was encouraged to be my true self. I have gratitude for the teachers and healers who offered their skills to teach me that body awareness and authenticity. I have loving gratitude for my body – its energy, its flow and its truth.

“What does your heart know?”

It knows a deeper awareness and understanding of the revealing power of movement. I learn about you and you learn about me by sharing our unspoken dialogue through movement and dance. The body doesn’t lie.

“What does your heart know?”

I know that I am part of a greater natural world. I am powerful, fierce, and flowing as the gifts of the ocean, the cliffs and towering vegetation. I learned to be at one with it, to yield to its power and beauty, rather than dominate and separate myself from it.

“What does your heart know?”

I can share your pain without it binding me up and swallowing me in over-empathy. I don’t need to know all the details. It is enough to just be there for you in your moment of need. I don’t have to solve it for you. All I have to do is be open, loving, and supportive, as you work through it. I don’t need to be afraid of your pain. I don’t need to eradicate your pain. It does not need to overwhelm me.

“What does your heart know?”

I am learning to ‘go with the flow’ – to not fight it. I became aware of the knots and blocks in my body and psyche that I am avoiding because they are too painful or too fearful.

“What does your heart know?”

I am learning to be ‘me’, not the ‘me’ that has been molded by a society of rules and expectations. I am learning to be authentic. I am learning how to love better, myself as well as others. I am better loving my natural world which I am a part of.

“What does your heart know?”

I am learning the power of the group, of community. When we all join together in a spirit of love, non-judgement, open acceptance and support, there is power in that.

We are One.
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Thank you to all who contributed to the One Dance Tribe event.

I thank you for the opportunity to retreat and learn. I was fed, housed, taught, and healed.

Thank you for the physical setting of the camp on Keanae Peninsula on the winding Hana Highway, a place of raw, wild, untamed beauty; a place where nature rules and man is a visitor. With honour, I danced the hula to the sun, moon, wind, clouds, rain, cliffs, ocean and shore. How magical was the appearance of a brilliant, glowing rainbow as it offered its gift to bless our dance to it.

Thank you for the blessing of the inner dance sanctuary which invited us in with its openness and beautiful flowing fabric, carpets, cushions, flowers and ferns. It was a space created with love and a sense of beauty and sanctity.

Thank you for the music, so carefully chosen to inspire, stimulate and feed our senses.

Thank you to each of the teachers for your individuality and uniqueness. As leaders, you gave us your best through sensitive offerings and guidance. Thank you for the union of your skills as teachers. We truly became One Dance Tribe with no competition, no judgement, a true union of a dancing people.

Thank you for all who made this event such a special and unique experience – the cooks, the cleaning staff, the grounds people, administrators, guests and volunteers. We fed and cared for each other, contributing bits of ourselves to a greater community.

Thank you. Grazie. Mahalo.