What do you love?
What makes your spirit sing, your body move?
What cracks open your heart to reveal the seed of soul inside?
We all have a passion . . . or more than one. Whether we acknowledge that passion, understand it, indulge it, is up to us. To the extent that we follow what fires us and excites us is the extent to which we live our full destiny. Can we embrace that which burns inside us? Can we dance it?
Join us Thursday night, to dance our passions with wild abandon!
"There are two ways of spreading light; to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it." ~ Edith Wharton
Indeed, we are mirrors for one another. When we open our hearts, suspend our judgments, release our expectations and are truly present with each other, we possess an uncanny ability to see another human being with more than just our eyes. What we admire and/or admonish in another is more often than not the very thing we admire or admonish in ourselves. Our mirrors do not exist merely on our bathroom walls. They surround us everywhere in the faces and bodies of the people we meet and interact with on a daily basis.
As in life, so in the dance. When we let go of what our dance or another's is supposed to look like, we can drop in to something more mysterious and fulfilling than outside appearances and see what's real and true inside not only for ourselves, but for those we are witnessing. What might we see in another that moves us to dance? What is it that is being reflected back to us that provokes and/or prevents us from participating in the dance? When we step back from our own dance and pay attention to the dance of another, does our dance disappear or does it deepen?
During this week's Explorations class, we'll have an opportunity to see others and be seen by others through the art of witnessing and reflecting. We'll learn more about the two ways in which we spread our light and how it feels to be both the candle and the mirror that reflects it. No doubt the studio will be shining brightly that evening.
We'd like to invite any dancers to come along on a movement field trip . . . right here in Astoria. As part of the Astoria Music Festival, there is a program Wednesday night called "The Arts Collide, Reloaded" featuring new music, dance, and visual arts. This program presents cutting edge music and dance--definitely an exploration of movement, music, and spoken word combined with a visual arts component. So in place of class on Wednesday, June 24, we will meet at the PAC for the 7:30 concert. Those who wish to join in a potluck supper, please come to Elia's (2625 Irving Ave., green house on the south side of the road) at 6pm. Elia will have soup and green salad; bring whatever else you like. It's a moderate walk or short drive from Elia's to the PAC on 16th and Franklin. The concert costs $15 and tickets most likely will be available at the door, although they can be purchased in advance. Check the Festival website for more details.
Thursday class will take place as normal.
Now is also a good time to mention our summer schedule:
Wednesdays, 6:30 - 7:45pm Divas
Thursdays, 6:30 - 7:45pm Explorations
Sundays, 6:00 - 7:45pm Sanctuary
Note the time change for the Sanctuary class. The first half hour of the class will feature opportunity for meditation, writing, stretching--an individual coalescing of energies before we bring the intention at 6:30 with the opening circle. Bring your own yoga mat, meditation cushion, journal--whatever you like to help you deepen into your experience. The theme and music will be as before, with a spiritual focus and more down-tempo music. The perfect ending (or beginning) to a busy week.
Over the last few Thursdays we've delved into spiritual and psychological topics--death, light/dark, personal stories . . . all good for the body and mind, all part of the huge spectrum of what we can explore through the dance. This Thursday we'll be pulling back to the body, and going deep within to identify where our dance originates. The origin of the dance is a topic we've explored before too, and it's fun to return to this theme periodically with a new angle. Will the music decide, or will you? Does a lack of variety, or too much, drive where we go with our dance? What would the dance look like if we danced for one hour to only one song? Or to thirty songs? Can we "transcend" the music and go deeply into our bodies, letting the inner impulse, rather than outer rhythms, guide our movements?
Questions to ponder, and to dance . . .
See you Thursday night!
"Be not afraid of the dark as it more often than not provides the very illumination we seek."
No doubt we have all gone through times in our lives that might be deemed "dark nights of the soul." No matter what the experience itself was, we were forever changed by it. No matter the loss or the grief...the questioning or the end result...the indecision or the decision that made everything different...we carry within us the capacity to handle pretty much anything that life throws our way.
Throughout our lives we will experience both the agony and the ecstasy, the pain and the pleasure, the dark and the light. During this week's Explorations class, we will have the opportunity in our dance to revisit those things that have been bright and beautiful as well as those that have been dim and dreadful. The studio will be a very safe environment to dive in deep and discover what lies in the dark and awaits in the light. Perhaps we'll discover that they are one in the same.
Join us Thursday night for a very illuminating evening of dance and discussion.
One of the most wonderful aspects of a creative outlet is the ability to make up a story and express it--whether through words, pictures, music, or movement. When we allow our imaginations free rein, we open doorways to possibility. Perhaps the stories we want to tell are merely tales that we don't necessarily want to create in real life. Or maybe those stories are potential destinies waiting to unfold. We can inhabit a virtual world different from our own, or plant the seeds for a vision we would like to manifest. Regardless of the outcome, magic happens when we allow story to flow through us. This Thursday we'll explore the worlds that our dances express.
First off...the title of this post may appear misleading. We will NOT be having children in the studio Thursday night. Big kids (aka adults 18 and over) are only allowed HOWEVER, your child-like self will be wholeheartedly welcomed. We'll be exploring a dance of different ages so bring your inner two-year old, your rebellious and curious teenager, your oh-so serious I'm a grown-up-now self and discover what it feels and looks like to move when you imagine yourself at a younger age and at an older one.
While the music will take you on somewhat of a time-based journey, will you slow down or speed up according to what's playing or what age you're playing at? Will you dance down memory lane or dance into the unknown future? Will you choose to dance exactly where you find yourself right now or mingle amongst all three?
Come and see. Come and dance. Come and play and in your fancy pants. (Lisa's junior-high princess of poetry showing up there in that last line.)
Big and small. Expansive and contracted. Outward and inward. Grand and subtle. There is no doubt we move our bodies differently depending on the music that's played, the invitation or intention that's suggested, and the mood we each bring with us into the room. How might our thoughts, our feelings and our dance change when we shift from one extreme to the other independent of the music we hear? What happens when our expectations meet up with the unexpected?
A new perspective gained on the dance floor often leads to a new perspective in life. Come to class on Thursday night and be surprised by your own interpretations of what big and small means to you.
Hello dancers!
The busy spring and summer season is upon us! Occasionally Lisa and I both have commitments that call us away from the studio on the same day. This Sunday, May 3, is one of those days.
THERE WILL BE NO SANCTUARY CLASS MAY 3.
Our Sunday class will resume the following weekend, Mother's Day, on May 10.
Thanks!
