In attempting to describe my beloved dance practice to people who have never heard of Ecstatic Dance, I’ll often say something like this:
“ …. Well …. if you were walking in the room for the first time you would look around and perhaps feel as if you were at a yoga class/dance club/meditation/kindergarten recess/spiritual revival”.
“….Oh…”they say, with a mixture of intrigue, awe and sometimes terror.
I realize that if I want to share this practice with others I will need to tell a more compelling story. So I try to remember how I felt when I was new to the dance.
It was 2009 and I was in the process of de and reconstructing my life for the umpteenth time in my 33 years of life. In less than a year I had relocated to the Sierra Foothills from Washington State, switched from working as a community/youth media facilitator to a Massage Therapist, moved five times, totaled my car and injured myself in the process, and started and ended an intense and dramatic love affair with my estranged childhood sweetheart. I was in physical pain from the car accident, struggling to perform just a few massages a week, and my handful of local acquaintances were limited to clients, office mates and the family of my (now ex) partner. I was lonely, broke, defeated, and giving into a dreadful feeling that I had finally screwed up my life beyond repair. I spiraled deeper and deeper into depression and ill health. It became difficult to even imagine reaching out to connect with others, and my sense of isolation became a paralyzing social anxiety.
One Sunday morning in early Spring 2010, inspired by a latent inner wisdom, or maybe just out of sheer desperation, I gathered the courage to drive from my house in Meadow Vista up to Nevada City for Sweat Your Prayers, a weekly 5Rhythms dance hosted by Michael Stone. I had heard of 5 Rhythms from a friend several years before, and thought that maybe I could begin to re-connect with other human beings there. Or get healthier. Or feel better. Or something.
I don’t know how I managed to make it to that first dance. I was terrified. I hadn’t danced in years. I didn’t know anyone. I didn’t know what I should wear. What if people laughed at me. I think my knees were actually shaking on my drive to Nevada City, and I had to hold myself back from stopping, turning around, and driving back home. I’m glad I didn’t.
On the dance floor that day, and at all consecutive dances thereafter, I was welcomed home as part of a giant, loving family. Whatever I walked in the door with was okay. Even my social ineptness was met without question or judgment. In fact, for many months, still struggling with intense social anxiety, I made it a habit to vacate the premises before the dance ended so I wouldn’t have to talk to anyone. None of the other dancers ever judged or questioned my absence. They repeatedly received me on the dance floor with smiles and open arms, let me run away whenever I liked and then, when I was ready to stay, it was like I had always been there.
The dance practice itself, often described as a “Movement Meditation”, feels more like play than practice. Organizers and dancers create and hold a conscious, intentional sacred space. Though there are some guidelines (alcohol, shoes, conversations and fragrances are usually left at the door) a profound sense of freedom pervades the spaces. You can laugh, cry, twirl, whoop and holler, summersault, jump up and down, roll on the floor, dance like no-one is watching (because no-one is) take a nap, explore contact with a partner (or not), or simply sit or lie down and rest.
Liam, a dancer from Grass Valley, eloquently testifies, “As a computer programmer in a hyper vigilante world, ecstatic dance entreats me to turn off my mind in a way that allows me to into a lucid body-centric emotional state and feel clearly what is moving there. Doing this as a group, invites a deep acceptance of oneself through the power of witness. The transformation that can occur through that acceptance profoundly affects every other part of life.”
So many of us are wounded and disconnected from our bodies, as I was when I first came onto the dance floor. Feeling ashamed of our wounds, our tendency is to try to hide from each other in isolation, not realizing our sameness, not knowing that connecting to each other can help us heal. When we are vulnerable enough to allow our wounds to be witnessed our shame transforms to connection and compassion, and the results are nothing short of life-changing.
I must say that dancing has been the most profoundly healing experience of my life. Through the dance I have connected to my community, my inner self, and my body with a deeper acceptance and love than I ever dreamed possible. In this safe, nurturing space, my body is able to release old emotions and stored trauma through spontaneous movement.
Dancing can clear a pathway for deep peace, joy and happiness to bubble up as well. Nolita writes, “Ecstatic dance brings me more joy than most things; an opportunity to drop deeply into myself, allow my body to move spontaneously, deliciously and to connect with an amazing community and the friends I love...”
Since that first Sunday at Sweat Your Prayers, my dance practice has become as integral to my life as breathing, and the opportunities to participate have expanded. In the summer of 2010 the Movement Medicine Collective birthed the Thursday night Ecstatic Dances, held weekly at St Joseph’s Cultural Center in Grass Valley. Between Ecstatic Dance Grass Valley, 5 Rhythms, Contact Improvisation workshops and other conscious dance modalities, (see the links provided below for more details) I have been blessed with immense healing opportunities.
There is a staggering difference between my life before and after becoming a dancer. I no longer suffer from depression or isolation and my social anxiety is nearly nonexistent. I’m in better physical shape than I have ever been in before. I feel so much belonging, connection, support and love from a wide circle of friends that it brings tears to my eyes when I stop to really feel it. And words cannot even come close to conveying the depth of my gratitude to those who work tirelessly holding space for these events.
The ecstatic dance space gives me permission to express aspects of myself that have been long forgotten in my serious, responsible adult life. As Matthew, a founder of Ecstatic Dance Grass Valley says, it’s a “chance to move freely and without inhibition just as you did when you were a child. And you don't need to get drunk to do it, so you get to remember how much fun you had the next day!”
Sometimes referred to as “dance church”, the experience can be deeply spiritual as well joyful and cathartic. Syris, another Grass Valley dancer, writes, “Ecstatic Dance is beyond words... It's an experiential practice of letting go of one's worries whether anyone is looking, then landing in the body, becoming fully present and really feeling it, all of it... Extending one's consciousness into every cell with greetings of love and encouragement toward greater unification, releasing all the thoughts of life and living, surrendering into being... Just being can be enough... one with the music, the body cannot help but move, in the way only it knows how... and at that point it becomes effortless, and music dances you, your spirit is set free, you merge with those around you and the connection builds... The music is the texture, the consciousness and authentic presence of every dancer becomes the color, and together we create sculptures of light and sound, of mind and matter, alchemy of cosmic dance that transforms everyone present, at the core of their Being. Aho.”
I believe that every community should have the opportunity to be part of the dance. In the years I’ve lived and practiced healing arts in Auburn, there hasn’t been a regular dance event that I know of. And for as long as I’ve been dancing, traveling like many others from far and wide to the various Nevada County dances, I’ve been hearing a clear quiet voice telling me it’s my responsibility and honor to bring this practice home. Thanks to the CoMotion crew, it is now a regular event at The Portugese Hall in Newcastle. More details on the links below!
Links
