The Magic Of A Self-Love Sanctuary She/Man Cave!

It is no secret what my favorite color is: PINK!

When I was on a women's retreat this past November a wise woman shared a beautiful insight with me  regarding the color pink. She said, "Red is love. White is courage. Pink is the in -between of both those colors. Pink is peace." Those words went straight to my heart and snuggled right in and have not left since. I have managed to create some kind of "pink room" in other places I have lived before. I have always needed the soothing walls to make me feel peaceful and at home. I left behind a beautiful pink room last November that held the most precious moments, memories, tears, laughter, anger, inspiration, and layers of healing energy within its supportive walls. That was my "she-cave". I feel it is important to have that alone space whether you are a man and need the "man-cave" or a woman needing to retreat to her "she- cave." I like to think of it as a self-love sanctuary. It is a sacred space. Its the place to take care and love on yourself and give yourself what you need so you can then go out and give to others. The others may be a partner, boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, wife, friends, students, etc.

Many things can happen in a self-love sanctuary.  For me countless hours of writing and workshop designing happened. Vision boards were created and many visions were manifested. On any given day any genre of music could be heard playing including: 80's, 90's, metal, industrial, world, kundalini, hip-hop, and show tunes. Basically any music that inspired me to move could be heard blasting out of that room. The floors were so kind in supporting me as I danced, stomped, twirled, screamed, and often pounded on them. I have to say much anger release work was accomplished within the pink.  My inner child is always pleased in the sanctuary. Many mornings the walls meditated with me and took in the vibrations of the mantras that I would chant and play. There were many evenings my kundalini yoga music would seep out into the living room inspiring someone down there to turn off the T.V.  I would often catch that same certain someone listening to the mantras being played instead of watching the TV:) Some days it would be an interesting mix of yoga music clashing and somehow blending with the metal or prog rock drumming going on in the man cave in the next room. There was never a dull moment in the pink room. 

In my new place I cannot have a pink room. It seems strange and it feels like a piece of me is missing. I have created a sacred space in my bedroom to connect with my higher power and do my meditation practice. I dance in my living room and I write on my dining room table enjoying the beautiful view from my windows. I am grateful. My whole apartment is now my self-love sanctuary she-cave. I am creating beautiful layers of healing peaceful energy within its walls every day. Yet, it just isn't the same. Even with the pink decor it doesn't hold quite the same inspiration. I need my pink walls! I need my superpower. I do not know how long I will reside in this place. When the time does come that I am supposed to move to a new space I will welcome it. The only deal breaker will be is if I cannot paint a room pink. That is a must. It means everything to me.

Creating a self-love sanctuary she- cave is telling myself I am worth spending time with, I am worth listening to, I am worth caring for, and I am worth the gift of play and fun.  I know by spending the time away in my she-cave tending to my inner world the outer world  becomes more magical on a daily basis.

RIP PINK ROOM. 

You are always in my heart.

Last photo taken of the Pink Room wall before it was covered with a vanilla color:(

Depression: A Fight That Cannot Be Won But There Is Something That Can Be Done..

"There is no sun without shadow, and it is essential to know the night. -Albert Camus, "The Myth of Sisyphus"

"He who learns must suffer,
Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget,  falls drop by
drop upon the heart and in our own despair, against our will,
comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.  -Aeschylus, Agamemnon

"One heals suffering only by experiencing it to the full." -Marcel Proust

I am sitting at my desk on a snowy Monday morning here in Nashville, Tn.  Yes.  It is snowing here, finally!  It is peaceful outside as the last few flakes of this long awaited snow storm falls.  Some unfortunate humans have spent the morning chipping ice off their over sized metal tanks they call automobiles so they can make their daily commute into the daily grind. While others spent moments in conflict as to whether or not to use this fine day as an excuse to stay home.  And some did.  I was called off of work. The birds are chirping away outside and the squirrels are catching air from tree to tree.  The animal kingdom unfazed by the fresh blanket of white snow that has brought a hush to the neighborhood.  The squirrels play on.  The birds peck for bugs and worms in the frozen ground.  Nature in perfect harmony.

Meanwhile inside the pink room on Barksdale Harbor Dr……….

I am sitting in my office and thinking about the events of this past weekend and how once again I was reminded of how much:  DEPRESSION SUCKS!  I have not felt in harmony with nature or like running and skipping or chasing anyone from tree to tree.  No.  Not me.  Not for the past few days.

Depression.

I have had to deal with this on and off for most of my life.  I have been on anti-depressants and off of them.  I have explored every conceivable unhealed core issue there is in me.  I have researched the effects of my gut health in connection to my brain as a cause.  I have learned about how depression is a separation from universal love and a call from my soul.  I know certain substances I took in college really messed up my brain chemistry.  I know depression is a call to go inwards and see what needs to be tended to in life that is out of alignment.  I know its possibly frozen anger or unattended to grief.  I know it could be one or all of the above at once.

It doesn't make it any easier knowing any of the above are possibilities.  Sometimes it just plain sucks.

This weekend was bad.  Real bad.  It felt surreal.  I wish there was a word for what the state of being which is feeling 90% numb and disconnected from the world around me and 10% feeling a pit of sadness in the stomach from which I cannot fight because it will win.

I realize there are fortunate souls out there who have never experienced depression.  I am not talking about having an off day because someone or something has made me upset.  I am talking about
D-E-P-R-E-S-S-I-O-N.  Only those who have experienced real depression know the pain of what I speak.

This weekend was a reminder to myself about what to do when depression creeps up and takes a hold.  I actually did go back and read my own blog posts from a couple years ago and I must say they were great reminders. Dealing With Depression: Part One and Dealing With Depression: Part Two  The part I needed to be reminded about the most was to:

 LET MYSELF BE DEPRESSED. 

I was not doing that for the first half of Saturday.  I was fighting it.  Also, I was not only dealing with being depressed but I also was dealing with the inner conflict of feeling bad because I was depressed.  The shame of it.  Talk about a war within.

I spent a good part of Saturday morning at the library.  What a shocker  to find myself in the health and healing section reading books on "healing emotions".  I really didn't mean too.  Honestly.  I actually went in to pick up a copy of Wuthering Heights.  I found it and before I knew it I ended up in the self-help section.

Yes.  The self-help section.  I put myself on a self-imposed ban from that section but something led me over there.  I ended up glossing over all the book titles that just seemed to scream at me, "Pick me. Pick me.  I have the answer.  I'll solve your problem.  I'll take your pain away."  I was not in the mood for the latest "flash in the pan self-help guru" book.  No.  There was a reason I was drawn over there and I soon discovered it.  After ample browsing I ended up settling on two books from authors I have never heard of, but, whom laid out the exact down to earth information I needed to hear at that moment of my depression.  So I took them home.

The three things I was reminded of regarding why my depression cycle happened:

1.  I still have unresolved grief

2.  Triggers set off by unresolved trauma from childhood

3.  Eating food I shouldn't causing depression via a serotonin/flora imbalance in my gut

My friend who is going through a cycle of depression herself texted me and shared something really helpful.  It also was in alignment with a chapter of a book I am reading.  This chapter talks about triggers and how to build a bridge between  unresolved inner child wounds from the past and the present reality of the adult in the present.

This is what my friend shared:

"In depression I am overly sensitive.  I just keep getting my feelings hurt.  I'll need to decide what is real and what is not when I am feeling better."

I totally got that.  For me, when I get triggered it is hard for me to know what is real and in the present moment and what is the perception of my wounded inner child taking me back to a pocket of time that holds unresolved pain.  The subconscious does not know linear time.  So if something triggers me and I have not healed that part of me I will be taken right back to the original pain and that age.  I will regress emotionally.  If I am to far into a depression it is hard for me to distinguish between what is the past (my wounded inner child perception) and what is reality (the adult perception of now).

As the depression lessens I can better distinguish:  "Am I feeling and seeing through the eyes of my wounded inner child (the past) or the eyes of an adult (the present)?"

I do know the best tool for me to use the other day was to: Let myself be depressed.  Once I consciously surrendered to the depression I then allowed myself to share with my husband that I was f'in depressed.  After that I  went upstairs and laid down with my cat and just allowed myself to stare at the wall and be depressed.  Believe it or not in the surrender I was then able to feel a sense of peace.  Not shame for being depressed..but peace.  I didn't try to apply any other tools.  I just surrendered for that day.

The next day I felt the same but was more of a willingness to do something.  I put some essential oils that are recommended for depression in my diffuser and applied them on my body.  I allowed myself to connect to my breath, turned on the music, and allowed my body to move.  I didn't force it.  I allowed it to express what it needed through dance and it didn't fail me. It certainly moved out some deep, stuck energy out through my dance.  I then went and attended a 12 step meeting, and after that went to a Kundalini Yoga class.

I never forced anything.  After I surrendered to allowing myself to be depressed something inside of me knew it was going to be alright….eventually.

There are so many possible reasons people experience depression.  No two people experience depression the same and no two people are going to deal with it exactly the same.  Someone may read this and think I am full of shit.  Which is fine.  This is my experience.  You will have a different one.  I can share tools that have worked for me and perhaps they may help others.  I don't know.  That is not for me to say.  What I do want say is this:  If anyone is suffering from depression right now just SURRENDER to it.  Please don't add anymore shame or inner conflict to your life.  Let it be.  You have to feel it if you want to heal it.   No matter how much you try to fight the reality of it you won't win.  Cultivate acceptance.  One breath at a time.  One day at a time.

I will end this blog with an excerpt from one of the two books that spoke to me this weekend:

Surrendering:  TO LET IT GO, YOU HAVE TO LET IT FLOW

Surrendering is an extension of befriending emotional energy.  It is about allowing emotional energy to flow to its end point.  Surrender is not about becoming passive and saying, "What the hell-I don't give a damn what happens anymore, so I'll just drink this quart of scotch and slobber in my sorrow."  It doesn't mean letting go of your senses or your awareness.  It means  being fully present to emotional energy and letting it pass through your body until it is gone.  A basic axiom of surrender is:  To let it go you have to let it flow.  You can't let go of a dark emotion until you have fully experienced its truth.

-Healing Through The Dark Emotions:  The Wisdom of grief, fear, and despair by Miriam Greenspan

Depression is a call from the soul to learn a deeper truth about self.  First we have to befriend it and listen.  Even if there is only numbness there still is a message.  It's up to you to find your personal way of receiving it.

I am going to go back to watching the squirrels now and enjoy the quiet snow.  There is such peace in the constant of nature.

Be kind to yourself.

Truly.

It will pass.  Nothing in nature stays the same.

In A NYC Dance Studio: I Sweat My Prayers, Danced With God, and Found Myself.

Dance till you shatter-Rumi


It has now been two years since my life as I had known it "shattered." I have been on a journey of piecing back together all parts of myself in a new way since October 22, 2011.  Recovering from emotional trauma takes a great deal of time, gentleness, patience, and a willingness to try different things to assist one in making sense of self and the world.  The journey that I have been on to recover the lost parts of myself over the past couple of years has taken me to therapists, treatment centers, various yoga sets, creative art classes, energy healers, chiropractors, natural healers, and of course this journey introduced me to the healing power of dance.  In particular, the movement as meditation, practice that is known as The 5 Rhythms.

 I discovered this practice while I was house sitting deep in the woods about 30 miles outside of Nashville.  I was grateful for the time I was given to be with me and the ability to be able to connect and rest in the womb of Mother Nature.  The time and space spent in nature allowed me to be with the confusion and pain that was permeating through my being at the time and assisted me with connecting to what I needed to do to heal me.

"Traveled The Good Red Road To The House"

  I remember one day I was sitting in the house drenched in sadness.  Intuitively  I knew I needed to start moving my body, but the regimented practice of the style of yoga I was practicing was not what it needed.  I needed something different.  I happened to get up from the couch I was on and go and google tthe 5 Rhythms.  I thought of the 5 Rhythms only because a year earlier a student came into the studio I taught at and was inquiring about possibly holding a 5 Rhythms Movement gathering there.  Due to the type of floors that were in the studio at the time she opted not too.  That meeting seemed to plant some kind of seed in me.  After that meeting with her I went home and looked up what the 5 Rhythms was about.  I remember  reading about the practice through the 5 Rhythms web site, but, at that time I just didn't get it.  I wasn't ready.

 A year later.

Deep in the woods.

 Nowhere to go.

 Looking through different eyes.

I  read the information on the website again. This time I seemed to be able to understand what the practice was about.  I remember watching a video of Gabrielle Roth, the creator of the 5 Rhythms, speaking about the purpose of the rhythms.  I had tears streaming down my face while listening to her and the call from my soul to get up and dance the rhythms was unlike anything I had felt before.  If I was going to get reacquainted with my body this was how I would start.  So I put on music and moved.

 I didn't really know what i was suppose to do.  I just watched the videos I could find on line,  looked up what I could about what each rhythm was about, and then I just danced.

That House In The Woods

My Dance Floor

 I danced in the rain.

 I danced around the fire pit.

I danced with the trees as my partners.

 I danced under the moon.

I danced in the mud.

Best of all I was dancing with myself.

 I was dancing back into my body.

Eventually I bought the book, Sweat Your Prayers by Gabrielle Roth.  Reading about the rhythms took me to a whole new understanding of the practice.  I learned about the disowned parts of myself.  Each of the rhythms actually have various archetypes connected to them and these archetypes represent different part of the self.  As soon as I read what archetypes were associated with each rhythm I immediately knew which parts of me needed to be reclaimed.  I knew one of those parts was my masculine/father energy.  I would own the rhythm of staccato:)

From that time in the woods until now I have continued to practice the rhythms.  There are no teachers in Nashville and no official groups that gather.  Last March by divine chance I happened to get an e-mail from someone that was advertising a 5 Rhythms Workshop coming to Nashville.  It happened to be only two days away.  What a miracle.  I attended and it gave me my first experience of really dancing the rhythms in a group.  It was powerful.  I was grateful.

 Nothing could prepare me for what I would experience with dancing the rhythms in a classroom in NYC just three months later.........


It amazes me that I have lived in New York City five different times since I was 18 and not one of those times did this movement practice come into my life.  It's strange to think I could have opened my apartment door and strolled just a few blocks to a studio and been part of a class every night.  Yet, back then I walked out my door  and strolled into the gym next door to work with a personal trainer and sweat in cardio- kick boxing classes.

"Machines don't call me.  I'm not a member of the gym.  The reality is I demand more from my workouts.-I want God.  When I dance I feel the presence of a divine force and this is my addiction.  Feeding it is as simple as putting on the right music and letting go.  Doing what I have come to call "the five rhythms" is the surest way to drop whatever you are carrying and to move beyond your baggage to a new you, a new body, one that is fueled by soul." -Gabrielle Roth, Sweat Your Prayers

So this past June I went back up to NYC.  The first time since my "shattering."  It was different.  I was different.  I had visited the city a couple times after moving away in 2001 but now everything within me had shifted.  I was now seeing the city through different eyes and taking in its energy through different senses than before.

On a grey, cloudy Sunday morning I had the pleasure of strolling by myself from my old neighborhood on the east side over to the West Village.  I stopped to sit in Union Square Park and did a bit of journaling.  That park has been a part of my life journey since I was a lost and lonely 18 year old from a small town in Pennsylvania trying to make sense of the living in a city. I ate many turkey sandwiches on the steps during my lunch breaks from classes at Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute, I have wandered the farmers market many times and delight in how it has grown since the early 2000's, and this park has welcomed me back to its benches every time I have returned to visit.   The buildings around the square have changed since 1994 but the benches, and the memories they hold, have remained the same.

 After visiting with my old park friendI left and  continued walking the streets, taking in the energy of the city, and honoring the memories of a time and a person I was long ago.

 I soon  found the dance studio that was hosting the class and stood outside.  I snapped a picture of a flyer on the studio door that was a 5 Rhythms advertisement.  The picture captured a reflection of a grand church that was behind me.  This  photo perfectly represented the experience that was going to come.  I was literally about to attend "church."

"The Church of Dance"

When I entered into the studio there was already a good group gathered.  The teacher had a pa system set up and already had music playing.  People started floating into the studio.  Everyone seemed to know what to do.  There was no instruction.  Just music and space.  I couldn't help but to notice right away a woman sitting on the floor against a pillar.  She looked primitive.  She was sitting with her feet flat on the floor, knees spread wide, eyes closed.  A slight grin of what seemed like ecstasy was spread across her face.  It literally looked like she was in the act of foreplay with some invisible force.  I was confused.  The cells within me that held old Puritan beliefs from my ancestors about the body and sexual expression must have caused me to roll my eyes and feel a discomfort within me at the site of her.  I wasn't expecting to feel like that.

There were people of all ages, shapes, sizes.  Men.  Women.  People with missing limbs.  All coming together to experience this movement practice.  To know themselves.  To know themselves in relation to others.  And to discover it all on the dance floor.

"Warming Up"

As I began to connect to the music and let the rhythm of flowing move through me the excitement of being there began to fade and was soon replaced with the experience of awkwardness in my body.  I couldn't let myself flow.  It was difficult for me to move.  It is never difficult for me to move.  My body was resisting.  I was self-conscious.  Nervous.  It hit me that I didn't know anybody.  I was an outsider.  I didn't know what was going on.  Part of me wanted to run.  I suddenly felt like I didn't belong.  What the hell was I doing here?  My core issues were coming forth.  The experience was beginning.  Shit. Shit. Fuck.

I remembered the passage from the book,  Sweat Your Prayers that had Gabrielle sharing about a woman who was dancing the rhythm of chaos.  This woman had a vision of herself as a little girl who couldn't have fun.  While dancing she tried to make herself have fun.  Gabrielle had said that was not a good idea.  Rather than imposing a feeling upon her dance, she should enter into the dance that she was avoiding, the dance of not having fun, and dance it fully, dance through until it changed.

"There are no good or bad or better or worse dance; there is only the dance itself."- Gabrielle Roth

So I did.  I danced the awkwardness.  I allowed myself to feel like a robot.  I closed my eyes and danced "uncomfortable and awkward and self-consciousness."  I allowed myself to feel the feelings of not mattering and not good enough.  I allowed all of it to guide my movement.  You know what?  Yep. It did shift.  Suddenly I was able to move and I allowed myself to move to a different area of the studio.

"Somewhere between Flowing and Staccato"

I remember how being in a group of strangers also brought forth the feelings of not mattering.  Many people seemed to know one another and I felt like an outsider.  When I found myself staying on the outskirts of the group I would  get myself to move towards the center and try to connect with someone to dance.  I could not connect.  I realized even in my dance the walls I had around me were there.  I was dancing staccato and I was getting mad.  I didn't want these walls.  I wanted to be able to move through them.  I wanted to be able to connect to people.

 I kept noticing one girl in particular.  Something about her rubbed me the wrong way.  I remember her blood red lipstick and raven black hair.  She reminded me of an 18 year version of myself when I first moved to this city.  When I would go near her I kept noticing she wouldn't look me in the eye.  I remember feeling really frustrated because I felt she was purposely avoiding me.  I did not feel this with anyone else just her.  It really pissed me off.  "What was wrong with me?" Time after time something about her really triggered me. What did she have against me?  So I decided to stay away from her.  Issues being played out on the dance floor.

"Chaos"

Then the rhythm of chaos came.  The collective energy of the group intensified.  Shit was getting real.  The layers people carried in with them had been shed through the rhythms of flowing and staccato.  A  sense of freedom to really move and let go was now fully present.  The magic was increasing and suddenly I was face to face with the raven black hair girl with the blood red lips in the dead center middle of the dance floor.  I like to believe the universe orchestrated that precise moment for the two of us to meet as part of our spiritual experience.

Alice Coopers, Schools Out, came on and the room erupted in screams.  Suddenly the room was full of 18 year olds.  Bodies jumping up and down, fist pumps in the air, as if we were connecting to the memories and feelings of the last day of high school. All of us expressing the excitement of not having to listen to teachers anymore or having to be trapped in the confines of a class room anymore.  Freedom was ours.

The freedom of the present moment was that of letting our spirits soar with the rhythms of the primal beats that were deepening as we all went into chaos.  This girl and I were now face to face and our eyes were locked.  In the middle of the chaos of bodies we threw a fit together.  Reflections of one another.  We did not know each other but something within us that we needed to see in one another brought us together.  Clearly something we were both wanting to avoid.  We threw a fit to Alice Cooper.  Jumping up and down, screaming,  hair flying, and  fists pumping.  When we had no more pent up teen age angst to release we both smiled at one another.  We had faced one another.  Each of us broke down a wall.  After that we didn't avoid one another.  We danced.

  God respects us
when we work but loves us
when we dance.
-Old Sufi saying


I finally could experience what I only read about in regards to chaos.  I went to the that place where the the soul takes over and partners with the rhythm of the music.  Out of the clutches of the mind the body and soul knew exactly what to do.  I was now part of a tribe and this tribe was sweating its prayers.  My body went into a tribal dance of some sorts and the observer in me stepped back to witness.  There was no effort. Sweat pouring down my face.  I was free.  It was a meditation.  A trance.  A freedom from the clutches of the mind.  It was a connection to spirit.  A connection to unlike anything I ever experienced sitting in a chair or on a hard wood pew of a church.  I felt the holy spirit.  I connected to shakti energy.  I felt the divine dancing with me.  I felt connected to every person in that room in a way I could not when I first entered the studio.  Nobody preached to me about how to find God or ways to act in order to connect to God.  I didn't have to go through a preacher.  I was connected.  In ecstasy.  I understood now possibly why the woman who sparked an uneasiness in me when I entered the studio was sitting there looking like she was making out with an invisible force.  I was now connected to the amazing creative second chakra energy that was permeating the studio. I felt like I was making out with an invisible divine energy.  I was simply allowing myself to not stop resisting the flow of the divine Kundalini energy.  The creative force of the universe.

"Lyrical"

When the lyrical rhythm began I felt free.  I was skipping around the studio experiencing the lightness of being.  Dancing lyrical after giving it all over through the rhythm of chaos is like experiencing the relief and lightness after a deep cry or emotional release.  I had shaken off so many emotional layers.  Even though this rhythm is about lightness and play I found myself feeling sadness.  The sadness was for all those people that never allow themselves to let go.  Those people who are held back from letting their hair fly and arms flail.  Those humans who don't allow themselves to play, and dance, and feel, and cry and just live.  I was sad for that part of me that for so many years never allowed myself to play.  I found myself saying a prayer for my ancestors and my current family members.  I then invited my family in spirit to join me.  I skipped around the room and danced for all my ancestors and current family members who can't let go.  Who can't connect to play or express their feelings.  I danced for them and I released for all my generations.

 I skipped and played and looked at the skyline of the city that I have loved and hated for so many years.  This time around I got this city.  I got it on a level I wasn't able to before because I had been blocked off to it.  Everything about New York is poetic.  It is shitty and beautiful.  It can make peoples dreams come true and can shatter them.  The creative energy in that city is thick with hopes and dreams and sadness and despair.  It is truly a place where all those who never fit into their families, who were misunderstood, and who are just free spirits can escape too.  Even if it is for a short time.  New York offers so much to people to feel alive.  And for the first time in a long time I felt alive.  Looking out to the skyline, looking at the grand church,  I was alive.  And for the first time I thanked the city for its beauty and its gifts.

"My Stillness"

Then there was the rhythm of stillness.  I just kept staring out the window.  It is all I could do.  At this point I was tired.  I gave the dance everything of me.  I was at the zero point and all I could do was be.  I stood in the window and continued to stare at the church.  Just swaying back and forth. Surrendered.  My body in complete prayer.  I then turned around and took in the studio and the group of souls-the tribe- that assisted me with this life changing experience. I breathed in the smell of sweat and city air.  I didn't want to forget.  I didn't want to forget how it was to experience heaven on earth.  I didn't want to forget what it was like to be fully alive and dancing in the kingdom of heaven.

No Filters on this Photo Just Sweat and After Glow!

I thanked the instructor and of course had to get my picture taken with him.  I shared how grateful I was and also how sad I was that this did not happen in Nashville.  There is a church on every corner in Nashville promising that their way is the way to connect to God.  Yet it was this practice that gave me direct experience  Where is a 5 Rhythms "church" in my current hometown?

That was my NYC 5 Rhythms experience.

The creative ideas that flowed from me during those two hours were amazing.  I wonder what life would be like to dance in a class like that twice a week?  At this point I would take once a week.

Tonight on October 22, 2013 three years after my "shattering"  I get to participate in a 5 Rhythms workshop here in Nashville, TN.  I am excited and nervous at the same time. That means I am alive.  I don't know what to expect.  Anything can happen.  I do know that no matter what some kind of magic will be happening.  Its just a matter of being open to how it shows up.

What are the "5 Rhythms" Of The Soul?

"Doing the rhythms is about waking up your most essential nature, stretching your intuition and imagination as surely as your body.  It's a formless form, one that expands your range of physical and emotional expression and introduces you to forgotten parts of your psyche.  Anyone can do the rhythms."  -Gabrielle Roth, Sweat Your Prayers

Flowing- Feminine energy, connecting to how your body moves, being open to change and birthing new movement.  Moving from the inhalation.  Taking in the goodness.  Taking in compliments, let downs, support.  Soft, rounded movements.  Earth.

Staccato-Masculine energy, putting self in world, moving through inertia, areas one feels stuck, sharp lines and edges, creating boundaries, the rhythm of taking responsibility, showing up for self, being the hero of your life, Fire

Chaos- The meeting of the divine feminine and masculine, diving beneath the self-imposed layers into the depths of your being and shaking it out, connecting to intuition, releasing from the mind, giving it all over to the divine, freeing self, powerful as water to wash away and cleanse out the old

Lyrical- "Lightness of being"  A celebration.  Still as free and wild as chaos but lighter.  This is about air.  Feeling what you feel but lighter.  Like the afterglow of sex.  The lightness of being after a really good cry. The good feeling after studying hard, taking a test, acing it, and enjoying the feeling of accomplishment.  Anything is possible when connected to the rhythm of lyrical.  We don't have to lock ourselves into being one thing we know we can shape shift.  We know we can change anytime.  We can celebrate life.  Air.

Stillness- Experiencing the power of being and not the power of doing.  Slowing down to the present moment.  Connecting within.  Moving to find stillness.  This is the rhythm of growing older.     The rhythm of dying.  Peacefulness.  Meditation.  Staying present in the middle of a storm.

If you are interested in experiencing this movement as a spiritual practice just start looking online.  There are plenty of resources and videos available to get you started.  There are no steps to learn.  You don't have to know how to dance.  

Books available:

Sweat Your Prayers, The Five Rhythms Of The Soul by Gabrielle Roth

Maps To Ecstasy by Gabrielle Roth

Website:

www.5rhythms.com

When is the last time you have allowed yourself to let go.......

DANCE.