This past month, I committed to doing a movement practice every day for 30 days, no matter what. Through this practice, I opened up buried wounds, healed chronic pains, challenged stiff beliefs and found the power in keeping a promise I made to myself. I also deepened my awareness that movement is absolutely essential to life. In fact, it is life.
The deeper we go with movement, the more wholly we feel and express ourselves in the world, and the more connected we are. It doesn’t matter what kind of movement you do – whether you follow a specific technique, move off beat in the kitchen or if it looks good to others, it simply has to happen.
Suffering and trauma repeat themselves because a movement gets stuck.
An impulse gets stirred up inside of you, the old story begins, yet again, and then it ends, often in the exact same place – potentially with frustration, anxiousness, boredom, loneliness or futility, to name a few endings – unless you choose to make a new movement.
And new movements can happen all the time.
Your body can ALWAYS offer you a new option, a different direction, a moment to take a deep breath. Sometimes it’s as easy as just doing it. Sometimes it takes more of a commitment, because old trauma needs a safe place to open and flow.
Whatever the case may be, your body desires movement.
It longs to jump, wiggle, nudge, shift, shimmy and shake. It craves subtlety and softness. It thrives from directness and wildness. It could care less if you’re on beat or if your movements look like Beyonce’s. It simply wants to move. It wants to feel the flow inside of you, any flow, to its fullest extent –the flow of sadness, silliness, grief, longing, fear, shame, anger, rage, shyness, sexiness, messiness, fury, passion, hunger, desire, playfulness.
Your body is already holding it all, and it’s just waiting for you to move.
It’s essential. It’s the basis for life.
A movement training + playlist:
(For those of you who know the technique I teach, go ahead and use it in the different body areas. For those who don’t simply follow the instructions and discover your movement.)
- Move your shoulders, make the movements big, breathe, and really focus on continuously finding new movements in your shoulders. You can do this standing or sitting, but relax into your lower body.
- Move your hips, make the movements playful. Resist the temptation to move your entire body, so you can more deeply explore the capacity of playfulness in your hips.
- Move your arms and legs, however you wish to move them, but commit to just moving the arms and legs, continuously. It’s a wonderful challenge.
- Now, move your entire body, even your face, maybe let your voice join in. Move with what opens up in you, whatever it is. Give it space. See where it moves you. Let yourself be.
- Breathe and soak up the energy.
Workshops
Every workshop I teach includes movement and body practices. Movement as a way to recognize what holds us in old stories and movement as the most natural, energizing way out.
- Yearning & Longing: Moving from the heart – We delve into the deep wishes of our hearts and move beyond how we usually hide them or push them into the background for fear they’ll never be met.
- Unleashing your Feminine Power – We recognize the rules that hold us in place, the ones we follow without ever having set them, and the endless resources underneath these rules. The depths we hold in our lower bodies of rage, intensity, fury, passion, tenderness, sensitivity, and intimacy. We access its physical potential through deep movement and a more intimate connection to our lower bodies.
- Embodying Boundaries – We learn to feel the NOs we hold inside ourselves, strengthen them and move them, so our deepest instincts and wishes are fully and naturally expressed through our bodies. As a boundary that is at once moveable, flexible and strong.
- Choosing Self-respect – The movement of promises, choices, old shame, quieted passions and self-worth. We’ll use movement to move the blocks that get in our way and release the hold they have on us. We’ll discover the movement of self-respect and mutual respect. Moving with dignity and fullness.
- Embodying Elements – This is 5.5 days of movement. Moving with the energy and qualities of earth, water, fire and air. Moving to fully integrate and connect to these elements within ourselves and all around us.