Embracing Limits with GAMES!!!!
I love games. Why don’t we don’t play games more often, not just in class but with our partner on the dance floor? So fun....
Our tango community here in Anchorage is so lucky to have Rebecca Shulman visiting to teach workshops starting tomorrow. I found this video of her dancing in 2007 with the rule that her partner can only lead her in forward steps. So much fun, and I am super excited to have the opportunity to learn from her in the coming days. I’ve also added a few other videos of tango games that look inspiring. Enjoy!
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The Discipline of Positive Calm: Redeeming Our Disagreements
Sometimes I just love participating in dance discussions and debates. I enjoy having conversations in person, batting ideas back and forth by email, diving into discussions on the forums. But I can only take so much. I’m definitely not a die-hard regular on the forums with thousands of posts. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I’m just the kind of person who likes to stop by and dig in for a couple of weeks and then retreat and focus on other things for a while. Makes my occasional visits much more focused and meaningful.
Part of this is my personality, but another part of it is the negativity, the derision, and the name-calling. I see it on forums, I see it on a few blogs, I see it in friendly conversations that have taken a wrong turn somewhere. When I encounter this I tend to take a step back and detach a bit. Why so much hostility? Why such defensive and caustic remarks provoked by seemingly nothing other than disagreement?
Dance is a very personal thing. It is played out on and in our bodies, reveals our mental and emotional habits and choices, and calls forth our creative and intuitive energies. It constantly yet insidiously butts up against issues of gender, culture, and politics. So dance can’t help but become wrapped up in our identities in a way that is both obvious and elusive. But surely our differences can be expressed and explored in a way that doesn’t lead to a cheap and adversarial battle of words.
Reformed Obsession: Recovering the Inner Life of Dance
Reading through some old notes and quotes today, I found this gem from Andrew Cooper in his book, Playing in the Zone: Exploring the Spiritual Dimensions of Sports. Although he writes about sports, the same can be written about dance:
“Our obsession with sport is a signal of its value. It is but a distorted sign of our passion to realize such qualities as beauty, excellence, transcendence, freedom, and communion. The problem with our obsession is not that we care about sports too much but that we care too little. We delight in the thrills, but we don’t love the craft… We want technical mastery without appreciating the traditions through which such mastery is transmitted. And in so doing, the intrinsic joys and inner life are lost.”
Dance is as much about spirit and character and communion as it about physicality and skill, as much an emotional and spiritual pursuit as it is a physical and mental one.
The empty dance is one in which your body is requested but your soul is ignored.
When we put intention into our movements and choices…
...the music is allowed to reveal its secrets.
...the partnership is infused with trust and understanding.
...the dance is flooded with meaning and purpose.
Let that be our obsession.
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