Move and Be Moved -

Acrobatic Ballet - Wow!

Sun, 03 Aug 2008 15:45:48 -0700

Some amazing balance and strength!

Who will sign the surrender agreement?

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 19:48:38 -0700

I was returning to my home in Taos from teaching at the Omega Institute yesterday, and spoke at the airport with a man who was a private contractor for the National Defense. We spoke about the current state of affairs in the United States and the ineffectiveness of our defense strategies. At one point, he poses the question, "Really, who is going to sign a surrender agreement?"

Yes, I wonder, about our own dances, "Who will sign the surrender agreement?" What will it take for us to surrender to not only what is true and real, to our possibilities, potentials, but beyond into the deepest place of infinite grace?

This is an act of true courageousness, to surrender so deeply to the dance, to the infinite wisdom within. If we cannot sign surrender agreements in our own beings, how can we hope that our relationships, families, communities, countries, the world sign surrender agreements?

Youtube favorites x 4

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 09:36:26 -0700

Exhilarated, then exhausted, now renewed & refreshed - the celebratory wave from this year's fifth annual Gathering in Olympia has left me high & happy & drenched at the tideline, a bleached piece of driftwood lying lazy in the July sun, draped in kelp, a hermit crab shell empty at my side and a leonine heart beating strong and sure inside me. As the 85 or so participants can attest, it was again a delicious journey into communal space, worthy of 10,000 words or more, but I’ll keep it brief and merely extend thanks to the teachers: Paganos2 (ever fabulous right through Amara's deeply moving closing ritual), Melissa Michaels (fluid play, circle vocalizations), Sylvie Minot (relaxed bellies & dropped down knees) & Joanne Winstanley (rockin' the Zep after being rocked hard on life's roundabout). And, once more, showers of love on organizers Liz, Ronny & a delightful crew of Marie, Sara Jean, Kathy, Devi, Joe & more.

In short, it was a reliably transformative weekend. And on that theme, I’m sharing four youtube links I've been steered to in past few days. Three feature Move&Be Moved contributors of long standing filmed not long back by Mark Shimada, who was asking professionals how art impacts on their working lives. The fourth is one of a remarkable series of clips featuring Philippine prisoners demonstrating how dance & Van Halen tunes can bring meaning, joy & purpose (i'm guessing) to the hardest of lives. All of it is more proof that we, the 99th monkeys of movement, have a calling that can woo the world's woes and heal a few of its & our own wounds.

Trudes Tango

Visudha de los Santos

Kari Uhlman

Jump in the Philipines

The Dancer Within

Wed, 25 Jun 2008 09:17:52 -0700

Sky-eye

Sun, 22 Jun 2008 16:24:24 -0700

Summer begins
light in the eyes,
returning to these
cloudy skies

miss you v.
love,d.

Funkraiser

Mon, 02 Jun 2008 14:53:55 -0700

Victoria's 5R community hosted Funkraiser last night to raise funds for two worthy causes: Lucie Nerot's Dancing Across Borders and The Power of Hope, a local organization with which 5R teacher Soasis Sukuweh has worked. Joanne Winstanley dreamed the event up and helmed the coordinating team, which included such 5R regulars as Nicole Lavoie, Val Hawkins, Todd Harmon, Carolyn Bateman and Joy Weick. Jazz and samba bands performed, Joanne spun tunes, and the community turned out to support the cause on a warm June evening.

The attached picture says it all ... and so do the comments of Power of Hope executive director Gita John-Iyam: "What an amazing amount of Love and energy and fun went around last night. I believe that the energy you generated will reach our youth and show them the meaning of compassionate community. I am so grateful to Joanne and all of you for having been invited to be a part of this generous and creative circle. - In peace! gita"

July Stone Carving Workshop

Wed, 28 May 2008 13:50:28 -0700

Start: 2008 Jul 5 - 12:00am

End: 2008 Jul 26 - 12:00am

Location:

I am offering a stone carving workshop July this summer. We will meet in my studio for four Saturdays, 10:00 am - 3:00 pm and engage in the transformational process of turning stone into soul. The fee is $350.00 plus the cost of the stone. Everything but lunch is provided. If you are interested in participating or learning more, please contact me at revdocsil@gmail.com.

Our Task

Wed, 28 May 2008 05:44:31 -0700

Our Task

Dance
Dance Beauty
Dance Love
Dance Peace
Dance Unity
within and without

Bernie's activist dance of peace

Mon, 26 May 2008 12:10:40 -0700

I meet so many fascinating people in this work - therapists, healers, environmentalists, teachers, award-winning filmmakers, artists, yoga instructors, photographers, pagans, priests, CPAs, writers, lawyers, mums, dads, sons, daughters, musicians, sculptors, creatives of all kinds ... Here's another who many of you know already but some perhaps don't: Bernie Meyer. I've always been curious about this gentle man who brings such dignity, presence and intention to Sunday mornings in Olympia - an elder (he's 70) who models possibilities for those of us setting our own intentions to dance evermore in this life. Last time through I introduced myself and started firing off questions, which he accepted with good grace and a smile. His card reads "peacemaker" and he is leading a truly remarkable life as an activist in the tradition of Mahatma Ghandi. His autobiography is to be published this year, I believe, and you can follow his pilgrim's progess online at http://theamericangandhi.blogspot.com.

michael & anneli's rites of belonging

Mon, 05 May 2008 15:25:52 -0700

Julie mentioned Spirtweaves a few posts back, so I thought I’d weigh in here on the morning after the weekend before. For the third time, possibly fourth, Bettina Rothe brought Michael & Anneli Molin-Skelton to Vancouver. Three dozen of us gathered in a church hall on the city’s west side, sun-splashed and spring-scented, showers of cherry blossoms carpeting the sidewalks. The workshop was called Rites of Belonging, and Bettina has ensured that for one weekend a year these two gifted teachers belong to us on Canada’s west coast. Fortunate us. Blessed us. They build, hold and sustain ritual space quite magically – equal partners, co-creators, two voices & embodiments weaving the mystery with sing-song poetic interplay, working the deck, then sufi-swirling amongst us, trailing webs of energy & inspiration & beauty in their wake.

The experience of many of us was that they were unstintingly generous with their attention – one or the other materializing at our sides at exactly the right moment to nudge us into a deeper relationship with the field of study – namely the continuum that stretches from the excluded, wounded, adrift outsider to the tribal being welcomed in the supportive arms of community. Many of us found ourselves slip-sliding ‘tween the two extremes – the gap separating "yum" and "yuck," as Michael put it with a laugh ... between being stuck in isolation and wrestling with our own stories & projections, then shifting through fears & tears & sorrow & age-old armouring into the collective heart that beat so loud and clear in that room. Poems were read. Prayers recited. Rituals enacted. Ancestors invoked. And at the foot of a soaring altar built by dancer Emiella Kaufman, we were finally held in the embrace of our birthright home – gravity, the still point, our own clear centre … pinned to the earth by a large, moss-covered stone that our teachers placed on each of us in turn as we completed the journey home. So yes, I unreservedly join voices with Julie: Anneli & Michael rock.

silent raves

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 13:28:36 -0700

An article forwarded by 5R Vancouver regular Rebekkah Harvey. Dance for us in this community is more than a 'hipster diversion,' of course, but I guess this is further evidence that some kind of shift into deeper embodiment is underway ...

The new rave: Dancing to the beat of their own drummer
Vancouver Sun, Saturday, April 26, 2008

In what looked like an improbable dance scene from a zombie movie, nearly 1,000 people gathered recently in New York to gyrate en masse as part of the latest hipster diversion: the silent rave.

The peculiar social trend, now making its way across Canada, involves the flash congregation of large groups of people in a public place to dance to the beat of their own MP3 players. The startling result is a sea of bodies moving in sundry rhythms to a soundtrack of silence.

"We all want to be part of something ... but at the same time, we also like to differentiate ourselves," says Jonah Berger, a University of Pennsylvania Wharton School professor who has studied identity signals within social groups. "This movement appeals to both those motivations: you're in a place with other people, yet only listening to what you want to hear."

Berger describes the events as a kind of "flash mob 2.0." The briefly hip cultural phenomenon earlier this decade involved organizing meetings for hundreds, even thousands, of people in a public place at a specific time -- say, 6:53 or 3:19 -- who would then perform unusual activities such as a mass chicken dance.

Although silent raves (also called silent discos or mobile clubbing) have had scenesters under their spell for years in the United Kingdom -- an event at London's Victoria Station last April drew about 4,000 dancers -- it wasn't until recently that the trend began making a splash this side of the pond.

Silent raves are currently in the works in at least two-dozen North American cities, including Edmonton, Kelowna, Toronto, Vancouver and Calgary. Nearly 1,200 people have confirmed plans to attend the Calgary event, which is planned for May 10 at a secret location to be revealed to the guest list via Facebook 24 hours in advance. Another 1,900 people say they might attend.

Spiritweaves

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 15:10:49 -0700

In the past six months I've been inspired by many forms of movement practice, widening the circle of movement experiences I have. One that has sparked my curiousity is spiritweaves, a movement practice developed out of both the 5Rhythms & SoulMotion. Anneli & michael molin-skelton are based in Los Angeles and teach around the country. For more information you can go to their website at www.spiritweaves.com

This is what they say about spiritweaves:

spiritweaves ™ is a movement inspiration
extended to all with an impulse
to pray in motion
to dance devotion.
it is a movement invitation
extended to all with a desire to listen
to their own voice
to dance the truth; your choice.
spiritweaves ™ is a dance of improvisation
guided through the lens of your attention
and married to the fire of your intention.
when woven together we are free
to do the dances of
twisting not resisting
rolling rather than controlling
unwinding and unbinding
unraveling as we are traveling
wandering together into the center of who we are.
spiritweaves ™ is a movement liberation
extended to all who are willing
to answer their own calling.
a movement revelation
unmasking the mystery and magic of our own dance.
we will asist, stir, incite, invite and inspire the dance
to be awakened into and throughout our lives
breath, weight, shape, pause, repetition, silence and witnessing
are some of the tools we will employ to engage
and enhance you as a creative event, always unfolding.
emergency: emerge and see what breaks through as
spiritweaves ™
spiritweaves ™ is a prayer in progress constantly being birthed
out of the 5 rhythms® and soul motion ™.

Dancing Across Borders and Paul Mongillo

Mon, 14 Apr 2008 18:58:17 -0700

An article in the Olympian about Paul Mongillo's photography work and experience with Lucie Nerot's Dancing Across Borders project. Link to Olympian Article

Another Wave

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 22:12:30 -0700

The Wave

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 22:11:31 -0700