Some dance to remember, some dance to forget

“Some dance to remember, some dance to forget” ~ The Eagles ‘Hotel California’.

The forms of our dancing draw on folk dance from many cultures, and from contemporary movements to a wide variety of music, old and new.
But what is it?
One can say it is many things to many people or that what it is can only be known in the dance itself and cannot be articulated. One can itemise benefits or describe the mechanics and origins. But I feel there is something I want to try to say - so I will see if it can find a way to speak through my willingness.

The areana I would address may seem beside the point but I feel that the context in which we do anything  is the determiner of what it is. Indeed the same external behaviour can demonstrate opposite things. It all depends on where you are coming from. It is not so much what we do that is important, but what we hold in our heart. I don't mean this in any superficial sense of emotional affirmations or wishful thinking - but the actual and active desire sets the purpose or context from which all else follows.

Though it seems we have  many options in a complex world, they can all be seen as either self transcending or self fulfilling - and I use the latter in the sense of seeking to maximise a personal sense of satisfaction in terms of a currently defined sense of self.  Self transcendence is not unfulfilling - but is an expansion or a shift into a greater sense of self and life than as themind tends to define - and arises from a willingness to join or open in relationship in the moment as it moves.

The mind that sleeps in its own self definition is a kind of taken for grantedness that doesn't need to really look or listen because it believes it already knows. It sees forms but attaches its own meanings and manages its sense of itself and world in an essentially private way. It is self protective and will maintain an insulated or separated experience as a way of protecting against believed chaos, pain or inner conflict. It uses forms of communication and joining without conscious embrace or extension of trust - as in a masked presentation. We are all very adept at such behaviour as it has seemed to protect us in a loveless world - and mind.

But in innocence of any strategy, we may find life surprises or undoes us of our defences in moments of transcendence, of beauty, of joy flowing freely, of an opening of our heart that occurs spontaneously and naturally. And  not surprisingly, we want to experience that again, and again and yet again.

In time we move from innocent willingness to join or trust, into a mind that acquires history, preferences and partialities and begin to grow a personna in place of a relatedness. We become opinionated and judgemental and conditional. We look to certain forms or arrangements to satisfy or qualify our involvement and withhold unless such conditions are met. We associate ourselves with specific aspects of a wholeness that carry our personal sense of the sacred or true value - and hold these over and against what seem to be misguided or off centred - or even heretical or corrupted - movements that we do not feel at one with. And so we factionalize.

to be continued...