Relating in dance #1

Relating cannot meaningfully be imposed, but is uncovered in the extension of trust.
While one can exercise methods or techniques toward such discovery, these are only bringing one into a place where realisation can occur.
The willingness for insight or realisation is the essential determiner of the outcome and not applied force or method.

In this sense our primary relating is within ourselves,  as an expression of self acceptance in expression.

As we see ourselves, so will we see others. If we are judgemental and rejecting of ourselves, we will experience as if others are carrying our own thoughts. Therefore an unjudgemental circle of trust will not reinforce a tendency to withdraw or retaliate in a sense of justified defence.

The attitude of defence is often one of damage limitation, of presenting one's self so as not to attract or merit blame - with all the feelings of rejection, invalidity, hatred and rage, that are associated with guilt, with exclusion, and with unworthiness or denial of love. Much of our social adaption and learning, works to suppress and limit our exposure to the hateful, but it does so at a cost of also denying or suppressing the life principle itself.

The desire or calling for dance has within it the desire to feel and be life in expression, and in joining in dance as a community, to share in and witness that expression.

If this desire is suppressed by a defensive attempt to limit and control our experience, we essentially usurp the movement of life with an imposition of forms of correctness in which we feel some sense of temporary protection and validation - relative to a hostile environment.  And because we cut ourselves off from our life expressing by such controls, we feel less at rest in our wholeness, and more susceptible to threat. Fear becomes a self-fulfilling loop of experience in which the seeming answer or protection, actually fuels and feeds the conditions of division, conflict and the need for defence.

Hence we dance in 'suits of armour', with little free attention to notice or behold the expression of being that is presencing itself as our relatedness - our sharing life.
But if there is any movement of the call to joy alive within us, we will have moments or periods of being-in-expression that are portals or stepping stones out from the mind of thinking, and into the mind that aligns with feeling. It may be these moments are brief, if our desire to get a handle of control on our experience interrupts by habit - because such moments are clear experience of being in harmony with - yet not being in control over - our experience of ourselves in the world with each other.

Investing in such Self-revelation so as to give it honour and welcome in our life is simply a matter of not persisting in suppressing it. This might be a simple moment of releasing what doesn't work, or it may be a process over time in which we notice the ways in which we are still attached or identified with in some protective or personal sense, and shift our identification by degrees until we feel safe enough to trust or move more freely.

A culture of joy establishes the conditions for learning are present, and each of us finds our own way in relaxing and accepting our inclusion in such joy - for though we can lead a horse to water, we cannot make them drink. Self-inclusion is the basis from which we relate in wholeness of presence in which 'life finds its way' because it knows itself. But the definition of joy in terms of a self-specialness will lose its way and will not realize it does this but to itself.

The dance has always spoken to me as a way of releasing self-specialness (in oneself or others).
One can say that everyone is special - but really it is that we are all significant, as the presence of life in expression - as the movement of relatedness of which we cannot really separate out from excepting in imagination that always becomes fearful and always loses the 'music' and the joining.

I thought I was going to write some simple examples of things that I have found helpful - but as the above paragraphs appeared I accept that a foundational perspective is essential. To abide in an expression of trust without attachment to outcome is to break the habit of a coercive intent.
The movement of trust is like a small quiet voice beneath the clamour of the mind in reaction, yet when it is desired, it can be discerned, already present.

Brian

If we build on the sand of merely wishful thinking, it will not stand.

On smiles, masks - and joining in truth

I tried writing a short personal bit of personal background and it became long and as
yet unfinished. Perhaps I will get a bit of time to finish it soon and link
to it here in case it interests - though the personal can so easily be a
focus of distraction. I am 'any one' or some one that speaks to the centre.
A voice willing to speak to an attention willing to listen.

The loss of communication is the loss of trust.
The mind serves to provide a mask of protection in a 'loveless world', such
that we we become in some sense withheld and behind our presentation of
ourself. Where our presentations 'work' in protecting us or find social
acceptance, we accept them as handles on living and coping in the world and
develop them and in time identify our self and 'the real world' in terms of
the mask, and relegate the stirrings of our being to our dreams of a better
life or our sense of what life 'could be' if the 'world' or others would
only change to support our needs. And in some ways we find others who we
make relation with on a basis of mutual - but separate - needs met.

And there is a kind of love, for while the 'other' fits my dream, I feel
permission to be unwithheld and allow my natural presence or joy to shine.

But we find there are limits and demands to others and our self that
essentially say, "if you do not be as I need you to be, then you will upset
me", and so to enforce the behaviours of others so as to maintain the
controls in which we will not be upset, we 'guilt' them.

So a smile can become a coercive intent of both presentation an intention,
which may have some currency of acceptance and yet be felt as forced and in
some sense demanding.

Within the 'mask' is a complex world of seeking validation, mutual stroking
or competitive reaction. And one of the ways of reacting to the seeing
dominance of others is to present the mask of withdrawal, sometimes called
passive aggression, because it is not neutral, but has its own atmospheric
effect. Minds are very complex, and some study these dynamics endlessly...

To restore the conditions in which communication naturally occurs is to
restore trust. This calls for a defencelessness to honesty within ourselves
such as to be with others in the clear purpose and presence of what we are
moved to share and be.

This honesty is a 'spiritual path', that is innate to the form of any real
path of commitment we have in life, and is not merely a private
accomplishment of making a spiritual connection to our person, or in
private, but is the restoration to an unselfconscious trust in  - and as -
the movement of our being, which is shared because nothing to withhold from
is given value or meaning.

I read recently that 'love begins the moment we decide not to take offence'.
What was once given the power to trigger my defences is being turned to an
opportunity to restore communication.

This isn't the email that responds with specific ideas and suggestions or
examples of what invites a shared and free attention into our dancing, but
any such forms might be implemented as part of the mask of 'social
engineering'. So though there are conversations which I look forward to
sharing on such, at the moment I found myself writing this.

We've been busy but have a few days where I hope to get to come back on
this.

The 'culture' that we teach and share is not always conscious. Indeed we are
often blind to our own presumptions and need others to help us see that we
have them.

Noticing symptoms or effects that indicate a lack of well being is part of
waking up to health. If we are curious rather than defensive and reactive,
then what comes into view does not condemn us, but frees us.
It is all a matter of trust.

There are adverts that use the slogan "Because you're worth it". I recomend
using this not only for hanging in with ourselves through the difficult, but
for and with each other.

I might say that there is no way to 'come Home' without your brother and
that to be joined in clear and happy purpose is not so far from Heaven.

Acceptance and honouring of another just as they are is part of moving with
them, and reflects the same quality in ourselves.

We cannot 'do' love and any attempt to assert or control can be felt by
others, even children. Especially children!
But we can learn to let love move us and abide and be with us - without our
interference. This is 'deeper into the dance'.

We don't have to call it love - or call it anything! - but the movement that
touches us in an uncontrived moment of welcome or togetherness is a natural
expression of being alive.

We like to talk of 'cooperating with Nature' at the level of our planet, but
if we are interfering and exploiting our nature at the level of our personal
sense of being - then can there be a true foundation for otherwise sound
ideas?

Being out of control is fearful to that which still believes it needs to
wield it, but in the moments where we feel the music moving us, we are one
with our experience of life in a very simple way.

Rather than plunder this until the seam runs out, why not let it abide in
our hearts and grow?

For it is a portal if we walk through it - or rather realize that that is
the real self and world, and begin to give welcome and commitment to it.
When masks no longer serve, they are nothing. But you - the movement of life
that is being all that you are - is still here.

Why do we hide our light?
Fortunately we are not completely successful, and another who is in their
acceptance can see another in a worth and beauty that they don't yet have
for themself - but in the sharing is the remembering.

We may have a special relationship with our music and dance in that it can
be used to 'keep the ugly world out' and protect the 'little that we have
left', but it can be consecrated to life in a way that transforms us and our
world in ways we cannot pre-think or imagine from the stance of defence.

The matter I speak of are deep and far reaching in implication. But the
world running as it has been running, has deep and far reaching implications
too. The sense of coming out of the closet is not fear-driven, yet the
nature of our times are such as to activate a greater leaning into trust
than I might otherwise allow.

"Smile and the world smiles with you" is a simple truth for a compass
direction in life. But the wherewithal for our smile is a trust and a
willingness of discernment and cannot be a technique to get a better handle
or become more 'spiritual'. We don't need to validate ourselves, but to
accept ourselves exactly where we are - and let that be the context of a
natural curiosity and joy in learning and becoming more able to abide in
life.

Brian

Reflections on the practicalities of opening joy and moving through inhibition in our dancing

1. When the teacher’s attention is such that dancers feel included, but not overly focussed upon or made to feel self-conscious, there is a culture of invitation, in which teaching and learning can more easily occur.  The teacher needs not to be operating out of a sense of ‘pass or fail’ with regard to themselves or others, but simply ‘being present with’, This means the teacher generally knows the dances well enough to dance AND have attention free for the circle.

2. The teacher has faith in the intentions and abilities of the dancers, such as to serve their willingness to learn and discover their dance, rather than compound any sense of inadequacy, difficulty or resistance. The teacher also has faith in themselves, in their sharing of dance and ability to communicate it.

3. The teacher can bring a critical perspective to the group or TO any members of the group without being critical OF them, within the focus This also invites and creates an unjudgemental atmosphere in which discernment and focus are valued, rather than merely focusing on steps as a 'problem to be solved'.

4. The teacher is essentially sharing and facilitating the joining in dance, through a selection of dances. The joy in the dance is not just getting the step right, but is being in the full flow and feeling of the dance such as to embody an example of the joy in dance as well as a proficiency of the step pattern. Teaching through the body reaches directly to the body of the dancer and operates whenever the dancer’s attention is not too bound up in themselves.

5. The joining is firstly the inner receptivity to the music and its clear embodiment, and the automatic or natural expression of that joining or connection is a joining in wholeness. This is open to meeting and being met in dances that have a social aspect as well as being relationally and spatially aware of the shape and space and synchronicity of the circle as a whole. It is not an attempt to be present so much as actually joining and abiding as part of, or one with, the presence or movement of life.

6. A culture of intimacy is that of uninhibited presence, which is not an affectation of closeness or any personal act or communication, but is the relaxed and open demeanour of sharing an experience by fully embracing it.

7. The teacher can remind, invite and practice with the dancers regarding weaning their attention from the teachers feet - or anyone else's feet.  Though this is down the list it is one of the habits that should not be encouraged or allowed to persist without reminders  and practice of finding the pattern in our own bodies and enjoying the freedom to take in the whole experience.

8. The permission to make mistakes while learning is not to say 'anything goes', for we are not without caring, but to put the focus into the joining and support the willingness for learning by not reinforcing fear, so as to be without anxiety. There are many creative ways to offer help to those who are either new or struggling, that invite a more connected approach than a head only approach.  Inviting the dancers to feel the music, the rhythm and the qualities of the dance as well as the sense of joining with others, works to counter the mentality that tends to withdraw into a private space and solve its problems 'all on its own' as if it WAS all on its own! As if to first BECOME worthy or valid in its own terms, rather than joining with what is already true.

9. The culture of the expression and communication of joy in dance is felt in the quality of our dancing presence, and in dances that have an outward or social aspect, in our spontaneous or uncontrived meeting in glance and smile. The quality of our touch also becomes energetically communicative and our clearer brighter perception of the moment is reflected in our presence.

10. Though there are step patterns to communicate and points of style, this is communicated to serve the expression of  the dancer from the inside-out rather than to join in or teach a formula to be intellectually understood and applied manually.  The safety to allow an inside-out expressing of felt spontaneity is also associated with a feeling of connection, kindness and gratitude.

11. The repeated temporary success of private unshared satisfactions of 'getting' a dance or overcoming a challenge, can pass muster as a a social enjoyment where dancers feel a sense of inclusion in an entertainment as a substitution for joining in joy. It isn't that this is wrong, but it is expressing an unreadiness or unwillingness to truly join with, enter in and be moved in the dance. It is so much less.

12. The willingness for, and inspiration in, an opening to love of life in music and dance, can not be forced. The teacher can learn to listen and feel for both the inspiration and the willingness to receive, in shared purpose of the group. Trusting ourself, is the key, because when we trust ourself, we communicate without coercion and find a free willingness in others to be or stay with us. An inspirational presence is one that draws from others what they may not know they have, or are. It is not the act of one will upon another, but is a joining in willingness to work and play.

13. Singing along with the music is not always desirable or appropriate, but, within the discernment of the moment it often is - and is also an expression of being moved and of uncovering a joined or shared joy. Singing and dancing, when true, are self revealing. Thus we may find we are inhibited in allowing their true expression. To be open to a release of inhibition is to be allowing the movement of our being to more fully express.

14. The way of self integration, expression and realisation is primarily one of willingness to identify or notice blocks or fears within oneself and to bring curiosity and willingness in finding a freer expression instead of a limiting factor. The focus is never on the blocks as they present themselves, but on the joy or movement of life in which the blocks will become discernible. Our mentality will show itself in our dancing; anxiety will contract the circle and hold back on our aspiration. Our attention will be withdrawn into a defensive mode and our eyes inward or locked upon the teacher's demonstration, with all else tending to be forgotten or excluded from awareness.

15. Living out from a presumption of a joined integrity of being is not a way to get a handle on others or the world in order to make it more 'loving', but is an expression of loving that is receptive and discerning enough to find creative opportunity in what otherwise seems a block or limitation. In this sense the teacher is also the learner, in terms of discerning and moving through limitation.

16. The willingness to learn, to be receptive in trust and clear in expression, is a fundamental honesty of being; of not trying to be more or other than one is - nor pretending to be less. Though all the facets illuminated 1-15 are examples of what is present in a joining in dancing as an expression of an integrity or unity of being, they are not a 'to do' list but illuminate or reflect a perspective that opens as we shift from thinking and controlling, into feeling and trusting; into a degree of mastery of the form. The essential realisation of 'trying to dance' is of getting in one's own way - and the essential practice is therefore of releasing or relaxing within a greater trust and awareness.

17. The experience of personal chaos, at some level is an 'initiatory' portal that cannot be sidestepped, but only passed through. The chaos of trying to understand in advance and then apply that understanding is  one of struggling always to maintain control and to feel invalidated when one cannot. Yet the willingness to abide with the music, the group and oneself included, is a pathway through to a shift in realisation - where 'the music tells us where we are, or the rhythm is felt that before was not, or the patterns and timings are found in the body in a way that no longer requires manual imposition.

18. A ‘control mentality’ has an aspect of demand, necessity or compulsion in it, and it is never wise to fight it - for that feeds it's sense of threat and of needing to control. To join with the worth of another will use whatever is helpful as a stepping stone in uncovering that worth, but will not be held hostage by it, because one remains in the purpose of sharing worth - and in our case, the joy of the dance.

19. As teachers, our personal responsibility is in keeping open to inspiration and on track in conscious purpose. If we 'lose the signal of our calling', we will see this reflected in the circumstances of our practice. Such feedback is never a validation of blame or failure of self, but is the call to release the thinking or attitudes that undermine or substitute for our true desire, and making a space or pause in which the movement that inspires us be felt anew. It may be that we pass through difficult personal experience in the course of a desire to share what we love, but within all of this is an essential simplicity that is exactly this; we love to dance and to share in dance, and this movement in our lives is part of our being in the world and sharing life. If we do not bring our presence into the world, it will be lacking for us - AND for those in our lives.

20. The music that moves is a living metaphor for our Spirit - in that the energies of life that are embodied express a spectrum of our humanity - of what it is to be truly human, as tangible felt qualities to our whole body-mind. In a society that has become imbalanced in the thinking or rational aspect, our music and dance offers a wholing, where we can 'let ourselves out from being led by our head' in the sense of struggle and stress management - into a present and felt wholeness of being. This is not an escape in to a private temporary alternative state but a reconnection and renewal in our true being.

21. The attempt to get a control, or handle of understanding - along with the sense of successful achievement in so doing, can make us more sophisticated in our presentations of ourself (to both ourselves and to others), but this is always at the cost of losing the immediacy and the inspiration or healing power of joining in dance.
If we allow our social persona to substitute for a willingness to join in dance, we become judgemental, opinionated, and defensive, such as to make and take our identification from the externals or forms of dances or music, rather than sharing in their living qualities. This also can lead to substituting mutually agreed meanings for living qualities - which tends to use dances that are considered powerful in their presence, as ways to leverage or bolster the dance experience, instead of as opportunity of a deeper receptivity.

22. In one way or another, the ‘ego’ is always tending to arise as a facet of consciousness and habit. This is not ‘bad’, but is a mistaken and self-defeating identification. Trying to grasp and keep and protect the living quality of our dancing, is something we will discover we are - in one way or another attempting, whenever we find ourselves in struggle or conflict. This is referred to above as an attempt to control our experience all by ourself. Wherever this is encountered in ourselves or with others, is an opportunity to be curious as to what is truly present, because there is another perspective available than that of opposition and conflict. A perspective in which we can freely and fully rejoin the Dance.

23. Learning dry theory without practice is a sort of blindness. To have a living sense of what we are learning before and preferably during the process of learning, reaches to a wholeness - where defining step patterns verbally specifically demands the head. The cultural bias toward the head is of a scientific impersonal non participance, in which we our FELT being is denied or subjugated to the demands of an external ‘reality’, associated with judgement. Reclaiming our wholeness is reclaiming the languages of expression of all levels of our being.

24. In the freedom to use all aspects of our being we may find freer, more joyful and more effective ways of sharing the dance, as our own learning unfolds. When we limit our learning, we limit our teaching. Surely, Life Itself is the Teacher, and when we move out from our self-preoccupations, we notice more of what is here to be appreciated and shared.

Circle of Shame

I love connected dancing. It is a joining with and an enjoying of. It allows, invites and facilitates relaxing and harmonising into a congruency of being in which the defences and armouring of any sense of problematic existence that I bring with me out of my past, fall away or are forgotten in a present fullness of being that is at the same time empty of demand that it be different than it is.

The joining with is not really joining if it is not also reflecting an inner state of communication or honesty within myself, for it is very possible to join in with the form of a group activity without really joining in purpose or willingness for joy.

Circles dancing for me has always had this 'inner track' learning and communion, without which the forms are similar but nothing - or very little is truly shared. Indeed the rituals of the world seem to embody a desire to share the form of togetherness without any real commitment of presence - so as to leave our little ego-sense of ourselves intact - untransformed - except perhaps just a little - but in private - where we 'join' in rehearsal or imagination but never look up to meet another.

Since I came back from a decade in the camp-scene into the circle dance network, I have been struck by how un-relational and disconnected it has become. There are individual exceptions and there can be situations of informality among friends or in smaller groups where dancers allow their natural being to shine, but generally speaking I see a "circle of shame'. For why else would anyone be downcast but that they fear unwelcome or indeed share a sense of unworthiness?

There are factors which play into this for circle dancing - for its very inclusivity means that dancing ability can be not required to join in, one simply has to be able to 'do the steps'.
And 'doing the steps' can become the focus - as if a problem to solve and a dance 'mastered' in order to move from one to another to another dance form and music as a pleasant and undemanding way to pass some time, in a warn social activity offering some recreation and exercise.

Now there is nothing 'wrong' with engaging life at whatever level or depth one is comfortable with - but to accept so much less than life, as if it is Life is likely to become defended around a fragment against the Whole rather than in a process of uncovering Wholeness.

In our world today we don't discern the difference and see things in terms of similar forms rather than their living qualities, and so are 'templated' into a sort of mass-managed existence because we essentially demand it!

It is as if our true presence must be hidden and protected from life and from the world, and a mask presented and structures found whereby to keep it hidden - because we fear the un-love of the world that we all have met and which we find intolerable.

And so there is a tacit conspiracy in society that works to keep us unconscious of a deeper dissonance, avoiding anything that threatens our automatic defences and trying to impose a sense of order upon life from a place that is not actually centred or grounded or ... connected.

Yet we also have the movement in our hearts to know and be known as we are - and this is quite different from the desire to 'become' someone valid in the eyes of our self or parents or others. Whenever we are inspired to step out of an old or obsolete defence pattern, we embrace Life and though we may pass through a process of risk, excitement and fear, we feel and find a deeper or more real sense of ourselves, shared, as a result.

But if this willingness for Life is not nurtured, the pathways into Life become a new territory in which the old habits reassert themselves and a sense of private control comes to replace a willingness to join in purpose. And so the forms that once brought deep gratitude and  spontaneous expressions of appreciation, become a ritual of 'the crumbs from the table' that are protected as 'the little we have left'.

It is hard to teach an old dog new tricks they say, but a human mind has another perspective available upon its own consciousness in which to wake up to a fresh way of seeing. The way we seem to 'lock' our minds isn't just our conditioning, but is the beliefs and assertions that we invest in as our very sense of self; that seem to be ever more justified by the reflected perspective of a conflicted sense of self.

The movement in our mind that seeks to become valid, is the unconscious sense of invalidity which is reinforced by our world. But the movement to know and be known truly, is a wholly present expression of life. These two directions are mutually self defeating, but only one is true.

The inclusivity that I love about the dancing is that of a sense of worth - shared. That is, a lack of the judgemental one-upmanship or withholding of attention that communicates in terms of of personal status and communicates an atmosphere and distrust.

It was this sense of inclusivity of worth that attracted me to hang in through my difficulties when I first turned up at a dance event. I wasn't trying to join something 'outside myself' but was joining consciously with a sense of worth that I felt both stirring in myself as well as held in the 'culture' around me.

I came to the dance FROM a context of spiritual experience as part of the learning to express and therefore abide in that realisation. For the coming back into a true focus and perspective in our being is not adding to our self - but is in so many way the releasing of what we recognize to be who we are not - of what no longer serves us.

Yesterday after introducing a fairly demanding dance that was new to my dancers, I felt to share with them that we had all experienced real glimpses amidst our learning, in which the 'dance did itself' - or we were somehow held and guided in an experience that was harmoniously 'out of control'. And this is a miracle for it directly attests and witnesses to a capacity that we don't have within the perspective of control, and yet is freely given us or available in the willingness to receive.

And yes, if we try to bring control mind into play with 'how did I do that', then we immediately 'lose it'. Such moments are rich in true insight.

A control mentality is quite different from being on purpose. To be on purpose is to be single and clear and not struggling - but persistent in willingness to stay on purpose. This also looks like the efforts of learning, but is not the reinforcement of a desire to control life and 'become' someone, but is the holding open of the conditions in which the miracle can witness directly what no amount of struggle can attain - or indeed imagine possible.

The Life that lives us is not operating through a filter of wish-beliefs and defences, but our experience of it may be thus distorted. And thus we are out of step and stumble as we move to where we think life should be rather than feeling our way in a greater trust.

Trust always begins with an honesty within ourselves from which we can reach out. It is not a matter of technique or ritual but a living dance within and between ourselves in which we allow the condition in which Life happens because it is already moving.

The human consciousness is largely a device of 'forgetting', of busyness and distraction. But at its root is the creative movement of Life to know and to be and to share.

The circle of trust is a relationship in which our focus shifts from distraction and dissonances into a natural and free presence of acceptance, that we can only access by sharing, and which renews and encourages us. To seek 'salvation' or completion on purely personal terms is to deprive ourselves amidst a self-deception.

In a recent mail to another dancer I said, that although I bring a conscious attention to form, I also bring it to the joining and to the joy, for without ALL of these present, the dance becomes an empty ritual or mimicry of life.


Thanks for your attention

Brian

Presence communicates in all that we teach

There are many points raised in Colin's message. (Posted in a previous blog post here)
One that is close to my heart is that whatever we are teaching (or apparently communicating) at the level of form - we are also communicating our presence.

A clear, open and relaxed presence communicates effortlessly,  because it is not self-consciously inhibited by doubt or division. Nor is it seeking to validate or become something more or less than serves the shared purpose of the situation. Such congruency of being will serve towards a mastery of the subject involved, not as a perfection of some personal state of achievement, but as a fluency and an at-oneness with all dimensions present. For we are always growing in our capacity to discern and embody the qualities of Life. In fact a willingness to learn and to receive, is the basis of inspired teaching because it listens, connects with and learns from those it serves, rather than identifying itself as a personal status that presumes others are there to validate.

A conflicted mind gives conflicting messages and communicates an energetic in which even simple things seem difficult to communicate - and attempt to control a fear of conflict rather than listen or feel a way through to a unified act or response sets up a culture of establishing unspoken rules by which to operate. Following such rules is fundamentally a strategic and defensive gesture and unconsciously communicates a dissonance regardless of what the outer forms teach. This can easily become  an energetic where the 'teacher' is unconsciously making emotional demand for support of their students - so as to avoid upset. Which is very different from a clearly communicated trust - or even an overt request for support amidst a potential difficulty or indeed willingness to take a risk together!

The idea of support is often targeted at (and also taken advantage by) those who present a sense of lack. But a true presence of support reaches through such appearances and communicates a sense of faith and worth that inspire more from the student than they knew they had in them to bring forth. This is transformational.
But only by embracing such a transformational process in ourselves  - as students of Life - can we serve as the extension of such an opportunity, to others.

To open to glimpses of an egolessness of being is the stirring of the desire to abide in it without the interference by which we 'lose' the connection.  To honour this desire is to accept a calling in life.

But if we make our identity upon the apparent fragility of our connection to such joy, then we perpetuate an unconscious passivity to a mentality of division - and our experience reflects this back to us ... and we believe it.

Joy is full-feeling; a direct abiding in Soul. The experience of anything wholly felt is an experience of our being because its meaning is directly discerned and not filtered through a mind of interpretation. And abiding in wholeness of being transmutes the perception of loss into true presence - as we are willing to accept.

For me these things have always been in the dance because my life had been previously touched by the glimpse of egolessness in a way that I haven't been able to successfully ignore. Indeed the dance came to me as a way of integrating and aligning with such direct experience, that brought it out from any personal sense of specialness into the willingness to share and to serve. As a culture for uncovering and expressing an already present truth rather than as a means of getting or becoming something in our own right.

Trying to articulate these matters in terms of ideas can seem very complex, particularly if meeting a vocabulary one is not accustomed to. Yet the nature of the experiential realisation and practice is simple and easily shared. But I have found that it is not enough simply to share an energetic presence amidst a culture of expectation and demand that identifies with the forms of things without embracing the aliveness that communicates its meaning through all of it.

But nor do I feel for spirituality - (for want of a better word) to be lost to a self-serious problem solving mentality. The ego-sense is a problem solving mentality that will extend its employment indefinitely, because it perpetuates an imposition upon life that renders it problematic. The more you feed it, the more it needs to eat. There is no fulfilment in it beyond a passing show, lost even as it is gotten. When is seems to come up is when a noticing allows a pause from reaction that allows a more honest movement of our being to register a shared integrity in place of a perception of lack of integrity in ourself or others.

There is an innocence in sharing music and dance that extends an invitation to be moved and to know oneself more fully in the movement itself. It is wordless and intimate to the dancer's own willingness and trust - and in the context of the qualities of the whole group. And yet whenever we allow ourselves to be undefended to the movement of our being we automatically communicate that presence into our world, because the armour falls away that also obscured our perception.

I am not indifferent to the forms and styles and background contexts for they are part of a sense of honouring a conscious intent - not as authorities in themselves but as they serve the expression of a living culture; wherever two or more join in a willingness to share or receive in an extension of trust. For our true authority in life is in the gift of our true presence, without intervention or constraint of dogma, but as an honouring and in gratitude for a gift of welcome extended.

The withholding of our presence - and the witholding of the extension of trust in a genuine attention, begets a poverty of Spirit (of unified conscious purpose).  Into the lack of which every kind of mask and presentation asserts for its own private or group advantage and resists anything but heavily managed change by which to maintain and adapt itself unchanged.

I feel the dance serves as a way of reclaiming a living inheritance in which we are moved as one rather than just being one moving among many. Such is transformative, because we see each other and the world in a new light, but to be more than a glimpse that is quickly lost to self protective reaction, we have to grow a culture of abiding in such being and letting it become in us. Holding connected silence can serve this - but only as it serves a true willingness to be joined - and not if it becomes merely the required thing or an empty ritual. So often do the forms that once expressed life become the forms that inhibit its expression.

It is also so, that when forms of expression fade or are diluted, become devoid of truly shared passion or presence and then even pass from serving as a currency of respectability or conformity, that they can be reclaimed or redeemed in an energetic sense of expression felt and known as truly shared. Whenever there is a perfection experienced, there is a tendency to want to hold on to it - and this is the shift from presence to form. that introduces a separation into an indivisibility. Noticing this in our own mind is the opportunity to become weaned from an identification of thought that deprives by trying to get, because unless we can also let it go, we cannot let it in. Gratitude is neither loss nor isolation and a sense of our life as a gift is a context in which to discern through even the most difficult, to a rejoining of the dance. I would not pretend that we do not meet the difficult, but that in opening to our presence, we uncover a practical wisdom in which we find something moving us and through us that we had forgot or thought lost.

Thankyou for your attention - even if you just skipped to the end!

In Peace

Brian

A gift of renewal to the roots. (A message from Colin Harrison to the Dance network)

While thus far I have used this blog for my own writing I felt to put Colin's message here because I was very glad to receive it in the context of the Circle Dancing community.  I include Colin's introduction and publish it here with his permission. Colin Harrison was one of the founder movers in the early Sacred Circle Dance Network. His site is www.beingmoved.com
Brian

                   ______________________

Dear Dancers
Following a very moving couple of days dancing with you all at Back to our Roots, I intended to leave before the New Visions process began. But I found myself wide awake at 5:30 in the morning with a very strong sense that I might have something to offer to the gathering. So I got up and wrote, trying to express with clarity what was in my heart. I’d so loved being in the turning circle again; it was a fresh re-membering of why I’d been so passionate about it, and poured so much of my life force and creativity into it for a decade or more. Somehow this remembered love gave me a ground to stand on in offering a perspective on what seems important to me in your work as dance teachers. It’s a point of view looking freshly at the dance from a place outside the circle; yet informed both by my love of what you are offering here, and by all the explorations and the deep spiritual work I’ve done since those days.
So here is what I wrote, somewhat revised and re-considered since originally reading it to you that morning.
(...and although I’m not currently teaching the dances, I’ve included myself as one of ‘us’ because my days of teaching the dance feel so close to me right now!)
With much love and respect Colin

                   ______________________

Transmission of A Dance / Transmission of Being
Anyone who teaches will not only convey the subject they're teaching; with every word and gesture they'll also transmit the truth of their being and their consciousness. I’m not saying anything particularly mystical here; most of us have probably experienced this in some way – the English teacher who inspires us not only with her love of poetry, but her love of life, for example.
For us as Sacred / Circle Dance teachers this is particularly important precisely because the dances have touched us so deeply. They speak of the precious mystery of being alive, of love and community, of our connection to the earth and sky, and of the possibility to express every quality of human feeling through our dance. The question is how to convey all this when teaching.

In my view, there are two main aspects involved. Firstly we’re transmitting the form of the dance itself, and as we know, there’s a lot involved here – the steps, the feel, the subtleties, the energy, the cultural context in which the dance arose, the intention of the original dancers or choreographer, the meaning of the gestures, etc. It can be a lot, yet personally, I have no concern in this area.
The second aspect (and in my view the more important one) is the transmission of being through us as teachers – the way that we embody and convey qualities such as love, inspiration, respect, compassion, creativity and a sense of wonder. This may be effortless at times, and yet it can also be much more demanding for us personally. My sense is that this aspect may sometimes be under-valued in this network.
I also think that there may be ways in which the energetic and transformative qualities of these dances may be confused with the commitment needed to live that energy, or to actually be transformed. (...as an example, June’s dance where we make the gesture of removing a mask, and take the shape of being exposed. This dance may genuinely touch us, open the heart and even give an insight into the way we personally hide behind a mask at times. But it is not the same thing as daring to actually lower the mask in the world and expose ourselves as we are. This would require another big step, outside of the circle and away from the dance.)
In my view, as teachers, we need to keep being willing to take these extra steps.
(Please note that I’m not saying that anyone in particular is not already doing so – I have no way of knowing that. I just want to emphasise and value the importance of this willingness in the transmission of being.)
We transmit the mystery of life by being open to this mystery, touched by wonder, humbled by the ongoing realisation that we are but a passing wave in a vast ocean. And yet every movement, every action will ripple outwards through this ocean and we have no way of knowing where it will end.
We transmit love when we do actually love; which includes loving ourselves in all our different facets, both our strengths and our weaknesses. This deep self acceptance fills the heart from the inside until love overflows to all and everything. We can't give love if our own cup is empty.
We transmit a sense of community through the sense of welcome we convey in our teaching; by listening to those who are often excluded or marginalised, through speaking the truth, through living our values, through caring.
We transmit a love of the earth we dance upon, through our capacity and willingness to actually love and value them.

We express every quality of human feeling through our dance when we can let ourselves really experience every quality of feeling in ourselves.
We can't fake it at this level.
This isn’t intended to deter beginners or to put off those who are moved to share a few dances with friends. When I asked Bernard about qualifications to teach this dance, he replied that the call in the heart is the only real qualification needed. I agree! There’s often an innocence when someone dares to follow their heart that can carry them through all kinds of pitfalls and difficulties. To all who are touched and want to carry the dances onwards I would always say, ‘Trust yourself. Trust the movement of your aliveness and the inspiration that makes you want to take this step. But do keep growing, keep learning, keep being willing to let go of what you think you know, so that a fresher, deeper understanding can reveal itself.’
Because the innocence of the beginner will inevitably pass. On a good day we can wing it; we can be carried by grace and good fortune; everything can seem rosy. But when things aren’t going our way, when we meet the inevitable difficulties, when we’re confronted by our own limitations (as a teacher or as a person)... how do we cope then? This is when it’s vital to face into the difficulties, to ask the uncomfortable questions, to be willing to be humbled. Not to do so is to switch (in an instant) into the opposite of what we may be trying so passionately to create in offering these dances, for example:-
To the degree that we're afraid of our own feelings we will transmit fear rather than acceptance.
To the degree that we take the earth for granted, we will transmit casualness.
To the degree that we avoid the truth, or don't live our values, we will transmit a lie.
To the degree that we don't (or won't) listen to the other voices, particularly of the ones outside the circle of love, we will transmit the imperviousness of the privileged.
To the degree that we don't truly love - ourselves, others, life itself - we will transmit the hardness of a closed heart.
In order to keep growing in an ongoing way, one piece at a time our own shadow will need to be met and embraced; self-importance, competitiveness, narcissism, self-righteousness, hostility, hard-heartedness.... To the degree that we avoid knowing these aspects of ourselves, that we continue not to own them or avoid feeling the impact on others when we act (consciously or unconsciously) from these aspects.... we will transmit our own shadow.

We can't fake it.
Please don't mistake a simple love of the dance with a true willingness to keep growing as a human being. Please let’s not delude ourselves that because the dances have temporarily transported us beyond the confines of our little egos, this means we're now beyond ego. No, the ego will keep doing what it does - ie attempting to annex the divine for its own small purpose; to ring-fence infinity and say ‘Mine!’
This offering comes from my heart. My hope is that it is both inspiring and sobering. This way of dancing has been, for me and for many of us, a true initiation. It opens a doorway into what is possible. But please, let’s not stop at the doorway. Let’s not get complacent or kid ourselves that being touched by the energy of the circle, or the deep symbolism in the moment we do a dance is the same thing as finding the courage and commitment to live what we have tasted.
It is possible to live what we deeply know to be true. Please don't settle for less.

Deeper in the dance - or in anything in life!

We have regular intimate dance gatherings in our Home that don't need many and cant take more.
Our New Year Gathering this year is full but we have gatherings and days throughout the year. If dancing in such a context appeals, then consider joining us. With sufficient interest, dance days can become weekends or longer - and with time for walking the land and being together and simply being.  We feel for sharing and growing a culture of joy in dance and accept support rather than charge a fee. If you want to pay a fee, invite me to run a workshop!

I was just going to link you to our Christmas Greetings:
http://www.livingcircle.net/amerrychristmas.html

.... But then I found myself writing.....  I like writing. It isn't about asserting definitions or opinions - but my best attempt to cloth meanings that have tangibility of feeling, in a tangibility of form. It is like a dance or a music because I have to 'get out of the way' to allow its fullness. It may 'look like' intellectual stuff just as circle dancing may look like whatever the mind of the perceiver looks WITH. Always what we choose to look WITH is the guide for what we see. We are never independent of the mind we employ.

There is no call to read on in what I write unless something of a similar resonance occurs.
A stirring within that the mind is willing to hush in order to feel.




I see Dance as a vehicle and not a thing or end in itself - and yet of course anything that becomes associated with a tangibly shared joy and freedom of expression is easy to love, hold special - and become possessive of and identified with. 'Holy' wars are made of such idolisation of forms.

I have long noticed that our human minds are predicated to see the things and forms of the world as if they are separate things, and miss entirely, the Living Context in which - and of which - all expression rises. Human vocabularies may not articulate a unified appreciation without being open to misinterpretation. Because the mind is a layer of interpretation that runs largely unconsciously along preconditioned lines.

But the languages of music and dance operate at a different level and open an experiential quality that doesn't need to be interpreted into the 'meanings' of a mental mapping in order to be felt and known in the heart.  This 'level' of being actually is conscious and not merely thinking itself as being conscious.

So much of the meaning of love is lost to us simply because we are culturally too embarrassed to allow its witness and expression in our lives - and the world then easily becomes a tacit agreement to keep our light hidden - often by 'ritual behaviours of love' that may pass muster but do not communicate an underlying ease of being.

The first and most important dimension of circle dancing when I first met it was a tangible atmosphere that was akin to spiritual states I had witnessed - but was a shared communication of a cultural willingness or intent. Simply put, it was without judgement - to a significant degree, compared to any other social events I had participated in. I found a capacity to include myself even though at that time I had yet to uncover the 'dancer within' or the unashamed expression of life in movement and grace. A lot of the early phase of any movement is a relative innocence and discovery, that becomes lost as we make history together and become covered over by what passes as 'knowledge' - or experiences that condition us to no longer open in a willingness of discovery and growth.

The 'deeper' of the dance or of life is simply available when we cease to skim the surface realities and let the moment live us. This is always a releasing of apparent controls or defences, into a greater trust, for it is always fear that triggers such a mentality - which then starves us of our Soul and its cultural expressions in every walk and dance of life.

People look out and decry the 'state of the world' and may or may not engage in attempts to influence it at the level of effect, but very few look within and see the mentality that gives rise to the world we experience and tacitly communicate, because it is very uncomfortable or dissonant - and tends to trigger a great desire to escape such feelings by any means available!

I have found the dance to be a relationship 'within' that also extends 'without' in which a harmonising occurs not only in myself, but in the group - as we are willing to accept. I also find that the simple willingness to share serves as a safe and trustworthy context in which armouring or inhibition falls away of themselves. Not in order to become a free or fearless someone 'in our own right' - but as a transparency to the qualities of being that are present - in this group, in this place, at this time.

There's another thing I was drawn to about circle dancing, a freedom from the cult of 'individual expression' that has taken our culture into anything but the witnessing and sharing of an indivisibility of being - which is the true nature of our individuality and not the outer presentations or packaging - which are transcended rather than perfected.

There is that in our human mind which becomes distracted very easily from Wonder, and Gratitude. It becomes self-absorbed at the drop of a hat and cant be reached while it is so engaged. However, I feel that to heed and to accept the opportunities that DO arise in our day and our lives, to allow (even momentary glimpses of) a spaciousness of perspective is to grow them instead of grievances - and as this becomes self aware rather than moments of self-awareness, it becomes a seed of cultural renewal.

Unless a culture is being lived and shared, it remains a fantasy or rehearsal of life, unlived. What can be shared is what we are willing to accept and this is the fruit of the level of trust we can allow in the honesty of our being.

I find it ironic to see reports making fun the 'end time' - as in Mayan Calendar or other communications - amidst such fundamental change as is now occurring. For sure, the tendency of the mind to fearful and dramatic reaction has to be seen for what it is - just that! But that is not to say that the attempt to operate on the basis we have been operating on, hasn't bankrupted us, laid waste culturally and environmentally, and lost the power or capacity to maintain itself as a credible and cohesive authority.

It is all in a kind of slow motion paralysis - the falling apart - because of the global indebtedness and investments in holding the appearance of order intact. Bankruptcy is often a surprise to all but the insiders - because of drawing out to the last in hope of rescue - and in denial of the true nature of the situation. When the world has changed - there is no option to remain as we were. We either suffer resistance in seeking to control life, or find the movements of inspiration and sanity from which to build anew.

From longing in loss, to love's presence shared

This writing came out of a discussion around the dance Thalassa. A song of loss and longing that has a circle dance which has remained popular over many years.

I have a songsheet with translation HERE (pdf) - and a version of the song can be heard HERE


The theme of separation from love - as a disconnected longing that persists in bittersweet dreaming amidst an absence of loving is surely one of the most universal human archetypical expressions.

I am reminded of a Rumi poem that points the way out of dreaming on lost love - (at least to me it does!)

"God picks up the reed-flute world and blows.  Each note is a need coming
through one of us, a passion, a longing-pain. Remember the lips where
the wind-breath originated, and let your note be clear. Don't try to end it.
BE YOUR NOTE."    -Rumi

There is a polarized expression of emotion and experience in the mind of loss and longing which becomes the basis of all human drama. This particular song doesn't bring in guilt or fear as ingredients or developments of losing love - the 'why' of it isnt referred nor any sense of unworthiness - just a black fate and a personalized sense of 'Sea' as the power and effect of separation.

There is also a healing and transcending expression of feeling-being in the waking up as unified perspective and presence.
This is a shift from identifying with a polarised part in an emotional drama to feeling the movement of love's presence now.

Although words and concepts are clumsy things and associated more with the wars in the mind of Human than communicating in love - I felt to write this much with them anyway...

The healing nature of music and dance is at least partly because of feeling the energetic of our drama and being it as embodiment in music and dance, such as to open or shift into a perspective of a shared loving presence. Such understandings are in the heart and not the head - and are facilitated rather than imposed or used as costume.

What it is to be human, and what it is to be Divine - are not so far apart. Its all a matter of perspective.

(No need to read on, if you don't relate to the subject, but I felt to write on...)

In singing and dancing Thalassa, I feel a tension of an outward longing in the verse that remains in motion unfulfilled - with the second part (where we move into the centre) - having a sense of seeking solace and connection within, that brings a temporary respite. Then in the chorus there is a wonderful release as an expression of full-feeling. (Which dances a different energetic through the same step pattern).
A true catharsis lets the movement of the heart find its expression in a context of trust - in place of the censorial mind that was set up as if to suppress and control a sense of mental and emotional chaos.

Self-Realisation, (or whatever phrase points to the same thing for you),  is at least in part the coming back to a perspective of wholeness - that cannot be defined or described and constructed or achieved within the context of the framework of thought that we could loosely call our 'separation experience' - where separate concepts manipulate separate things as if there were no unified field of awareness - in which and of which is all existence.

I confess to having a bias towards embracing the separative, as a means of remembering the unified, rather than persist in its drama.
If there is an end of the world as we know it and a renewal or shift of consciousness going on, then it will be a simple but profound shift in us all as one - whereby we wont be able to afford to maintain the structures of a conflicted self sense and will need and desire to learn and discern from a unified perspective.

When people find the mind of clever thinking is not the way to safety or abundance, but to a desolate despair, then music and dance and the true art of all things will find soil in which to grow.
It isn't that we do not in some sense know - but that the knowing of the heart is disallowed and usurped by a polarized experience in which conditioned reaction has denied any true receptivity.

The receptive is not passively acted upon - but calls and embraces with discernment!
The extension of life is not blindly projective - but is rooted and guided in the receptive.
When we get out of kilter - what I tend to call 'separation' occurs.
Then we embrace or accept what we do not truly want (or love) and yet share it as if we do, and fuel it with dreams of connection - acted out in rituals of not really joining hearts and minds in shared purpose.

Forgetting seems to me to be a condition that calls for remembering - and this world is a very distracting experience!
I feel our dance offers one tool, path or vehicle - among many - to serve the desire for renewal of perspective and purpose.
I recall crispbread adverts from long ago that qualified their slimming claims by adding 'as part of a calorie controlled diet'. I have always felt the healing and renewing power of our dance to be likewise - part of a whole way of life.

The breakdown of old patterns of human culture at all levels - along with changes in climate, makes a very compelling case for the uncovering of the basis for the renewal of culture - both in personal and universal terms.

Sharing in the passion and the presence of life.

Now of course there are those who simply want some exercise or to allay alzheimer's in a pleasant musical way - (or any other perfectly valid motivation). but if the intention of the dance is held as a core culture, then that is what will be called forth - in a way and in a manner that freely arises in relationship together.

In Peace

Brian

A Truly Human Culture Shares Music and Dance

I have always felt the the dancing belongs within a larger context and live it as such. The idea of things 'on their own' is also the idea of giving things the meanings we make up, (and fight over). In made-up meanings we are cut off from Meaning; a 'Prodigal journey' away from our true relatedness.

The wish to 'go our own way' has an allure of becoming something in our own right; a self specialness that sets out from a place in ourselves that is turned away from our true being - as if a curiosity, taken as real, becomes mesmerising - losing perspective in a self protective mask.

Prodigal journeys promise fulfilment but lead to depletion, conflictedness, limitation, and loss - an utter loneliness of being that cannot be merely salved; a convoluted thinking that cannot be extended or reconstructed. In one way of another the structures that expressed attempts of a self-will, disintegrate.

It is in the context of a willingness for reintegration that true culture originates or in 'Prodigal' terms the willingness to be of service in true relationship. In putting self will aside a deeper current rises through us and finds expression. To be moved, rather than being the mover, danced rather than being the dancer. To be wholly lived rather than playing out apart.

The interrelationships of wholeness transcend any organisation of seemingly broken or separate parts because each part expresses wholeness. In a willingness to 'be with'; to remain or abide in relationship, we invite the living spirit or principle of relatedness to express, in place of a compartmentalized mind. And are harmonized thereby.

I have never been able to articulate what the dance is that is truly shared, because even the manifest aspects of its expression are the least of its being. When I see a community learning to dance apart; of joining forms without joining of hearts, then I must dance as stillness; for joylessness is not my heart's desire to share or multiply.

In the disintegration of a joylessness is the prayer for love's awareness remembered; to see the love, and to be the love. This is an order of need of each other that cannot be measured.

Without a true basis, culture cannot 'take'. Establishing such a basis, is of giving welcome in place of a 'self-protective' script that blocks our own ears with fear of loss and costs us recognition of our true interrelatedness.

To step out of 'problem', fears, self-unworthiness, prejudice and the liability of self righteous isolation; is to step into the Music and the Movement of Life, as an integral part of wholeness. As a living embodiment of trust and connection.

Unless we give it, we shall not (know that we) have it (to share).
Perhaps losing all that we think we have, (and are) is the only way of awakening to (and as) as wholly fresh appreciation of all that is alive.

In some form or another, gathering in a shared heart, in music and dance, and in silence of our being, is integral to any truly human Culture.

The need for truth - for a true sanity of heart and mind and whole communication - is kindled within the disintegration of identity.

The wish to survive in our own terms initiates a protracted delay in which the new cannot come in because the old is barring the way. This doesn't stop the new, but simply covers one's eyes while all about is moving on. Has moved on.

The gestures of community tend to be subverted in reaction to ill fortune; to evils besetting us or adversity to overcome. Then dissipate when new evils come into fashion.

The passion with which fear is invested runs counter to the innate qualities of love's gift.

I feel it is time to own the mind that we called 'unconscious' and to become willing to share consciously of that which expresses a true interrelatedness. That isn't subject to spin and self specialness because it embodies in act, rather than being encapsulated in ideas that become used out of context.

To have a point of reference and witness that is not itself a reactive group of us over and against them or of a me over and against others, offers a true foundation. "When two or more gather in My Nature, there I am".

This is what I feel in the circle dance and this is what I hold sacred.

In Peace

Brian


PS: I also write. Some of which can be accessed via the blog links on my website:
http://www.livingcircle.net
Because it arises from a willingness of listening, it is only available to a willingness to listen. Twitter disciplines me to 140 characters!
https://twitter.com/binra

Kefi - Joy of life at the heart of the impulse to dance

Reflections arising from reading that the Greeks have the word 'kefi', for the joy of life at the heart of the impulse to dance.

This phrase stands out as a reminder of a truth the world so readily forgets.

The heart tends to be denied and suppressed by the impulse to define, identify and defend.

In earlier years, our dancing was more open, Though I don't travel that much, I often find what I tend to call dancing with the drawbridge up.

As if what once opened a way of naturally moving in a shared joy became but another environment in which to self differentiate (in self protective conditionality).

Intellectually, I am not surprised at this for it is 'the way of the world' to absorb and neutralize the heart's innocence of being - for it often seems to undermine or break our rules. But in the place of joy's expression I feel a kind of shock in meeting a joylessness within a natural occasion of joy - no matter how normal it might be in the 'culture'.

The (dance) teacher is also a point of invitation and demonstration of culture. Culture is broadly speaking, the values that we embody and share in all that we do, but in specific activities such as our dancing, we have an opportunity to invite and embrace in personal and cultural renewal. A truly Recreational activity!

Drifting, could be used as a term to indicate when old habits are running in place of - and perhaps unconsciously denying -  a conscious appreciation. When everyone drifts together, they tend to support the status quo - and the fresh energies that would rise as healing and renewal do not find a way through. The old rigidifies form and protects against change by exercising control. The new will always break through - gracefully or otherwise.

Nothing new in all this - but to read something so very true, prompted a little reflection.

Joy is innate rather than acquired - though of course we are all conditioned to relax and enjoin in some situations and not others. Joy is not only effusive or expansive - but is the felt quality of Soul (for lack of a better word) that shines quietly in a heartfelt connection and as a tangible presence in a shared trust.

There is a lot of folderol around spirituality - but freedom to feel and be moved, is joy's embodiment. Any attempt to become a someone or something in our own right always works against such a joy, no matter how it is presented.

When I first came to circle dance (without coordination!) I also came to a wholly joy based learning - in which the basis and context of learning was guiltless within a movement of recognition (of value) and an act of self-inclusion. I did not want to exclude myself on the basis of 'cant do it' or 'I don't belong here'. I wanted IN - and so listened within for the way of hanging in despite the triggers to fold, to back off - and to judge.

Such inclusiveness was also amidst an aspirational movement; in which we were willing to open and grow.

It is perhaps ironic that the opening of such joy invokes a self-protective grasp which inevitably patterns into factional historical perspectives over time. But just as we all sometimes feel the dance moving us that 'knows itself in its flow' - so is there in the greater dance of our lives - of the culture we create together and the perspective in which we live.

The key in simple terms might well be joy. To risk into our joy may make us more sensitive to joylessness in our life - but wherever joy is denied there is an opportunity for noticing what is really going on beneath the story our mind's set. Only the tension of which we are aware can be released.

I can can recall coming through aspirational inhibition in a willingness to reach up. Relaxing through a belief-identity that said 'boys don't move with beauty and grace'. These are easy to describe and share - but the opportunity for uncovering the so called inner dancer (you) as an embodiment of a shared innocence of being is ongoing. This speaks to me of a way of life - not preset with identities, so much as an ever releasing and renewing in a greater participation of discernment and trust.

Anyone who has danced with me knows I am not careless of the step and style of the dance - but that these are communicated within a relationship or living context that invites and extends a willingness to joy.

To be undefended to our own joy is to be without inhibition or embarrassment for THAT we love (are moved). This witness is denied our world if we hide our light under a bushel, for it is not our light ALONE - and that is what we have forgotten when we contract into a defensive posture of isolated ones seeking to connect as isolated ones through ritual acts that re-enact forms of what once Moved alive.

Please take all this as a sketch. It isn't a tirade against anyone or anything, but a prompting of joy to share its own nature.


Thank you for your attention!

In Peace

Brian

If this is at all interesting, you may appreciate reading

"Reflections on the Spirit of Dance":

http://preview.tinyurl.com/cfhgden

Feedback about feedback, the mind and the roots of culture

Before I have began to even write my feedback to the Easter Gathering, I have pondered what feedback is, and what it may serve at a deeper level than votes on likes and dislikes and consequent tweaking of the form of things to please the many and perhaps to less displease the vocal few.

Feedback, in a scientific sense, is neither good nor bad, in that it is communication that can serve to illuminate the underlying mind or culture of which the experience of the event was a fruit. The ‘feedback’ reveals meaning according to the questions we ask. Therefore we are never dealing with external facts, so much as participating in a relationship that inherently includes our desires, questions and the accepted beliefs from which they spring.

What is the purpose, basis or culture of the event for which feedback has been invited? If this itself is fragmented and conflicted, then on what basis can feedback be reliably evaluated? Is popularity or its opposite a reliable indicator of value? But feedback can simply be a vehicle by which issues can be raised and communication shared with the organising team. In that case it is enough that they read it and allow it to speak in their hearts (discernment) such as to walk with it in the next step. But the event itself is already feedback - as each organiser's experience and participation - and carries far more information than can be written or conveyed in words.


Before presuming to gather or articulate my feedback about the event, I consider my own journey of experience - that was my participation with you all - and discern its fruits. I cannot honestly say it wasn't perfect. But this is not perfect at the level of my personal shopping list of likes and dislikes. Perhaps I can clarify.

I have realized that the experience we meet, tends to be set up for and by ourselves according to the desires and intentions that we set out with. Much of this is usually running unknowing as personal wishes and fears, and in the process of experience some of what had been hidden may be brought to light of conscious awareness. This is always transformative.

When fears come to the surface, we tend to become defended, controlling, rigid and reactive. But finding a way to move THROUGH such states without investing in them IS the release of fear and this always opens a more spacious, tolerant, accepting and compassionate presence. In this freedom, love and the true desires that arise from love of life can move us directly, and we feel blessed, joyous, and grateful in an ease or natural harmony of being.

The attempt to control or manage fear IS fear, but it is fear operating strategically and coercively to seem fairer in some respects or less extreme in its effects. And by adopting mutually agreed definitions as a culture of joining without really meeting, in empty rituals upon which each projects their own imagined meanings. Joylessness becomes the new standard - against which background our personal satisfactions become our reward and the cost of conforming to a joyless culture, becomes the price exacted.

To share a living culture, as a positive life honouring gift - known in its sharing - we must learn to move free of the fear of upsetting the rules that the fearful put upon themselves and each other, by living out from a different place than a fearful separated sense that seeks to validate itself or become something valid - as if we are not already worthy of love.

Our natural authority, or integrity of being, is lost when we feel disconnected from our love and joy. We feel undermined and confused and tend to mask this with what seems to work as acceptable to or aligned with that which seems to be given authority. And we then defend and identify with our masks and their allegiances against unmasking - as if they were our selves.

Our mask also filters and limits our communication, for whatever appearance we may present, the actual energetic is what is communicating beneath the appearance - and fear or division calls a mixed response - because of wanting conflicting things. But joy calls forth wholeness of being because it speaks directly to the same in all and disregards the mask altogether.

In our teaching, we demonstrate. We firstly teach ourselves - for we are learning by what we teach. If we teach that we are moved or inspired to share something we love and value - as an expression of trust, then THAT quality will bring all else into alignment in ourselves and others - and we will teach and grow and learn in trustworthiness. To trust our self is not the same as being in control.

In a heartfelt safety, the mask evaporates of falls away of itself as unneeded, and joy shines the freedom to be unlimited and unconcerned by such thoughts as feel the need to hide. This is the context that we can invite and share as the basis of our dancing.

The form of what we teach doesn't matter - IN THE SENSE that joy is not strategic and can discern in the moment how to teach, what to emphasize, what manner to adopt - in short, how to be in the moment. So we may then also focus of the particular exactitudes of form without getting bogged down in the mind that clutches them as a mask.

The masked mind may be the normal but acquired culture of our society, but it is not our Nature now to be drawbridged, under siege, joyless and withheld from sharing in the presence of being alive. Because we feel a sense of temporary security in such attempt to control, we resist opening into life energetically and emotionally, as the feeling beings that we simply are, regardless of how locked down that sense might seem to be.

The true safety of our being, arises from growing discernment and trust within our selves, as to what we open to, and join with - at the level of our thoughts. Instead of using and identifying with a fearful template that re-enacts our past judgements and locks us out of our connection now, we live out from a felt or intuited sense of life, listening and feeling as we go.

A dying network, a dying culture, or a dying planet - these are all symbols of a sickness of our thought - even if their fruits seem irrefutably tangible. Allowing that the world is a transient phenomena that cannot be held onto anyway, we still have and Are the life that Lives us now - in and of which we may behold in a wonder and appreciation that inherently moves in us as shared being and not as withheld thought.

That whose nature is wholly shared cannot die - though it can seem to be killed over and over again. The Source of life is timeless. When the structures that arise around ‘loving to hate’, disintegrate, the birds are already singing as the dawning of a spring morning.

Thank you for your attention
In Peace

Brian

Cultural awareness and responsibility?

(This article was written in a context of discussing the issues of paying for legal copies of the music we use - as opposed to sharing between ourselves or downloading 'shared' illegal copies - especially when such musicians are part of providing the culture we value and enjoy).









The argument for not undermining our own commonwealth and well-being seems self evident to me. But we each draw our lines in different places - and grow in our willingness amidst a culture of support. Is money the only currency of exchange? I think not. Sometimes the gift shares on, but not backwards. I certainly see that with my parents gifts to me that then get shared on to my own children - who like me have no real sense of that yet - as they haven't had children themselves. When the gift is not shared, it is forgotten amidst a life of substitution.

If we try and impose our own current view on others (by implied guilt), we just might get others to conform by the letter - but not in the spirit. Or, we may instead become a symbol of holier-than-thou-ness - or 'political correctness' against which there will seem to be a freedom in reaction - albeit in the dark of a hidden activity.

To meet those who hold a clear sense of value and boundary in a way that is congruent with their own integrity is to meet a conscious intent. They may or may not inspire the same outer forms of adherence - but they will hold a tone or quality of being in the culture of their dealings with others and this CAN be picked up and can grow in a freedom to feel and discover for ourselves.

The freedom of acting from an innate integrity is altogether different from the sense of freedom got in reaction to perceived restrictions. It is relief from a dissonance of being.

In the world, there is the Gift, that is felt and shared, if you will, in the Spirit.  And there are the practicalities.
Using our gifts for our private self interest may be normal to our (more modern western) culture - but this is because individualism has usurped the cooperative structures of family, clan and tribal cultures - some aspects of which we would no doubt find greatly oppressive to our modern sense of freedom to express ourselves individually.

I feel that a lot of my life has been exploring and uncovering a sense of self within relationship - rather than of asserting self amidst what might seem to be many conflicting or competing relationships. In any group or shared purpose, there is the ongoing awareness of the balance of self interest with group interest - and as one learns to tune in deeper than merely thinking about what seems to be going on and feels or discerns within - at the same time as looking without - there is the allowing of experience of unified being - in which the outer and the inner are as one - without the interjection of a thinking strategy.

We often - I trust! - experience something of this in our music and our dance - for here is an arena in which we are more readily willing to temporarily let go of 'control' into a relaxed and trusting appreciation of the flowing Moment.

The Gift is in the Spirit - but we may exclusively associate it with the forms of the music and the dance. But they are the conditions in which we are more willing to relax.  There are no words for Unified Experience - not because it is private to each mind - but because it is beyond the scope of any private mind and beyond the limits of symbolic or conceptual representation.

But love is one of the words that can been used. Unlike human attempts to DO love - which express a wish or a transactional attempt to negotiate or manipulate oneself or others, the love that is uncovered as shared be-ing is not personally generated or directed.

An unconditional love, is simply a willingness to be love in any or all conditions - and this may in practice be a willingness to NOT choose the path of withdrawing or withholding, but instead to watch and wait for the prompts or sense of integrated direction that rises to awareness BECAUSE we are listening directly to a subtlety of being that our old thought habit disallows.

Like the circle dance, it doesn't matter if we lose our way or fall of into confusion, because we can simply stop struggling, tread water in a manner that is kind to our neighbours and look for where we can come in again so as to simply rejoin the dance. IT didn't go away while we had our confusion and nor ultimately, did we.

But the living dance rejoined is a sense of connectedness that restores, renews and enlivens.
Even as recordings can substitute for a live musical relationship, so too can a sense of  'owning and knowing' music and dance undermine the direct appreciation of the Gift.

There are all sorts of ways in which we could be a purist in terms of what we do or do not accept or cultivate in our lives, but this is not always expressing a true wisdom if it makes us rigidly inflexible and judgemental. What allows or invites a Sacred dimension to our music and dance is not necessarily anything overtly present in the form, but is the conscious receptivity and intent, of both heart and mind, to the Gift which is tangibly shared and by which we are moved, not only around the circle - but shifted in our perspective.

The sharing of the Gift is always its strengthening and its extending. "Go forth and multiply" is an attribute of the  embodiment of expression. But what we choose to give value to, will be what is 'shared' - even if it is undermining of our peace and wellbeing. For this reason, I would always not want judgemental processes to block awareness of what is actually active as the current choice of focus and attention. For I can only release bad habits of which I have become aware at the level of choice - which is always deeper than the level of judging and self presentation.

Scientists need to release what they think they know in order to observe and thus describe what is actually occurring - otherwise they know that they tend to 'see' or interpret according to pet theories or unconscious beliefs, So they learn be curious amidst situations that normally one would be personally reactive in. We are all scientists in this sense if we want to observe our own mental and emotional processes so as to make an always fresh conscious choice as to what does or does not express and witness for what we really value.

Our bodies can learn a pattern and take it from our mind - but if we let our mind take over the true function of the heart - which feels whole bodily - we drift off beam with conditioned reactions to life that are partial, past their sell by date - and represent yesterday's stepping stone rather than today's discovery.


When I learned to dance our way of dancing, I also learned about learning - because the practice was an ideal scenario in which to observe myself in blockage or confusion and grow responsibility. To learn in joy is to uncover a golden path where others merely see steps to learn and problems to overcome or master.  As if our validity is about fulfilling an external requirement rather than opening an expression of wholeness, through whatever kind of discipline it may be.

Reductionism is an understandable polarity to ritual or symbolic approaches if they feel ungrounded or coercive.
But wherever we personally choose to make our own points of emphasis, it has a place in a larger culture, in both its strengths and liabilities. It seems to me that much of our attempt to 'protect' the sacred or indeed the secular aspects of life, only limits the full expression of life in an attempt to avoid the feelings of conflict that are necessarily to be found around where we find our treasure or connection in life.

But feelings of conflict do not have to be acted out from, or answered or resolved externally in order to be felt, abided with in a context of shared purpose or intent - and allowed to release in music or dance as a shift of perspective. This is not to say that action isn't ever required, but that to act from a perspective of connectedness is very different from reacting from personal histories reactivated.

In order to articulate, I use chosen words - but none of this is about words. I feel to risk into communicating because I feel the a bankrupted disintegration of modern life and choose to Occupy my life and give voice to what I feel moving in me. I stand in the willingness to look within - but I also stand with those who express integrity - whatever side of any fence they seem to be on - because I do not feel alone - but in shared purpose; a larger dance.

Thank you for your attention

In Peace

Brian