I love learning new choreography - new Nia moves and the organic stuff that I generate from my personal fusion of Modern/Jazz/Ballet/Hip Hop. I listen to the music and let my body do what it wants, wading through my habits & tendencies until something fresh clicks. I have learned not to go looking. Actually it's when I'm NOT looking that the good stuff comes! (Isn’t that always the way!)
Mmmm, and what of the power of 3… my relationship with the music? (But that's juicy stuff for another day!!)
In general, if I'm not getting a move, continuing to move through at tempo doesn't work for me. If I don’t slow down I will simply be following somebody else’s directions and I will have to continue to follow since I am learning only a superficial level. It’s kind of the equivalent of never asking ‘why’. I’m just doing what I’ve been told me to do – and we all know I’m not good at that!!! It’s also no fun. Yea, someone else got me a new toy, but I only get to look at it, I can’t actually take it down off the shelves (or out of the garage!) and take it for a spin – I don’t know how to use it – it’s not mine.
Along the way I have noticed how unpolished, sometimes raw the material that bubbles up can be. Even as I spend time repeating and repeating so my body doesn't forget, it is still an unrefined little piece of a puzzle. For me, it's only when I slow it down; dismantle, breakdown, disassemble the movement word or sentence that I begin to understand what I've got, somatically speaking. And only in discovering the details, the buried treasure, will the moves ever be mine.
Another thing: expression and flavoring a move are completely in the details. That move has to be in my cells if I want to share its story. To do that, I take it apart so that I will learn that the foot step actually begins w/the heel and the arm thrash has to come from the base not the shoulder. Debbie Rosas Stewart and Carlos AyaRosas shared their genius with us and this part of the work that engrosses my mental body never ceases to inspire body, spirit and emotion as well!
Ooooo, soaring with wings is all about my shoulder blades and collar bones today, but if I add a very subtle undulation to my wing movement, I can engage more of my core. If I take it a step further and increase the range of motion in my wings and add travel and wish to sustain flying, then my feet become the base from which I create my flight. Adding my feet is also a lovely way to increase my energy so that I can sustain flight. Being in relationship with my feet and legs as well as the degree of intimacy I have with my base will determine not only the amount of energy I am circulating, but also the emotional connection that is available to me.
If I am busy working to maintain flight, I have less energy with which to connect to my emoting process. If I cannot connect and be present to my emotional body, my movements will be all mechanics. They will be assembly line. Lifeless; meaningless. Empty and colorless. Out of balance.
(Alot like life as a whole without emotional balance.)
My mental self will be complaining that I’mtiredandcan’tIdosomethingelse (you know, ‘are we there yet?’) andwhenarewegoingtodosomethingdifferentthisisboring… Spirit? Lost in translation. Lost in the ocean of it’sallIcandotomaintain…battery running low…running out of juice…can’t go on much longer…
Slooooooooooooooow …
Awareness in action.
Insight expanded.
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