On Screaming During Practice: The Individual, the Collective, & the Role of Discernment
I’m deep inside my own inner darkness. My eyes are closed and I make my way slowly through the room, my feet whispering. I can actually feel the molecules of “me” intersecting with the molecules of everything around me: the ballet barre, the tin ceiling, the wood of the columns, the glass of the mirrors, the floor. The edges of me blur and vibrate, blending with everything. Tears are streaming down my face.
The teacher of this particular 5Rhythms dance and embodiment class felt strongly about everyone keeping their eyes open. Usually, I followed this guideline, but during this one period I started closing my eyes at times.
I couldn’t sense the energy of the materials around me with my eyes open, but when I closed them, it all rushed in.
This was a really important shift in my personal practice; and I don’t think it would have been available if I had followed a rule of “you must keep your eyes open.”
Blanket rules are important for some things, but when it comes to practice, I don’t think anything is always true.
Recently, a participant who came to one of my Friday night 5Rhythms classes was vocalizing loudly, screaming, actually, during the part of the class when everyone was being called into a deep Stillness. My attempts to re-direct only seemed to throw fuel on the fire.
I explored it at length with my collaborator, the late Karen Ritscher. Karen was extremely generous, and trusted each person to find their own medicine in the dance.
I was still a little concerned. I wanted this individual dancer to get their needs met, but I could see that the loud screaming startled people, amping up the sympathetic nervous system at a time when we
were calling the parasympathetic nervous system online.
Karen talked with the participant at length, learning that they’d been through a painful and intense period. The next week, the person was still very enthusiastic and vocal, but refrained from screaming when Stillness was starting to gather.
It got me thinking about how the needs of the individual intersect with the needs of the collective.
Gabrielle Roth, the creator of the 5Rhythms, taught that the individual and the collective are of equal value: that we are at once exquisitely unique, and also unfathomably interconnected. One of my favorite quotes of Gabrielle’s expresses this better than I can:
“There’s only one of us here.”
I, myself, have had episodes of loud screaming. I remember a Cycles-level 5Rhythms workshop in Philadelphia when we were exploring adolescence, the period of the lifecycle that’s associated with Chaos. The teacher put on a song that strongly recalled my own adolescence. Painful memories surged up and broke off, floating freely inside and around me. A rage-scream also broke free.
After the workshop, I wrote an entire book about my adolescence. The words poured out of me. The more that poured out, the emptier and cleaner I felt.
I’m grateful to the teacher and to my fellow dancers that I had the space to fall apart in this way.
But if I showed up at every class and workshop and went straight into trauma screaming – well, that might be another story.
My individual need to scream no doubt impacted the room. Maybe some people felt inspired to let loose themselves. Maybe some were frightened. Or resentful. Or envious. Maybe it even took some people out of their own practice (whatever that might mean).
How do we find the right balance between the individual and the collective?
In this society, we’ve been conditioned to prioritize individual expression over everything else. But what if the needs of the individual and the needs of the collective were equally valued? Could we fall apart when we need to, and also be generous and hold space for others when they need to?
It might look one way on the outside, but it’s possible that what’s most telling is what’s happening on the inside.
Have I stifled my voice for decades and suddenly it’s coming out in a roar? Have I built up an ego story about myself as a victim, and is my screaming another way to shore up that story? Do I find it interesting to trigger people’s nervous systems with a sudden shout, embodying my dominance? Do I usually hide in plain view, but for the first time today claim my space with my voice? Does part of me want to manipulate people into feeling sorry for me? Does my cry give voice to generations of agony that my ancestors endured and set me and my descendents free from ancient harm?
I guess what I’m saying is that screaming might be skillful or might be not-skillful, depending on a lot of different factors.
This is a bold statement, but I believe that becoming adept at discernment is the key to effective practice that can eventually lead us to full awakening.
If we aren’t able to develop discernment, it’s possible that our practice could plateau once we’re moved through some initial layers of personal healing and catharsis.
For me the key question is: Does the thing I’m doing open me up, or does it strengthen and shore up my ego?
Anything that appears skillful could, in fact, be unskillful. And anything that looks like practice could in fact be escape or some other conditioned habit.
We each have to do that inner research for ourselves.
Partnering in the 5Rhythms is another place to invite discernment.
Am I always trolling for a partner, constantly roving and inserting myself into every dynamic, never willing to turn to my inner experience? In that case, not-partnering might be my practice. Am I totally opposed to partnering, resenting the imposition of others on “my” dance? In that case, experimenting with partnering might be my practice.
Over the years, partnership has been a rich inquiry for me, and my relationship to it has shifted many times.
One of the most beautiful gestures I’ve ever lived came at a workshop, when I was gliding through the room and a dancer happened to be rising just as I passed. We energetically twined together, our forearms softly touching, then each glided off in separate directions.
I remember one partner I connected with at a (long ago) workshop and then in classes over the following months. Our first dance together started as an energetic overlap, then it gathered momentum, magnetism, magnitude. We roved, we swooned, we soared.
I barely saw anyone else. Sometimes it was really sexy, sometimes cosmic. I wonder now if this was annoying for others in the room? Triggering? Touching?
Through the lens of the individual vs. the collective, I have to ask myself, was this engagement causing a huge drag on the collective space? Was my individual need to connect with a partner more important than considering the collective at this time? I still don’t have answers, only more and more questions.
And through the lens of discernment, I have to ask myself, to what extent was this engagement opening me up and expanding my capacity? To what extent was I clinging to a habit, a pattern, or the perpetuation of a self-story?
It might even be more than one thing at once. It might shift over time. Perhaps it could even start as practice, but then become its own unskillful activity.
As a teacher, I’ve occasionally gotten feedback about couples.
One participant said they were annoyed by a couple who only had eyes for each other and were very intimate in the way they were engaging. The person who shared said they felt like we were all building up energy together, sharing and moving it through the space and through our bodies, but that it seemed like the couple was just taking the group’s energy in, and not giving it back out.
I could understand this perspective. At the time, I remember being touched by the couple’s wholeheartedness; and also that I wondered how it might be perceived by dancers who did not identify as hetero, as this appeared to be a man-woman couple. Might it contribute to some feeling marginalized?
Following one of the first classes that I led as a 5Rhythms teacher, a dancer reached out and let me know that she felt another dancer was being intrusive in a way that didn’t feel good for her. He didn’t touch her or say anything offensive, he just didn’t seem to notice (or perhaps even to consider) that she was not open to partnering.
As a teacher, this gave me pause.
I wanted to hold space in a way that feels as safe and respectful as possible for every participant. But creating strict rules didn’t feel right either.
In the end, I landed on creating and sharing requested class agreements that I hoped would address the concern without unnecessary blame or shame.
These are the agreements I landed on:
*Adopt the perspective that everyone has gifts, and everyone is needed for what they bring.
*Everyone is at a different place in their process, and holding each other with respect and sensitivity (including in consideration of partnership) allows each person to move with their process as they need to.
*Although we don’t speak with words during practice, consent is always a consideration. Please move with the idea that different people may have different levels of privilege, though it might not always be obvious, especially to those with a lot of privilege. Set the intention to consider consent in your interactions, and be willing to give people space if they seem to need it or if they ask for it.
*All are encouraged to move with the medicine they need. Please be mindful that everyone else is also moving with the medicine they need, and be aware of the impact your own actions might have on others.
*During verbal interactions, set the intention to use affirming language around race, gender, LGBTQIA+, ability, and all matters of identity. Take the lead from whoever you are talking with, and ask for guidance if you aren’t sure about what language will be affirming. See making accidental mistakes as a way to grow and increase in skillfulness and generosity of spirit.
There is a printed copy of the requested agreements on the check-in table; and my collaborator, Alyssa, and I just created a large poster of the agreements that we can display more prominently. We also send the agreements, along with additional information, when people register for the Friday night “Body Waves” class.
The participant who bravely shared about her experience expressed that she felt better with these agreements in place.
I also started to include more verbal prompts touching on consent, and added this to the registration materials:
Prompts: The teacher will offer some prompts and invitations designed to engage and open up new ways to move. Each person is encouraged to decide whether or not responding to the prompt is correct for them in a given moment, as each person knows their own needs the best.
Since then, we also added the following agreement:
*Please do not take pictures or videos of participants. Although tempting, as all of the dancers are exquisitely beautiful especially when in motion, the possibility of photos can bring our “posing-selves” online, hold us in a fixed identity, and can make it hard to allow ego to soften its grip so we can explore the inner territories where we have no temporal name.
This is an ongoing exploration for me as a teacher; and I very much welcome feedback about what feels right for participants, including those who might feel most vulnerable.
Again, I really don’t have answers, just lots of curiosity and lots and lots of questions.
Another time comes to mind when I think about discernment.
During the 5Rhythms teacher training, I noticed a friend on the floor, heaving with sobs. Most of the time, it’s skillful to give people space to have their experience without trying to comfort or interfere in any way. One of the lead teachers even said exactly that at the beginning of one of our sessions. After all, someone might have been holding back tears for years or even decades. If I zoomed in to comfort her, she might stop crying and miss a precious chance to heal herself.
I also had to wonder, was I performing a story of myself as a “savior”? Was she performing a “victim” story to my “savior”? This time, though, I really didn’t think about it. I just trusted what seemed to be (what I hoped was!) intuition, and softly moved behind her on the floor, putting light pressure on her back. She started to rock back and forth with me, and cried even harder. Occasionally providing comfort and support is exactly what’s needed. Sometimes it’s the exact opposite of what’s needed.
Now, if I noticed a pattern that every time someone started crying I ran over to try to “fix” them or caretake, that would be a sign that what I was doing wasn’t practice, but was actually a way to shore up an ego story–the opposite of practice. On the other hand, if I was never willing to comfort anyone, and always told myself coldly that each person has to be responsible for their own experience…well, that could just as much be an example of me shoring up an ego story.
Author Naguib Mahfouz said, “You can tell whether a (hu)man is clever by (their) answers. You can tell whether a (hu)man is wise by (their) questions.”
And I love this quote by Rainer Maria Rilke, “Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart …Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.”
Usually by the time I write one of these texts for Notes on Practice, a conclusion emerges organically, sometimes magically, sometimes poetically. But this time, no conclusion comes.
Just more questions.
I’m so grateful we have a path and a practice that give us the space to live the questions.
October 27, 2025
Brooklyn, New York
This writing is not produced or sanctioned by the 5Rhythms organization. The views presented in this text are my own, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the 5Rhythms organization.