by meghanleborious | Sep 13, 2015 | Notes on Practice
When practicing alone, I tend gloss over Lyrical, technically attending to it, but rarely taking it on fully. Which is why I am delighted, in this languorous late summer air, to find Lyrical a persistent partner.
In the afternoon before Tammy’s Friday Night Waves class I went swimming with my five-year-old son, Simon, and his father. Later, we had a picnic in the park and went on the swings. My stomach flipped rhythmically again and again as I lapped higher on the swing. Simon leaned his entire weight back with abandon, smiling, holding the swing’s chains confidently. At first, I was afraid to fall, to be upside down, but Simon taught me patiently; and I was eventually able to try on his playful gesture.
I arrived at the Friday Night Waves class and sank happily to the floor. I began to move gently—porous, smiling, free—released and receiving the perfect amount of energy for the moving I wanted to do—letting the wave of my spine complete its gestures in all directions. As I was stretching and moving in big arcing circles on the floor, my dance quickly acquired fire and definition.
Class on Friday was like a survey course. Before class, Tammy posted on facebook, “… the ocean connects every wave to every other wave, dissolving isolation …’ Dean Sluyter, The Zen Commandments.” She spoke at length in the pause between the first and second waves of the class, casting her eyes downward toward her heart as she inhaled, seeming to wait for words to arise.
She began with a story about Gabrielle Roth, the creator of the 5Rhythms practice. Tammy shared that once at a public talk someone posed a question and several 5Rhythms teachers offered beautiful, profound, articulate responses. The last to respond was Gabrielle and she just said, (smiling and shrugging, I imagine) “Or not!” Tammy talked about how as much as we would learn and understand, Gabrielle would always find a way to turn it on its head, allowing us to continue to enter into the mysterious darkness of experience, pushing us to push ourselves beyond our edges, beyond what is comfortable, beyond what we think we know, like, understand or perceive.
Tammy led us through the litany of the rhythms. Flowing, the most receptive rhythm, might be a personal investigation inward. Staccato, the second of the rhythms, could be more expansive, more expressive, and more connected with the people in our immediate sphere. Tammy modeled a possibility for moving through the room with bold clarity, “I have a right to be here. I have a reason to be here; and I am going to be here.”
This relates to an investigation I have considered at length. I accept that I can be immense—gathering and whirling huge swaths of energy—with massive emotions, huge (sometimes unrealistic) ideas, intense, unrelenting, gigantic. I am both proud and ashamed of this part of me. For many years, the more I let this show, the more I seemed to draw fire from someone very close to me. I tried to make myself small, discreet, bundled into separate physical sections to avoid upsetting this person and to avoid setting this person off. To avoid being declared selfish. To avoid being attacked. It hurt my muscles, my posture. “I have a right to be here. I have a reason to be here; and I am going to be here,” is medicine, for this still-not-fully-healed me. At that moment, I reflected that I don’t have to apologize to anyone for existing, not even to the person who sometimes seems to wish that I didn’t.
In today’s Sweat Your Prayers class, taught by Meaghan Williams, I accidentally bumped a friend. Instead of making myself more porous and more small, I stayed neutrally with the collision; and he, too, held up to me, moving backward with the momentum as I moved toward him, then physically pushing back against me—moving forward as I receded; and we folded briefly into coupled, chaotic whirling.
Tammy repeatedly challenged us to look for “our edge” and acknowledged that the “edge” is different for everyone. For example, for some, the edge is staying in partnership. For others, the edge is dancing alone. For some, the edge is moving with energy in the middle of the room, for others, the edge is lingering toward the wall or mirrors, outside of the dynamic center. Chaos, perhaps, contains this implication, this experimentation with simultaneous opposites, with paradoxical systems.
Tammy also spoke with great feeling of the recent press image of a drowned three-year-old Syrian boy and of the Syrian exodus and refugee crisis. She has, on many occasions, grounded the 5Rhythms in heartful social justice—including awareness of both the pain and of the joy of the world in her teaching. On many occasions, I have heard her say that what really matters is not what you do during class, but what you do in your life, on the street and in the world.
For me, the class was characterized by long, slow grooves. I found an extraordinary dance with a friend in the second wave’s Staccato and Chaos phases. Tammy kept offering the instruction to move to a new partner, but I stayed locked in partnership, instead—smiling and laughing, rising and falling, spinning and coiling until at last my friend indicated that he needed to get water and moved away.
A totally new, totally unexpected dance snapped into me, jerking me diagonally sideways as I passed Tammy’s table, rhythm finding every one of my joints. As the music carried me along, I tapped on the bendings of me—wrists, fronts of elbows, backs of knees—and light began to leak out. After a while I realized that what I was perceiving was not light leaking out, but rather cracks in the opaque fired clay of me, coming away in body-mold-shaped pieces. I entered a deep, fluttering spin, finding an entire light body underneath all this dense, crumbling gray—extending beyond the limits of my small self. The light body—the body of joy—was peeking out, testing the waters.
I entered today’s Sweat Your Prayers today class with the expectation that the rhythm of Lyrical would predominate. This is because today’s teacher, Meaghan Williams, is renowned for her lyrical nature. I also expected Lyrical to present strongly because lately I am in the middle of the first sustained engagement I have ever knowingly had with the rhythm of Lyrical.
I think a major factor is that I have had a beautiful summer—the most lyrical of seasons—when I have had plenty of time and space to connect with my own experience. Also, I have re-connected with someone I love and considered the possibility of falling in love with him again. Because of opening up to him, the world has rushed in, too, and I see love everywhere I look. I am afraid even to notice it, to name it, since I fear that Lyrical will flee again. I also fear that everything will fall apart and that all of my habitual ways of seeing myself will collapse if I really let Lyrical—and the joy that seems to accompany Lyrical—in.
When I noticed that I had this expectation about Lyrical being the strongest charge for today’s class, I then expected that I would not move in Lyrical, since I had clearly formed the expectation that I would move in Lyrical. Remarkably, since I then had the expectation of not being in Lyrical as a result of having my expectation of yes being in Lyrical, the expectation reverse-psychologized itself and I did, in fact, find a strong connection to Lyrical. (Yes, I am that mental!)
Meaghan’s musical choices were not simple. Lilting scores were underpinned with grating resistance, and I moved back and forth to the extremes of a certain continuum, pulling through my edges, scraping the tops of my newly-painted toenails in long, painful arcs; then finding edgeless, breathy, dynamic release; again and again re-discovered. As I moved, I continued to find novel movements, delighting in both extremes.
I absolutely love to delve into my most caustic edges—the little catches that jerk me and fling me into a different direction—perhaps in mid-air, in mid-movement, perhaps with the resistance of the floor, perhaps even as I am affected by the movements of another. Today the front edges of my knees felt vulnerable. My back was slightly tender, too. I used to love this edge just above my hips in my lower back, but over time I have backed out of it and lightened up in the interest of longevity. I realize that eventually I will have to give up the emphasis on my edges or my body will wear out. This summer, I have had a little renaissance of youth, but I am not so deluded to believe that I can escape the decline of age.
These physical edges are related though not analogous to the edges Tammy considered at length in Friday’s class. Pushing beyond our edges can be about moving into areas of discomfort, and I think can also be about working with our inner complexities, as they rub against each other in the fabric of our muscles—another kind of discomfort entirely.
This summer when I received a Reiki treatment and initial Reiki empowerment, my teacher kept telling me to “remember to look up.” I thought about a meditation retreat when I had a vivid experience of looking up. I had spent several previous meditation retreats with a close, controlled gaze, carefully following my breath with mindfulness. Gradually, the teachings had guided us to take in more and more space, until in the last stage we were instructed to raise our eyes upward during formal practice. We took a field trip to a city park and practiced in silence there. I sat smiling, cross-legged on a park bench, swaying, enraptured. I raised my eyes and drew breath sharply, as in an instant the park had come to life in many dimensions, including the dimension of the spirit world.
Somehow I have gotten the impression that Tammy is not a fan of raised arms. Probably it is just that she is not a fan of raised, flailing, out-of-control arms, but somehow this has worked its way into my understanding. Raising my arms in class has always felt a bit rebellious. One extremely dynamic friend inspired me to copy her and spin my shoulder completely open, dramatically rising up in a gesture of charismatic presence; and I have often incorporated her gesture into my own experiments. Another very tall, gentle friend has inspired me to roll out into the edges of my fingers, sometimes raising my arms in the process. Meagan, today, held her arms up in a completely different way. They were not simply rising as result of momentum. Neither were they at maximum altitude, but instead around the height of her shoulders, upright, palms toward her own face, moving symmetrically, supporting her in spinning. She almost moved like she had on a hoop skirt. I tried her gesture on for myself, delighted.
Since I am not convinced that I deserve joy, receiving it can seem exceptionally dangerous. When Simon was very small, I was seized by panic every time the rhythm of Lyrical arose in class. Although I knew that my mind was messing with me, and that it was simply the joy of Lyrical causing me to freak out, I had to pause and check the cel phone, to make sure I didn’t have any emergency messages. Eventually, I forced myself not to disengage with what was presenting, and slowly, slowly, Lyrical has come to dance with me. I can jump instantly into Flowing, Staccato or (most certainly) Chaos if that is what is called for, but Lyrical comes only when I am gazing obliquely, never on command, and very rarely comes without significant time in each of the preceding rhythms—Flowing, Staccato and Chaos.
I danced very hard from the very beginning of class, and my energy flagged halfway through. I decided to get back down on the floor to see if I could call up some vigor. I put shorts on under my skirt (since even though I tell myself it doesn’t matter and no one cares, I am inhibited if I don’t have shorts or tights on under a skirt). I thought that, again, since I had the expectation that being on the ground would change the experience I was having for the better, most likely my plan would not work and I would remain tired. Again, as with the appearance of Lyrical, the expectations cancelled each other out, and I found fire and engagement very quickly, pulling myself again to my feet with great, soaring conviction.
In the second wave of Sunday’s Sweat Your Prayers class, I found Lyrical again. I kept all of my edges but worked in and out of them, high on my toe tips, moving on an invisible tight wire, burnishing the back of my breastbone. I noticed that part of my difficulty with Lyrical—my resistance, perhaps—is because I fear that Lyrical is somehow disrespectful to the world’s unrelenting pain. Part of me wonders how I can possibly be joyful when there is so much suffering. Some part of me seems to think my joy is an affront to suffering people everywhere.
Robert Thurman, a Sanskrit scholar and the first American to be ordained a monk by the Dalai Lama, talks about the Dalai Lama’s cheerful outlook, “Everybody has the wrong idea. They think Buddha was so boring, and they’re so surprised when they meet Dalai Lama and he’s fairly jolly. Even though his people are being genocided — and believe me, he feels every blow on every old nun’s head, in every Chinese prison. He feels it. He feels the way they are harvesting yaks nowadays. I won’t even say what they do. But he feels it. And yet he’s very jolly. He’s extremely jolly.”
As I read this over, I realize that my current relationship with Lyrical is anything but happy little clouds and butterflies. I look forward to continuing to investigate this aspect of my practice; and I am curious to see if some hint of Lyrical will linger as I move into the press of fall.
(The image shows visuals I created for Tammy’s class on September 4–an homage to summer and to Lyrical)
This blog consists of my own subjective experiences on the 5Rhythms® dancing path, and is not sanctioned by any 5Rhythms® organization or teacher.
September 7, 2015, Brooklyn, NYC
by meghanleborious | Aug 26, 2015 | Notes on Practice
Lately I have been feeling embodied, creative, productive and inspired; and connecting with others has been unusually available. Sunday was notably different, however. In the Sweat Your Prayers class, which was taught by Amber Ryan, Martha Peabody created a visual contemplation of Memento Mori—an historical artistic theme that translates to “Remember Death.” Martha also led us in a closing ritual to grieve and remember a talented photographer and 5Rhythms community member who took his own life this week—Michael Julian Berz. On Friday night, Tammy, too, brought up the tragedy—with a ragged edge in her voice as she spoke.
The installation included a beautiful photo of Michael Julian Berz, an hourglass draining of black sand, a pile of rocky sand, white candles, and a curving line of silver, asymmetrical nesting bowls filled with water. All of these objects were set on the floor in front of the teacher’s table and placed on humble bits of cut brown paper.
Sunday I walked in with a headache. Saturday, along with my five-year-old son, Simon, I went from beach to party to party. At the last stop I had too many drinks. Simon was upstairs with the other children while the adults drank and talked animatedly in the yard. At the first party, there was no option for dinner, and Simon ate only cake and some small pizza-appetizer-things. When we got to the second party he fell into video games with his peers—something I generally discourage—and declined to eat. I let this go, and went to have fun with my friends. I told him to come downstairs when the clock said “nine-three-o” and (to his credit) he did, in fact, appear. For some reason, I sent him back upstairs for a few more minutes; and kept drinking. We finally left shortly before 11. At home, it was difficult to get him ready for bed because he was too tired to cooperate. Also, he had developed a cough; and he scraped his knee in a sidewalk wipe out, resulting in a long, seated bawl.
Waking up in stages, restless from before dawn, I regretted that I hadn’t cared better for my adored son or for myself. I have been feeling good lately, despite dynamic circumstances, but this drinking episode toned down my energy—my life force—considerably. I was by no means out of control, but it was enough to diminish the momentum of a good run.
Several occasions come to mind when I have been very open, then a serious drinking episode has arisen. Many years ago, I did a residency at an artist’s retreat center where there was also a meditation building. I received brief meditation instruction; and then, without any guidance or support, began meditating independently for many hours a day. The world glittered with spirit. I was drenched in it. A rainbow appeared one day as I prepared to enter the dining hall and I was destroyed with the beauty of it. I fell in love with everyone. After two weeks of this, there was a big party with a giant bonfire. I drank way too much and said and did things I am not proud of. From being drenched with spirit, I became instead depressed, fragile and withdrawn; and spent the remainder of the retreat thus.
Thankfully, last night was much less severe, but I have to wonder about this correlation between feeling inspired and open, and then having an episode when I essentially shut it down for myself. Although I had fun and did not do egregious harm at Saturday’s party, I wish I had cared better for my own life force; and that I had cared better for my little son.
The class Sunday was beautiful. I felt honored to participate in such a meaningful dance. Yet, at once, I felt depleted and distracted—not fully able to show up for myself or for my community. I found myself crying often, pockets of grief erupting, and, too, taking in the grief of the other dancers. Though we stayed in Chaos for song after song after song, there was never catharsis. Most of the feelings that came up for me remained unresolved. Sometimes I have the honor of directly dancing the grief of spirits, but this time, though I offered myself up; I remained too opaque to truly embody my offering.
Life is so infinitely tiny, so infinitely fragile. I simply don’t have any moments to spare in self-induced distraction, in anger, in limitation, in hesitation. I hope I can stop cultivating those things in my life—for example by not overdoing it with drinking at key moments when I have somehow managed to escape my self-imposed limits and expand into infinite possibility.
Amber instructed us to let repetitions come through and to fully express. Sometimes it is in these energetic glitches that spirit breaks through, manifesting in our gestures. I found myself close to the floor, touching it often, even casting an arm down inside a spin. Every repetition that I found involved either the ground below me or the space above me.
Since I was given a Reiki energy-healing empowerment in July, I have been thinking more about self-protection. Not protection that involves aversion or pushing anything away, but protection that involves remaining porous and at once carefully cultivating my own life force. It also involves avoiding things that diminish life force, so that I may be powerful and happy, and so that I may be of service. My human Reiki guide said, “Stay strong and attuned to your highest self and all will flow.” Somehow, contemplating the passing of Michael Julian Berz, a widely-beloved human, made this thought present even stronger.
I am writing in a café and a Nirvana song just began. I can’t help thinking about Kurt Cobain, another artist who took his own life—likely with similar agony—leaving many questions, regrets, torn hearts, and such a touching body of work. It is just so sad. It is hard not to perseverate on this. All the people I know who died by suicide or with unresolved pain come up now. As Amber said in a conversation recently, in part “it just sucks.” There is not always beauty there is not always deliverance there is not always peace. Please let me die with grace when my time comes. Please let me respect how everyone chooses to exit, instead of dwelling on the pain and sadness and fear that arises. Truthfully, my biggest fear to die alone, sad, small; and that is exactly what comes up in the face of this.
When I was at Cape Cod with my family one year, a very old woman planted her cane in the sand and walked into the ocean. The cane looked so resolute, casting a little hooked shadow as the sun moved across its arc. We noted the cane with curiosity all day, and later learned that the old woman had disappeared—never seen again. I love the beauty of the woman’s gesture, but I am tortured forever imagining her last moments—not able to breathe, taking in water. Perhaps she was at peace, or perhaps she regretted her decision after it was too late, wishing for one more embrace, one more kind word, one more sunset, one more chance to connect. My Gods it hurts to feel that. I have to just gulp breath in.
At the end of today’s class, I danced with a friend who I have an incredibly powerful connection to. We moved energetically—spinning, stomping, leaping—and moved in and out of attenuated shapes, balancing each other’s gestures, often extended sideways, balancing on one foot, reaching to the farthest edges of ourselves.
At the end of the class, Martha guided us into a hand-held circle, communicating the initial directions through gesture, not words. She led us in a ritual then, employing the objects of her installation.
I couldn’t quite land at the end of class. Amber put another song on and I moved gently for a little longer while friends greeted each other and caught up. I felt fragile, on the verge of tears, depleted. I didn’t really want to go out into the big , scary world. I lingered and lingered, wondering if I could handle it.
Earlier today, I asked my little son if I could give him a big hug. Knowing that he loves to be picked up though he weighs over 50 pounds, I said, “I will pick you up.” He said, “No, no, Mommy. Don’t pick me up. I don’t want you to hurt your back,” as he held his arms around my neck, hugging and kissing me.
Michael Julian Berz was a talented photographer and beloved member of the 5Rhythms community. He created many of the most iconic images of 5Rhythms teachers and practitioners, miraculously capturing the intangible grace of spirit and inspiration as it arose in his subjects.
August 25, 2015, Brooklyn, NYC
This blog consists of my own subjective experiences on the 5Rhythms® dancing path, and is not sanctioned by any 5Rhythms® organization or teacher.
by meghanleborious | Aug 24, 2015 | Notes on Practice
August 16, 2015: Yesterday I went to Riis Park beach with my five-year old son, Simon, my sister, and her soon-husband. Right after we parked our belongings on the sand, we played in the water for a long time. Simon was not a swimmer just a short time ago, but he has at last crossed the threshold of buoyancy. Last summer, he barely wanted to be in the water. This year, after a month in Costa Rica and a week playing in the water for many-hour stretches with family in Cape Cod, he has come to love the water as much as I do.
When we arrived, the sea seemed relatively calm, but as the tide came in, dangerous currents began to present. Right in front of us, a man nearly drowned when he panicked in a rip tide. A relative swimming next to him was a lifeguard, but he had no flotation equipment. He signaled the lifeguards frantically. They dashed into the sea with their red buoys and rescued them. Shortly after this, Simon said he was cold and I snuggled him on my lap, wrapped in a towel. I was very happy to hold him like I did when he was small, and marveled at his beautiful aliveness, crying softly because I was so grateful for the precious moment.
Just moments later, one of the same lifeguards who saved the drowning man went crashing by us, her heels nearly kicking her back as she ran. Someone was missing. My sister bolted toward the scene, wanting to help. I saw a line of people in the water and thought they were making a chain, holding someone in a rip current, connecting to the land. We ran, Simon in tow. We learned that the people in the sea searching were lifeguards only. Everyone else had been ordered out of the water; and we could not help. The lifeguards were all in a line perpendicular to the shore. They would all hold up a right arm, then all dive, searching for the missing person. It unfolded like a nightmare. A huge crowd had gathered, waiting. I decided to walk away with Simon—thankfully, thankfully—because just minutes after we walked away from the scene they pulled a lifeless five-year-old boy out of the water. My sister found us shortly, as her husband told her to run away, staying behind in case he was needed as a paramedic. My sister sobbed and clung to Simon, then to her husband when he, too, appeared. It was only after some time that my sister told me that the victim was a small boy. She said he was floppy when they pulled him out, white spittle at his lips. We learned later that night that they could not revive the little boy. We also learned that his name was Ezekiel Gray and that he lived in East Flatbush, Brooklyn. I can’t stop thinking about it today. I hugged Simon and rubbed his back and snuggled him for ages this morning—grateful, grief-stricken, afraid, tender.
That is what I stepped in with to this morning’s Sweat Your Prayers 5Rhythms class, which was taught today by Daniela Peltekova. I stepped mindfully across the threshold, bowed deeply, then found the floor. I was still only briefly, feeling my pelvis spread gently as I lay on my back, then moved into attenuated stretching, both circular and resisted. The first lyric I keyed into was something about “being pulled out to sea” and several jagged sobs escaped me. Before long, I was on my feet, moving in weighted and weightless circles, totally released. I began to move around the room with tears still presenting, looking into people’s eyes, neither hiding nor displaying the tears that continued for some time.
I also spoke with my mother this morning. I learned that a friend’s sixteen-year-old son died yesterday after many years of battling liver cancer. This was just too much. I couldn’t really take it in. My mom sensed it and changed the subject, talking instead about Simon’s outfit for my brother’s upcoming wedding.
Sometimes (and this only ever happens on Sundays) I flirt with the idea that my basic nature might actually be aligned with lyrical, instead of chaos as I have generally held it to be. Today, I found total freedom and tenderness, despite the unending pain of the world.
In Tammy’s Friday Night Waves class (my first 5Rhythms class in over six weeks, since I went away to Costa Rica) I was also unusually receptive. I arrived late as I was (then, too) at Riis Park beach until late in the day; and stepped instantly into a massive, back stepping, winged, weighted Staccato storm with a friend I love to dance with. I traveled around the room, the universe delivering the perfect amount of energy as I moved, carefully noticing everyone in attendance. Tammy instructed us to partner with the person closest to us saying, “Let them in.” Then, she added something to the effect of, “Let in. And let out,” as she continually told us to change partners. Although she did not say it this way, I heard, “Let them in. Then let yourself be let in.” This is when practice is sharp. Is precise. Is a light-glinting sword cutting the dross away from the tissues of the heart. It is nothing less than a warrior’s call to battle, carried over hills and mountains and into vast space.
I danced with a man I have often taken lightly. He can be intense with eye contact, which I find a bit intrusive. He always wants to connect, but seems to have a slight smirk as he approaches. He is probably just expressing playfulness, but sometimes I feel like he is making fun of me—of everyone, not just me. I often have a turn with him, but usually move away before sinking deeply inside. Even when I have engaged for longer, I haven’t ever let him in fully. On Friday, I told myself that I might as well be receptive to everyone. Why not be receptive to him? He is just as likely as anyone else to enter my heart. We danced together at length. I experimented with letting myself be lead, without going slack or losing my power. He spun and released me, perhaps to see what would happen. We clasped hands and passed each other in spinning, briefly entwining. Poised high on my toes, I bravely touched his back, encouraging a certain direction as I moved by him, then let myself follow again, going soft. He was tall enough for me to spin while keeping eye contact, bending my neck backward. I smiled as I danced upright again, shyly meeting his unwavering gaze.
This took me by surprise. I realized that although I have shared many very intimate dances, I had never really explored what it is like to be lead. In a subsequent class, Tammy spoke extensively about coming to the point in practice when we are lead by the rhythms, themselves.
The man I spent eight years with, Simon’s father, joined us on our family vacation in Cape Cod during the first week of August. It was touching to have him there, the site of many beautiful shared memories. On his first night, we went to the beach and flew a kite as sunset lit the sky. I sat comfortably on the sand, gazing at the kite, tears coming easily.
At the end of today’s class, I paused to speak with two friends. When I thanked one of them for a beautiful dance, she said, “Our dance was the most energized I felt during the whole class. At other times I was really just feeling tired.” The other friend, with whom I once shared one of the most beautiful gestures of my 5Rhythms career said, “How could you not be energized, dancing with Meghan?” I loved this compliment. I lingered in it. I could see and hear and feel that they both like me, and that made me happy. Even more, that I could somehow contribute to another person’s individual investigation, could offer something in partnership, that someone could feel better during or after dancing with me. Well, that is just beyond.
After so much individual practice on my own in Costa Rica, I wanted more of this dance experiment with the man I decided to be receptive to, but as I moved toward him other currents kept gathering me in. At the end of the second wave, in a long, swooning, downward-gazing step, my shoulder grazed the shoulder of a woman I barely know. Instantly full-on, it was almost like a continuation of my dance with the earlier man, but now I danced with her instead, letting myself be lead, swept away. Drawn inside a coupled spin, our eyes meeting playfully, the rest of the room fell away. Looking me in the eye, she firmly circled my waist with her arm, just as my dance partner in the Dominican Republic years ago grabbed me in the throes of a lively merengue, and I rested my hand on her other raised arm, being lead, being guided.
In today’s Sweat Your Prayers class, I found a dance with a 5Rhythms teacher who I love dearly. I asked myself, if I were enlightened, right now, right in this moment, how would I be? My heart answered that I would be total presence, just like her, just like the friend I was in that moment dancing with. Winds swept through me, coiling around my spine, entering it, making all of me porous.
In Chaos, I danced for the mother of the drowned little boy. I danced, too, for all mothers who lost a five-year-old boy yesterday, and, indeed, danced with my own fear of losing my own son. I let the prayer dissolve, spinning and leaping, gazing up, my fingertips casting upward. I recalled, perhaps, a memory of a past life that has presented many times over the years, that I once lost a child, drowned in a pond on my own land.
Halfway through the class, I connected with another dancer I have a long history with; and who I trust absolutely. We moved unselfconsciously; breathing each other in, our spines undulating patiently, profoundly in Flowing, unable to stop moving even as Daniela paused the music and offered brief instruction in the middle of the class.
We found each other again at the very end, and connected in creative emptiness, the ceaseless activities of my self-making mind pausing briefly, moving in sublime silence, even with all of the world’s activity around us, even with the street noise of the West Village on a hot summer Sunday in the thick of August.
August 16, 2015, Brooklyn, NYC
This blog consists of my own subjective experiences on the 5Rhythms® dancing path, and is not sanctioned by any 5Rhythms® organization or teacher.
by meghanleborious | Jul 24, 2015 | Notes on Practice, Uncategorized
Despite the often-experienced bliss of being here in Costa Rica, the magnetic pull of my life in New York has been acting on me lately, and it feels like everything is falling apart.
Yesterday was a blissful day. After my son, Simon, and I did our morning drawings and I dropped him off at camp, I headed for a surf lesson. I returned to my lovely little mountain home overlooking the sea and wrote with happy engagement for several hours. Next, I headed to the farthest edge of Playa Pelada. I went to the little treed alcove by the cliff and began to move in Flowing, without much inspiration. I realized that the sky was cloudy, and that it wasn’t as important as usual to stay in the shade, so I moved out from the shadows—the fringe of the beach—and into closer engagement with the sea.
This dance led up to and through the highest point of high tide. Because I have enough experience with the site now, I wasn’t afraid that high tide would pulverize me, and knew where I could safely go. I flowed into an exquisite intersection. There is a sharp little cliff island that the sea has to flow around, so at high tide the waves don’t just travel to the beach and end, instead they curve around the island and into each other, contending on one side with another giant cliff, and on the other with thousands of medium-sized rocks. There was sand space between the two fields, but it would often fill up to a foot deep as the waves dumped into it. There was a tremendous amount of dynamic activity there. Each wave itself was fascinating, but here there were also conjunctions, risings, fallings, eddies, whirlpools, waves created by rock forms, currents hitting, turning and continuing past the cliff, and, further out, the crashings of giant waves and the cascading ribbons of white water over the huge rocks as each wave fell away.
This is where I found my dance yesterday. Small flutters of receding water carried me into a swoon as I glanced along the edge. I danced quickly backward, running away from an advancing wave. Waves from the two sides of the cliff crashed and battled and I dipped and turned, catching edges, expanding, contracting. In Chaos, the water rushed to my knees and loose rocks crashed into my feet as I danced through the breaking waves.
I have been deliberately vague about the theme I am exploring within visual art during my stay in Costa Rica. I don’t want to give it all away here, but I will share a small piece, since it is important if there is any hope of you understanding why this dance was so touching for me. The theme I have been exploring is “Everything is Perfect.” I don’t mean this in a repressed, let’s-pretend-we-are-not-vulnerable-or-flawed sense, but rather from the perspective of Tibetan Vajrayana (Tantric) Buddhism that we already have absolutely everything we need to “wake up”, exactly as things manifest in this moment. The conditions for our enlightenment are always perfect. We are not trying to be holy, we are not trying to get somewhere else—instead we are working with the exact material that we have on hand—be it debt, anxiety, unresolved relationships, a beautiful sunset, mild fear of poisonous animals, exquisite florae, problems with your landlord in Costa Rica, the kind gestures of a tender-hearted five-year-old, difficulties with a roommate, or whatever.
The phrase “Everything is Perfect” was whispered to me at a Tibetan Buddhist temple at a moment when my life felt like an untenable disaster. I danced then, sobbing, gazing at sunset over the Hudson River as I took in this important lesson, that things are exactly correct, just as they are, no matter how unpleasant or messy.
What would it be like if we, ourselves, were Buddhas? Would we still get jet lag? Take out garbage? Lose car keys? Sometimes I play a game with myself and imagine how I might experience things if I were a Buddha. I am pretty sure I wouldn’t be just sitting around all day with half-closed eyes and a mysterious smile, but that I would be engaging fully with the events that arise in my experience.
As I have been making visual art, meditating, dancing and moving, I have been contemplating “Everything is Perfect”. Yesterday, as I partnered with the waves, I started to sing the chorus from the 1960’s ballad with the lyrics, “Take good care of my baby. Be just as kind as you can be.” Flowing had much to offer me, and I stayed in this foundational rhythm for a very long time. The receding waves pulled me, new waves pushed me, various conjunctions spun and tilted me. And throughout I hummed the refrain, “Take good care of my baby.” As Flowing danced me, I started to sob.
I realized that the message was kindness. If everything is perfect, there is no need to try to force anything into a different mold, no need to insist on anything, no need to resist whatever arises in your experience. You can simply be kind. Tenderness melted me and as I sobbed I witnessed each event with gratitude as the waves took form and disappeared. Interacting with these elemental forces humbled me and broke my heart. I thought about the times I have been mean, tight or unkind with my son—usually wishing for things to be a certain way, for him to act a certain way, for time to bend to my will; and I cried and cried for all of the minutes I have lost with him and for all the times I could have been kinder. In dance, I sobbed, asking forgiveness, prostrating, bending back and forward, offering my heart with my hands.
I danced a full wave at the beginning of this dance, but Flowing pulled me into it again and again. After a while, I let go of the frame of the rhythms—not letting them dwindle, but instead letting them collide—and continued to move with creativity and wholeheartedness. A few people came walking by. I barely registered them—not wanting to show off or to hide in any way. Lyrical brought me to the sky. Stillness, when it finally came, found me again sobbing, porous. The waves passed right through me, even passing through a tightly held spot in my diaphragm that I rarely release. I moved un-self-consciously, crouching to observe rippling, golden sunlight on a little pool of water, the wind moving and directing me as I slowly shifted positions, the waves arising and receding again, revealing the sand between.
Gabrielle Roth, the creator of the 5Rhythms, was absolutely right. She often said, “A body in motion will heal itself.” She believed resolutely that if we could only move we could each find our path to freedom. The journey of my dances in these short two weeks has strengthened my faith in Gabrielle’s position; and I feel even more committed to practice, even if I feel lethargic or uninspired.
In the afternoon, after dancing my heart out, I picked Simon up at camp. We took a break at home before heading to the beach. He watched Spanish-language cartoons, and I worked on red tape. After awhile, I switched to make some notes about my dance. Simon wanted attention as soon as I began this activity. He kept asking questions, having new needs. I said sharply, “Simon! I need to do this right now. I need just a few minutes. Please leave me alone!” He responded, “That’s mean, Mommy!” It is amazing how quickly I forgot the lesson of just a few hours before, the aspect of “Everything is Perfect” that has to do with acceptance and kindness.
Today was not a blissful day. It was riddled with afflictive emotions: anxiety, discomfort, anger and sadness. For one, I decided to move out of our current lodging to try for something better, though I wasn’t able to get a refund on the original place. I regretted my decision almost immediately, and we wound up in a place with no view and with nowhere beautiful to sit and write. Although I wasn’t thrilled about the place when we were there, I missed the family very much, and found a lot of sadness once I started to dance. Now, I am considering even a third move. Part of me just can’t get settled, thinking there is something different somewhere else that will be better, somehow, than my current conditions.
Sometimes when I enter a dance with afflictive emotions, I end the dance with the very same set of afflictive emotions. Today, however, when I went to dance with the colliding high tide waves, I found tenderness and emotional depth instead of afflictive emotions. Though there was not as much cloud cover as there was yesterday, I again left the shadows and stepped into the dynamic matrix of high tide forces that I found yesterday at Playa Pelada.
The constantly changing ocean waves carried me through another exquisite dancing wave. Again, I stayed in Flowing for a long time, being pulled and repelled by the sea’s shifting forces. I moved with my eyes raised and alight, attending to the horizon and to the many elemental forces that moved and held me.
July 15, Nosara, Costa Rica
This blog consists of my own subjective experiences on the 5Rhythms® dancing path, and is not sanctioned by any 5Rhythms® organization or teacher.
by meghanleborious | Jun 25, 2015 | Notes on Practice, Uncategorized
Hello world. Thank you, as ever, immensely, for your kind attention in reading these words. I love to write in this modality, and knowing that you are there to receive and respond gives it density—it helps me to show up for you (and for me) with all the commitment and integrity I am capable of. I am grateful to all of you for sharing in dance, for talking with me, for guiding me, for challenging me and for supporting me.
On Friday, Amber Ryan substituted for Tammy at Tammy’s Friday Night Waves class. Amber brings her own blend of insight, tenderness, sharp insight and vision; and I have benefitted from her teaching on and off the dance floor.
Before class, I had a very full day. After a long day at work, I had a fast swim. I also shared a full meal—which I rarely do right before a class—with my small son. I wasn’t sure how I would fare as the energy of digestion, combined with the longness of the day, affected my system. I need not have worried, as the collective enthusiasm swept me along from the moment I stepped in. “How happy are we that it’s summer?” Amber asked, and was greeted by cheers and enthusiastically bouncing bodies.
At one point in the class, Amber said, “I am going to ask a question that might not sound very…spiritual. The question is: What do you want?” Her voice was theatrical, tender, almost beguiling. The first thought that arrived was, “I want my son to be happy. I want him to live a long and happy life!” Then, I flashed on many of the things I want in my life, and noted that I already have most of them, or at least they are in some kind of process of becoming. At some point, I considered that what I most want is to be love, to manifest love, in everything, in every moment.
My cousin Alexis gave me a card for my birthday this year that said on the front, “Happy Birthday to woman who lives life her own way…” and on the inside it said, “boldly, lovingly, beautifully.” She said she read it and felt it was perfect for me. It made me cry. Sometimes I might feel small or mean or inadequate, but really what I really want, what really guides me, somehow was visible to my lovely cousin. Nothing less than the total expression of love, total uncompromising presence of heart. That is what I want. That is my truth. The star that guides me.
I thought about one of my Buddhist teachers, Sharon Salzberg, who, when clarifying a misconception about the concept of non-attachment, said, “We would all be well-served to think much bigger than we currently do.” I challenged myself to think as big as possible, even in terms of the concrete world. If anything were possible, what would I want? What do I want?
I had some insights that I will return to in the coming weeks. About work, for example, and how I am directing my resources. Also, I have to ask myself if I still want to “be a professional artist.” And, too, do I really want a certain kind of love? Part of me wishes for a partner, a consort, perhaps a soul mate, but part of me is in love with the world, with my life, with all of the creative activity I get to immerse myself in—and is hesitant to couple. Is that just fear? Do I want love love? That kind of love? More points to ponder. Thankfully, I will have hours and hours this summer to contemplate, meditate, make and release.
I have had a stress fracture in my foot that since the More Than This workshop in April that faded briefly, but returned again. Toward the end of the class, I took off the dance shoes I wore to protect the foot, and moved with mindful curiosity, taking care not to jar the foot and only bearing partial weight on it, easing my balance carefully with its health in mind.
My mother-in-law, who was a black woman from the south, possessed a resonant oratory style, abundant good humor and flawless dignity. Once, when we were together, we heard the song, “God, Won’t You Buy Me a Mercedes Benz.” I tittered. Having been raised Catholic, I always thought the song was tongue-in-cheek. You don’t ask God for a Mercedes Benz! You ask for world peace, an end of hunger, saint-like patience…something like that! But my very wise mother-in-law said, “Meghan, why wouldn’t you ask God for a Mercedes if that was what you really wanted?” She heard the song totally differently. The conversation opened a whole new line of questions I needed to pose to my mind. Why, indeed, wouldn’t you ask for a Mercedes?
What do I want? What do you want?
Amber played a dance remix of the Annie Lenox song with the lyric, “Sweet dreams are made of this….” She suggested that we think about what we want, and that we show it to others in the room. I lept into a gigantic dance with a friend who had just entered the class, bounding, spinning, emoting. In my head I said, “I see what you want! And I hope you get it!” I could feel her wishing the same for me. The beauty of un-conflicted, straightforward want is that it is, perhaps ironically, quite generous. When I want what I want, and I take responsibility for my wanting, I want you to get what you want, too. I don’t resent you for wanting, or even for getting. I even hope you get a Mercedes if that is what will make you happy! I carried the mantra around the room and repeated it in my mind to everyone I encountered,
“I see what you want! And I hope you get it!”
Happy summer, dear friends! May you live in the fullest expression of everything!
June 21, 2015, Brooklyn, NYC
This blog consists of my own subjective experiences on the 5Rhythms® dancing path, and is not sanctioned by any 5Rhythms® organization or teacher.
