mind.expressions: The Eight Worldly Dharmas

mind.expressions: The Eight Worldly Dharmas

Mindful-Body Awareness and the 8 Worldly Dharmas

Doing this healing work and using the Nia Technique as my vehicle continues to teach me those universal and timeless life lessons. Many of the new age and even old age traditions (Ekhart Tolle's Power of Now to the Buddha's transcendence) get at the idea of recognizing the ego and how it ultimately can cause a great deal of suffering, but also a great deal of pleasure. This is why it is so easy to stay hooked with the Ego on an endless journey of ups and downs. In Buddhism, the monotheistic religions, and the new age philosophies of today, there are teachings that encourage us to simply observe our thoughts, realities, actions, and reactions. In so doing, we permit ourselves to just Be in the moment, in the now. Letting go of these attachments to "our" things and ideas, we can simply Be in the Body, seeing and sensing the world the way that children do - free movements, noticing all of the beauty that surrounds us in this moment in time.

The lesson that I experienced this past week through the NIA practice is to not let myself become so easily swayed by my emotions and ego. For example, when I teach a class and everything goes really well and my students are giving me lots and lots of complements and support, this feeds me and makes me feel really good. Then for example, if I have a class that seems awkward and uncomfortable, this can cause me to feel bad. Yes, these are natural human responses to praise and blame (not exactly blame, but I'm trying to tie this into the Buddhist idea of the 8 Worldly Dharmas).

Why is this such a great lesson? Well, because many of us know how easy it is to fall back into living in our heads, and not being in the present moment and experiencing life as it is in this present moment. Even now, as you are reading this post, I invite you to notice how aware you are right now of the sensations in your physical body. How do your fingers feel against the keyboard/mouse? Are you sitting in a chair? Is it comfortable? What do your toes feel like against the floor or in your shoes? Are you holding any tension anywhere in your body? Just be aware.

The Nia Technique uses the Martial Arts, Dance Arts, and Healing Arts in order to Energize, Heal, Align, and Balance the Body. To stay focused with today's blog related to awareness and being in our body. The Healing Arts part of NIA includes Yoga, Feldenkrais, and the Alexander Technique. I think that the Feldenkrais method ties in to what I'm talking about with sensing our bodies. Check out wikipedia's infomormation on the Feldenkrais Method.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feldenkrais_method

I have learned that by being present, and not judging thy precious self, that I can flow more easily from one experience to the next. For me personally, this takes a bit of work to not fall into suffering that comes not feeling good enough, attractive enough, flexible enough....etc. When I'm in the moment, dancing to the music, that is holistic healing for me! Yes.....The mind chatter says Au Revoir, and I find the peace that is talked about in Buddhism and in Tolle's Power of Now.

A Beautiful Love Poem - "Hope"

I hope your day brings nice things

not of mice and men

or chinese yen

but memories of love

when push comes to shove

and that with full moon eyes

you're dancing inside

until we can see each other

again.

Following Our Dreams & The Full Moon Dance Celebration

This Saturday, I will host my first Nia class with live african drumming. I must admit that I'm a little nervous about this. A lot of Nia is based on specific choreography and routines which can be memorized. Every song is looked at like a movement kata. Yes this is drawing from the martial arts part of Nia.


For me, to suddenly have 75 minutes ahead of me, without any set in stone kata, intimidates me. Those who know me, know that I tend to take the most challenging route from point A to point B. This lioness is ready for the challenge but at the same time it feels good for me to express my apprehensions before stepping into the unknown.

For this dance, we will dance to the sounds of Live Primal Drumming! In this Candlelit, light of the moon space, we will let out our inner warriors, animals, children, etc! It will be a big dance playground!!! This June full moon is only a couple weeks away from the Summer solstice, the longest day of the year. We will let our inner light shine as it is reflected from the light of the moon! This dance will celebrate life, longevity, and will allow us the opportunity to go deeper within ourselves as the beat of the drum resonates with the beat of our hearts, our spirits, and our souls. We will dance with the primal rhythms of the drums, and allow ourselves to "unplug" from all of the over-stimulation of modernity.


I'm looking forward to updating this blog to let you know how this event turns out. I'm sending lots of love and healing energy into this dance, and I trust that the universe will allow this to return to me and give me the inner strength that I will need as I create and share this dance-ritual with my students. From this place, I think that all of us will be rejuvenated by the powerful primal rhythm of our bodies connecting with life all around us (past, present, and future). Drums are used for ceremonies, for healing, and have been apart of human civilization for thousands of years. As a side-but-related note, the man who will be leading the drumming on Saturday night quit his corporate day job years ago because he knew it wasn't his calling. He decided to spend a year putting all of his energy into drumming. He told himself that if he couldn't make it work after a year, then he would return to the corporate world. Today, 20-something years later. He is still drumming and I don't think that he ever had to return to the corporate world. I am deeply inspired by his story as I am on my own path of finding a way to bring together my passions and loves and to make healing work my way of life. (My Story - Need to Create a Blog page devoted to that so I don't get too off-track here) I want to share with you a brief quote from Chuck Cogliandro that he wrote about his experience when he moved to Atlanta:

In 1992 I decided to move to Atlanta, and within a few months had an experience that would completely change the direction of my life. I attended a West African dance class that featured live drummers playing for the dancers. Upon walking into the class, I was electrified and transformed. There was a level of energy, consciousness and communication that I had never felt in drumming before. An ancient, non-verbal language and heritage was connecting the drummers, dancers, ancestor spirits, and soul of the earth. Multiple, interlocking rhythmic cycles were being played simultaneously in a continuous stream by a number of djembe and dunun drums of the ensemble- yet the overall expression was not static but vibrantly alive, breathing and pulsing.

There is a quote in the book The Alchemist (yes another blog subject) by Paulo Cuelho that I find really rings true for me. Like Chuck Cogliandro, I am also setting out on that road-less-traveled path - call it a spiritual calling, or simply a calling. Ever since I started taking the steps towards creating my life in a way that fills me and also allows me to share my gifts and serve others, things have fallen in place. Magical Things. I happened to pick the right time to contact the Decatur Healing Arts which is the amazing place where I teach twice a week and where the Full Moon celebrating will take place. I've met amazing people and who I've influenced and touched through my personal spiritual vehicle called Nia Dance. This is my first day putting together a blog, and how easy it is to get side-tracked. I could go off in a million directions here!

Ok. Returning to the focus! The quote is that "When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it..."

I am inspired by Chuck's story and am very excited to co-create with him this Saturday. He followed his dream, and the universe continues to conspire for him to achieve it and evolve with it.

The Witch of Portobello

I'm currently reading The Alchemist by Paulo Cuelho -Typically this is the first book that people read by Mr. Cuelho. However, I started with the Witch of Portobello.

At the Decatur Healing Arts, which is the main studio where I teach Nia (my homebase, I love that Place), they have a big basket full of books for lending. It's a little library of books covering everything from Lance Armstrong's story to Memoirs of a Geisha to Healing Headaches Naturally and then, there it was....The Witch of Portobello. I must admit that the cover of this book caught my attention.

A red headed dancer on a beautiful blue background. Those who know me well know that blue is one of my favorite colours. It's funny how books find us or we find books. It's interesting because I had this book for a few months before I ever started it. I even lent it out to the man I was involved with at the time and he read it before I did. I don't think that I was ready for it until I said good-bye to this man I was seeing. Let's call him Nigel.