Dance, Sister, Dance

Just before the flu visited us, my husband and I were discussing plans for making a very outward-focused change. And truly, at the time, those plans seemed like just the thing we needed, when in fact, what we were contemplating was actually an attempt at skirting an issue.

I know, that sounds cryptic, but that’s all the explanation I’m willing to give - for now, anyway.

So, there we were, 3 weeks ago, in the middle of lots of talk about making a big outward change and then, wham… the whole family immediately gets sick, grinding-to-a-full-stop sick. Not a coincidence. I pay very close attention to not-coincidences.

So, after the flu-messenger delivered its missive and departed, I found myself in the wake of realizing that those pre-flu plans were a shell game, a sneaky, if unconscious, sabotage (on my part) aimed at keeping me exactly the same inside while making myself and everyone around me very busy trying to enforce a change from the outside.

It became very clear to me that a major shift still needs to happen in my world, but simply tweaking outward situations/conditions is not going to do it. The change has to begin within me, and way deeper than I can access with just my mind. In other words, I cannot reason myself into or out of this one.

So, yesterday, while feeling pretty stupid about all of this, I suddenly recalled my first dance workshop many years ago. The class was an introduction to flamenco and I remember feeling as if I had been awakened as the teacher showed us how the graceful wing-like arm positions actually begin in the thoughtlessness of the breath, the wordless intelligence of the shoulder.

She explained that each movement is first born as an almost intention-less intention to lift not only the arm but eventually the whole body; a desire aimed not at the execution of a single movement, but at the longing to live oneself into the next moment of the dance… and the next… and the next.

That was when I began to understand that, for me, dance is the way through change. And I’m not talking about dance as metaphor here (though it certainly is). I’m talking physical ass-hauling movement through sweaty time and space - which all starts with a desire, an intention, a longing to move.

And it has always been that way for me, even before I understood it. Every major change in my life, even as a child, has begun with the mindless physicalness of dance, a fact about myself that I had forgotten lately. No, actually, I have not forgotten, I have let emotional and physical entropy lull that truth away from me.

Over the past few years my bodymind has been enduring the changes of menopause, but more than that, it has suffered a deep “enweakening” due to injury and grief and loss of hope. Somewhere along the way, I fell down a rabbit hole, and I began to believe that my fleeting states of mind, and the beliefs that grew out of them, were concrete truths, and well… let’s just say I’ve ended up doing myself a great disservice in the process.

So, dance as salvation, dance as reclamation, dance as a way. Yes. But as I also learned early on with dance, the dancer must start where she is. Not where she thinks she is, where she wants to be, where an expert says she should be, but where she is. And even in the best of shape, even in the prime of youth, that place constantly changes for each dancer.

Daily, a dancer must kneel and kiss the ground and begin all over again… right where she stands.

I know all this. But I am in a state of mind and body so far from where I used to be that the thought of beginning where I now stand makes me feel instantly overwhelmed; already failed. I feel that I can never get back to the ability level of my youth. I’m too old, I’m too tired, I’m too afraid.

Except I’m not. To paraphrase Gabrielle Roth: if you can breathe, you can dance. And I know she’s right. So, despite my best attempts to squirm out of this, I know I have come to the end of the bullshit, the last excuses.

I have come to a place in my life where I know there is no other way; no other place to go but here. If I want change, I must dance my way into it.

So, today is the ground under my feet. This post is my kiss. For the next 4 weeks, I’m stepping daily and intentionally into the fire of dance.

Beyond that, I do not know what will happen. I do not know what I will become, or what dimensions the shape of my life will take on.

For now, I begin only with a willingness to sacrifice my beliefs, a willingness to offer my body as it is in this moment, and the vertiginous sensation of re-discovering, yet again, that I am sure of absolutely nothing.

To be clear, this is not an exercise program, a new year’s resolution, or an infomercial-induced gotta-get-in-better-shape kind of thing. I have no plans of weighing myself or taking my measurements everyday. I have not stocked up on protein shakes. I have not gone out and bought Neena and Veena’s DVDs.

This is a puja, an invocation, a ritual, a prayer… the only way through. I have cleared a floor space in my bedroom. I have rummaged around in my closet and pulled out my old silks. And as soon as I publish this post, I’m going to light a candle, put some music on, and begin… with the thoughtless longing of my breath.

[My intention is to post everyday through these next 4 weeks, but beyond that, I don't have any ideas about what my posts will contain, or even how this whole thing will go. But, if any of you would like to join me in this, please jump in at any time. There is no need to tell me about it - unless you want to, in which case I would be delighted to hear it! This isn't a meme (thank goodness), there is no set anything. Basically, if you feel moved, just create your own way and do the dance you need to do... knowing that another woman is somewhere in the world dancing with you.]

Image credit: Dancer at Burning Man, by Paul at Sparkmedia