Transforming Early Life Trauma

Very serious topics call for Peony Kitten in Tutu

When I was fortunate to go away and do an intensive about working through the body to heal trauma, the thing that struck me the most about all the information and the videos of experiments and the reading and research and the experiential exercises was the superiority of the arts in terms of efficacy.

I mean, as a dancer, I knew that moving in this body to music was THE thing that had finally helped me lead a joyful and fulfilling life after decades of depression and anxiety, but I thought this had a lot to do with the fact that I was finally doing the thing I was born to do.

That was true. I was meant to dance and not dancing was a large part of my inability to recover.

It turns out, though, that dance (and all the arts) is exactly what we all need, regardless of our ability level or if the arts are our life's work.

As a teacher, I see it every day: a "non-dancer" finds their courage and their brilliance and their worth again, strengthens their physical and emotional body, and overcomes one layer of trauma after another.

All without talking.

But here's where I think this stuff is Extra Big Magics: pre-verbal age trauma.

Some of the worst stuff that happens to us as humans happens when we are pre-verbal and when we have no way to construct linear, narrative articulated stories of what has happened. It all just happens on that primal level of body and feelings.

This becomes the DOS of our inner programing. It's the hidden software on which all other software is then built. It's the software that is inextricably intertwined with and embedded within our hardware.

HOW do you get rid of that?

I'm going to say something that's not very popular: You DON'T.

You know how sometimes a tumor isn't removed because removing it would simultaneously create health (i.e., the tumor is gone) and death of the patient (because you have to take something essential to get the tumor)?

That's how I think some of this pre-verbal stuff works. It's part of you. Period.

That is not meant to sound negative or fatalistic.

I think what is negative and fatalistic is telling people they "should" be able to "get over" absolutely everything with lots of happy thoughts and positive reinforcement.

Then when they don't get over it or when the same stuff keeps coming up over and over, they get to add shame and guilt and all kinds of other feelings of ick to their layer cake of self-hate.

The tricky part of pre-verbal history, too, is that crap feelings and unexplainable behaviors and severe dips in mood will happen and people won't know where they came from because there is no memory to pin it on and no way to articulate that which never was articulated.

But...

Here's where the hopeful sunshine rainbows part comes in.

The arts.

When we dance or we paint or we play or write music, we circumvent that language-reliant part of us and head directly to the feelings and to our core.

Things that were once inexpressible when we were limited to the tool of language are now being expressed with paint or movement or sound.

We can, through the experience of art, feel the depths of the feelings all without talking about that which cannot be talked about.  We can know truth without having or needing to name it.

Like the initial pre-verbal traumas, the healing happens on the primal level.

This thing that used to overtake you and for which you could offer yourself no explanation? Now you have music or painting or dance to go to and through these more ephemeral means, you can express yourself fully and finally -- as you could NOT when you were so small.

And that is more than enough: the arts transform trauma and save lives.

Move to This

THIS. This is what classical music needs to make it interesting again...

Gabriela Montero dares to ((gasp!!)) interact with the audience, giving them a say in her performance. She takes requests. IMAGINE. Then the real genius begins. She improvises these pieces that have become, in many cases, rather stale and makes them new again.

For this, focus on a part of the body you typically don't think much about when moving and dancing and allow that part to be the leader. The rest of the body is being bossed around by that part.

Perhaps you could try your elbow, your wrist, the top of your head, your left ear, the back side of your knee...you get the idea. But decide before you play the music and just breathe and allow.

(This piece really starts to do something magnificent after about 50 seconds when she takes a long, thoughtful pause.)

A Writing Workshop: Teaching What I Need

I went upstairs to our "filled with books and musical instruments" room to take this photo, and as I unwrapped my 1969 manual Olivetti, the smell of typewriter key oil wafted up and I was overwhelmed with memory, yes, but also a sense of loss.

As my life kept changing and twisting itself to meet the needs of my depression and anxiety...as I got further and further from my essential, born-to-be self, I held onto some things as I put others away under lock and key.

One of the things that went under lock and key until four years ago, of course, was dance. I see my life now in two parts: Before Returning to Dance and After Returning to Dance.

One of the things that I held onto was my love of literature and writing.

From the time I was small, books were my life raft; books felt like a more peaceful way of subsuming my true self than drowning it in the stormy ocean of violent emotions around me.

In books, too, I got glimpses of other worlds, other ways of being, other possibilities for my life.

Books saved me.

The fact that I then thought I wanted to write them...well, that made sense.

But it was painful for me, this writing business, and I didn't understand myself well enough to do it in a truthful way, a way that means something to the reader and moves beyond trite or predictable.

But then...Marcy (Oh...it is always Marcy...) got me this typewriter and something about the physicality of a manual changed everything. I knew I HAD to use it and so I sat down and started and worked my way through 500 pages of a completed manuscript (too long!!!).

The finishing is so important.

The beginning is too, but it's the finishing that counts most.  Anyone can begin. There are drawers and drawers full of beginnings all over the world.

I had always written in other genres -- essays, mostly, but the novel was some High Ideal that I could not forgive myself for not giving a go.  And then I had.  (And Marcy would assert that my Biggest Gift is poetry but that's another story.)

And then dancing came. (It's all so wrapped up together and complicated, isn't it? These lives we lead and the paths and the journeys.)

I barely write anymore. I write this blog. I do a bit of journaling to sort my thoughts.

Lately, I have felt the call of something more.

So it makes sense that I am offering a writing workshop at the studio, starting Wednesday, May 29th, for six weeks.

If you have started a bit of writing here and there or even just DREAM of writing, this workshop is for you.

We'll get past the crap that stops you and we'll work on outlining a project you can finish.

If you want to join us, details and payment information are here.

Gratitude: The Beauty of Honesty & Courage & Moving

Yesterday was one of those days.  One of those amazing days. (You thought I meant otherwise, right?)

From my first class early in the morning (Thursday is my busiest day) to the last class that finishes by about 7:15, I was given the privilege over and over and over and over again of watching all these little miraculous fires being lit, sparks flying, embers glowing extra hot.

I took a risk with my girls from the residential high school and had them do a paired movement experience, not knowing if I would just have to keep saying "no talking...just talk with the body..." I expected that, actually, and I expected a lot of nervous laughing.

Nope. What I got is indescribable and it gave me arms full of goosebumps. So beautiful. So honest.

The whole day was like that.

By the time I got to my evening Kundalini yoga class, I thought, well, it's kundalini yoga so it'll be good and it's my last class til my day off so that will be great, but what can possibly happen to even compare to the rest of my day.

Lots.  Lots, it turns out.

A couple of students shared, in a couple of ways, that they had some leaps happen.  One woman learned something new about her breath and her connection to her breath, for example.

And then there was this. Go read it. Amy is a wonderful writer, first of all, and the bare bones honesty of her struggle with grief over the loss of her (very young) father is courage in action.

On Fire

There have been some videos over the last couple of weeks that have totally made my brain and heart expand in a million ways and just set me on FIRE, so I thought I should be sharing.

First up is this interview with a former OB/GYN. It's over an hour and WORTH EVERY MINUTE. Pay very close attention when she starts getting into details about her new book:

If you need a wake me up for your soul, here's what you've been waiting for:

As you can imagine, I watch a LOT of dance videos. And I get pretty discouraged (and a little mad) when I see some of the stuff out there that is considered "cream of the crop," and all I can think is, "REALLY? THIS is what is sucking all the freaking grant money!?!?" (This tends to be the case with most stuff I watch that is created in the U.S.)

But this? THIS is awesome. The piece at the beginning to the Violent Femmes. This choreographer? He deserves everything he gets.

Screw Gurus

If that offends you, then my work is not for you.

This is for women who read that and say, "YES!"

This is for women ready to take full responsibility.

This is for women who have known all along the power that resides within...even if they've been hiding from it or have thought it was lost or diminished.

This is for women who are open minded and ready to learn but knowing that putting into action, that putting it all together, that making something of it all is up to them.

This is for women who get that their path is their path. Alone. They make it by walking it.

And there is no one walking ahead of them and clearing the way.

They wield their own damn machete in their own damn jungle and they earn every foot of their path.

Move to This

I wrote recently about my dismay (and anger...) when I realized how little work female composers get (and all other female artists, really), and the result of that is my focus from now on in these Move to This posts on the work of women.

I am particularly fond of more avant garde forms of contemporary classical. Don't worry...sometimes these posts will just highlight some good POP!

But pop music is pretty limiting when it comes to movement work.  I find that my body does more interesting and new things when the music is deeply unexpected.

This piece certainly fits the "unexpected" bill.

Stay with it.

Even if you feel like you hate it, stay with THAT and keep moving. (This is a metaphor for life, after all.)

This is a piece by Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho.

Just try.