All Races, All Genders, All Body Types - Part 2

By Thistle http://www.thistlespace.org/

In northern California, some of the group started doing very focused intentional yoga the hour and a half before the dance officially started and we began sharing mostly raw local foods after the dance was over. For nine months, a community like none other I had experienced emerged in my life and swept me up in moment after moment of compassionate and totally dynamic, fun healing.

Some of us fondly referred to it as "Dance Church" because it gave us a sense of meaning, purpose and hope like an established religion might. The important difference being that our "church" had no dogma and was democratically organized. Alexa was our facilitator, but we took turns and she eventually moved from the area and the dance continued on in her absence.
Our "church" has leaders and followers who are any and all of us. Ecstatic dance is building community wordlessly and with our words emerging smashing dogma and old religion and creating spontaneously with all the love genes we got, spilling motion that heals.

Sound utopic? Try it. Another thing we have in common with religion is that we have break-through experiences and moments of non-judged euphoria. We become a gigantic mirror for ourselves, and what I see makes a world of difference in my daily experience of life. As a result of Dance Church, I am more relaxed, open, curious and easily delighted.

Though our moments together in ecstatic states are limited by time and space, the current stays strong with you all week and you may find yourself floating or dancing at work. You may find your feet feeling lighter and colors brighter, especially red, and you may feel like you are just plain in love with everything. Or you may find emotional, spiritual blocks deep within non-verbal layers, unraveling and spilling forth tears of rage or envy, or any number of unsavory states that could be holding you back.

Continuing to dance is the healing motion needed to move through these blocks to greener pastures. Or maybe the anger and frustration, pain and sorrow stays with you and you find yourself punching the air like a teenage boy, enraged the whole time. Or crying long, hard tears of sadness the whole dance. That could be. Or maybe you will just check it out, meditate to yourself, have fun and be light-hearted about the whole thing. Dance is something for everyone and different for each of us.

To be continued . . .