How to move into space freely? How to move into space freely? Today, I would like to share a dance tip for people who don’t know how to move freely into space. I noticed that most people usually stick to one spot when they dance, that is, they tend to have their legs standing at the same place and move only their upper body. In my personal understanding, this way of dancing focuses more on physical movements at a personal level, rather than having an awareness into the space one is in. Although ‘moving into space’ is not a key element in soul dance, I personally love it much. Because it can significantly improve the fluency and flexibility of a dancing body, helping individuals to have a further connection to interact with others. However, I usually meet some people, who participate in my dance sessions, have the difficulty of dancing with a group of people. They normally feel that it is already too much to take care of themselves during the dance, not to mention that they have to consider others at the same time. There are lots of people on the dance floor, how can they still move into space? There is a tip for moving freely into space, that is, instead of paying attention to PEOPLE, you can try to shift the focus on EMPTY SPACE among people. When you shift your focus, you can transfer the thinking of hard to move to the awareness of finding space to move.

Resigning from Dance Performance; Developing Teaching Ability Good Dancers Are Not Always Good Teachers Part 2 . . Resigning from Dance Performance; Developing Teaching Ability I only had a little teaching experience while working with the dance company, such as giving a warm-up class for dancers. After resigning, I finally had an opportunity to formally teach at schools. I had to plan a syllabus for each semester, and break down my teaching plan in detail in each session, etc. Not until I started teaching did I realize that dancing and teaching are entirely different. However, this teaching experience did give me a great chance to utilize my ability on analysis form the left brain - classifying my dance experience in a step-by-step manner and then integrating the material into different lesson plans. In addition to demonstrating dance movements, I also needed to give a verbal description. I would observe students’ dance and then provide them with my guidance. Throughout years of teaching, I accumulated tons of lesson plans in various subjects, and gradually developed my teaching ability, which was later applied to my soul-dance teaching.

Someone who can dance well may not equally good at teaching As a trained dancer, I always hear people from the dance filed say: “someone who can dance well may not equally good at teaching”. Why do they have this comment? I will discuss this topic from a view of different functions of the left and the right brain. In my understanding, self-dancing is merely a personal experience, mainly performed by the right brain which is in charge of sensibility. When one in dance, he expresses the beauty of dance through the physical body by tuning into his intuition. He doesn’t need to verbally communicate with others while dancing. He may need to think of how to perform bodily movements in terms of the aesthetic sense, or highly aware of a subtle change from movement to movement; however, everything only happens inward. On the contrary, dance teaching has more layers of transmission processes requiring the function of analysis of the left brain, namely how you can pass on your understanding in dance to the other. This involves the usage of multiple teaching skills including movement demonstration, verbal explanation, analysis of the dance, imaginary guiding. In so doing, it gives a clear guideline of how to perform a specific dance movement in order for the participant to understand fully both bodily and theoretically.

Life is a book If we use a book to describe a person’s life, each of us all has a fascinating story. Some stories may have been forgotten or are unbearable to look back. But only if we truly go through it, can we become a more complete self. In those dark paths we have been through alone, allowing being heard, seen and supported by each other, we finally realize that we are not alone walking on the path. I am very grateful to my group for being open-minded and close-knit. It is because of your trust and support that everyone can be a real self without defense and cover-up. Each meeting is unique and only, and there is no coincident. We have made a commitment on the soul level to meet each other in this life. When the body is allowed to express freely in dance, one can feel self-acceptance and liberation. We then can love ourselves and everyone coming into our life more deeply. You are brave souls being through a process of self-disclosure, in which tears and laughter are woven together like a touched painting that has imprinted into the heart.

An Introduction to Chakra Dance An Introduction to Chakra Dance Chakra Dance is an active moving meditation that works with seven main chakras located on the spine. In Chakra Dance, there is no set form, you just dance spontaneously with the energy in your body. When you are chakra dancing, you will experience at least three levels. The first level is “The Body Level”. When you dance, you have a chance to loosen your body. When your body is loose, it can move freely and allow you to feel better. The second level is “The Emotional Level”. When your body is free to move, you feel more comfortable on a physical level, and you may experience some deeper emotions locked within you that you were not even aware of. When you have a chance to go deeper, you will often find that there are a lot of emotions stored in our body; most commonly are unexpressed anger, depression, fear or sadness. We could use the metaphor of a pond to describe what happens when we are chakra dancing. Imagine that the inside of your body is a pond and the water is stagnant. When you dance, it’s like throwing a stone into the pond and as the stone sinks to the bottom, it stirs up sand that has been sitting there for years. Our emotions are like ‘that’ sand. Normally, we don’t have a chance to release our emotions, just like that sand staying at the bottom of the pond. As you go deeper into the practice, you won’t even be a pond at all but slowly transition into a river. A river, for me, is ever-flowing, like the veins in our body. As mentioned above, chakras are the centers of our energy, located on the spine. So, when you dance freely, you allow the energy in these centers to flow into the rest of your body. Also, you can imagine the energy flow into your veins. So, if we use the metaphor of the pond to represent our chakras, when you dance, the water in the pond starts flowing to the river and the river flows into the ocean. And that brings us to the third level ‘The Spiritual Level’. The Spiritual level is the cosmic ocean where you will arrive at a state of peace and tranquility. Now, you have a chance to look inward and reflect on what has happened in your life. Written by Ya-Wen Lin, Chakra Dance Facilitator