Sunday Morning Dance Starts March 22nd - Next Month

Next month's dance, which normally would be March 21st (typically, the 3rd Saturday of the month), will mark the beginning of what we hope will be a regularly scheduled Sunday morning "Dance Your Prayers."  The tentative dates for the Sunday morning dance are:

March 22,  April 5,  May 3, June 7 (full moon).  

I'm thinking that Sunday morning dance will be a different experience that Saturday night, and will allow people another opportunity to dance, since Saturday nights can be full of other things to do.  

Dance till the stars come down from the rafters...

I've been listening to some podcasted Osho recordings, and really enjoying his clarity, incisiveness, and humor.  Then, while doing some web surfing, I found this unedited portion of an unpublished darshan diary transcript which keeps ringing my bell.  Osho talked about a new way to look at renunciation -"sannyas" means "laying it all down" - and to me, the following quote speaks specifically to the experience of ecstatic dance.

"I don't believe in renunciation, I believe in rejoicing.  Life should be a song, a dance, not sadness.  The so-called saints have been too heavy, sad, sombre, and they have created an atmosphere of sadness all over the world.  Churches have become cemeteries, they are no more celebrations.  Even if celebrations are arranged, they are done in such a way that they lose the very quality of celebration.  They become to formal.  They are no more fun, they are serious.  Holiness has become too identified with seriousness.  

My work is to destroy that identification totally.  Holiness should be wholeness, and wholeness is always a dancing state, a state where the dancer disappears into the dance... Dance your way to God.  Dance till the stars come down from the rafters.  Dance creates the fire in which all that is useless is burned, only the essential remains.  Dance creates the fire in which gold becomes purer and purer and purer, and ultimately only purity is left."

February Dance Night Invitation - Download Here

Here is a link to the February dance flyer.

In your light I learn how to love. - Google Docs

Newly Energized and Creatively Inspired

After a single posting back in the beginning, I'm going to get this party going again! Since starting Dance Night, we've been going strong with monthly dances, now being held at Harmony Yoga. Last August, I undertook the fire initiation that is Burning Man, and discovered 5Rhythms at the RhythmWave camp, an incredible experience of what a dance community can create. Over New Years, I traveled over the mountains to Olympia, WA and danced with Amara and Sara Pagano at Waves Studio, my first 5Rhythms workshop called "Patterns." Last week, I returned to Waves for another workshop with Kate Shela, a gifted teacher who weaves the shamanic journey with 5Rhythms. In the coming months, I hope to bring 5Rhythms to Spokane, WA. In addition to our once-monthly Dance Night, we will hold a Sunday morning "Dance Your Prayers."

Let's see how this experiment flows.

"Holiness should be wholeness, and wholeness is always a dancing state, a state where the dancer disappears into the dance...Dance your way to God. Dance till the stars come down from the rafters. Dance creates the fire in which all that is useless is burned, only the essential remains. Dance creates the fire in which gold becomes purer and purer and purer, and ultimately only purity is left." - Osho