dancing inside

dancing with no desire to be there
dancing with fear creeping in
dancing with my inner child
without trying to get him out
staying with him
however unconfortable
experiencing his terror
frozenness
disabilities
and tremor

dancing with the feet
when they cramp, get stiff
when the toes get blocked
and the ankles tire
staying with them
however uncomfortable
experiencing the tries
misses
and tries

I am grateful

a new softness

another monday and another discovery on the dance floor...

tonight there was a softness about me that i do not remember having noticed in the past;
i found an acceptance within that transpired without;
i accepted to be touched by others around me and it translated by mimicking others' moves, and therefore very foreign to my usual movements;
in chaos i observed myself breathing in deeply and easily, while at other times I would have been short of breath and in need to stop for the lack of air;
i was my own spectator in Lyrical when it seemed at times that my hands and feet were synchronised via puppet-like ropes;

i was greeted by half moon as I walked out, and received a welcome into the night and its golden darkness;

last but certainly not least "i judge people and therefore believe everyone judges me. Best therefore to judge myself first, at least I know what to expect, however harsh..." yes, i had known this truth for years but tonight my eyes opened onto it in a very different way that i can not explain. all i can say is that i just KNEW it in my heart, I SAW the full impact of it on others and myself and I wondered how it will feel, eventually, to look at people not with a new eye, someday in the near or far away future...

for now, i'll just keep observing and catching myself

power of dreams...

I woke up this morning with the strong intention - planned - to get up a little early and meditate for 15 minutes or so before heading off to work. As I threw my feet then legs out of the warm sheets and sat on the side of my bed, head in hands, I suddenly had this flash in my head of an elusive dream I had just had.

feeling of warmth in the air, as if summer, a few people/friends (?) standing having a drink and a good time when I see my boss in shorts and bare-chested with a beer in his hand, having a laugh and being very relaxed with everyone, part of the group I think. It is a bit of a shock!

I felt good each time I remembered this image. It allowed me to be excited again about tomorrow evening, to go dancing tonight and be carried by my dance and to come back home and feel good. As if a missing bit had just come back to me to help complete the giant jigsaw puzzle...

more ah-has...

Another Monday night... Another dance... Another experience...

I am sooo grateful to my psycho-analyst for having "introduced" me in the world of 5Rhythms... he talked to me twice about it a few months apart. I hadn't heard it the first time an I decided to try it the second. I had to gather all the strength and courage that I had scattered all around the place for years and make my way to the other side of town on a Saturday night - and gosh, London is a big town!!! I'll always remember that first look into a large room, not many people yet as I was early and the anxiety locked into my stomach. It was 2 and a half years ago. And I'm still going every single week...

Tonight was the first time of 2008 in my regular Monday evening class (I'd gone on New year's day to another class) and the first time in a long while, too.

I enjoyed my dance for a while, warm-up was great then came the body parts... As surprising as could be, my lightness transformed in a split second into a heavy weight on my shoulders as I felt drawn to the floor... I lied down on my front on a cold wooden floor and immediately thanked the earth for holding my weight, for giving me energy and for allowing me to trust again in my own femininity.

Ah-ha!!! That's it! The feminine energy within was missing...

Back in London for 9 days after having stayed 4 days in the middle of Switzerland and one week in the countryside where my parents live, somehow my life style in this city had already challenged my nascent femininity: tarmak everywhere, speeding, doing, underground, back at work, rational thinking, sales, money... all of these contributed for more or for less of the onslaught of the feminine within myself!!

I was cold and I liked the music. I wanted to stand up and move but the dancer within me was adamant, "keep to the floor", and so I stayed there. Flowing moved into Staccato and I thought that it'd be the right time to get up and move that overflowing masculine energy contained inside... I was very wrong. The dancer within kept saying "it's not time yet, keep to the floor". At that time I also began to feel very conscious and uncomfortable of how I moved... I could picture myself raising and lowering my buttocks as if masturbating. I guess the Earth had already started her job of giving me energy and trust because I consciously told myself again and again, "it's ok Claire, you are a sexual being, there's nothing to be ashamed of" and I allowed myself to carry on...
As chaos moved into the air, my dancer inside allowed me to eventually get up and dance. But my body started to shake uncontrollably up and down, back and front, side to side, from head to toe and shoulder to finger tip. It was broken, stopping, starting unlike the rhythm... As I allowed this happen and focused on my breathing ...

Ah-ha!!

The relationship between masculin and feminine within myself has angles, hidden areas big shadow... it is non-harmonious !! Yet, however unstable and difficult, the relationship was happening. Each side vibrating with the other. Their frequence would tune in only rarely but who cares? What mattered then was that both could meet, however badly or ugly at the moment! Beauty, harmony, tuning in will come with time and is a life long process. And it did actually happen for a minute or so... it became harmonious, uncontrolable, unstoppable. My breathing was in complete tune with the movements, the music, the other dancers, the room, all had gone for a few moments. Asi "woke up", I was overwhelmed by fear and felt an immense gratefulness for the experience.

Tonight, I feel proud, I feel happy, I feel grateful, I feel open, I feel confident...

Here are my 21 gratitudes for today:

thanks to Gabrielle Roth for making the 5Rhythms
thanks to the 5 Rhythms for letting speak the body
thanks to the Earth for the trust
thanks to my feet for holding my weight
thanks to Boddhi for the class tonight
thanks to the circle of dancers
thanks to fire bringing light to the room
thanks to Clairette for having made me buy the tarot deck
thanks to Clairon for having let Claireet do so
thanks to C. for introducing me to the 5 Rhythms
thanks for the city of London which offers so much dance
thanks for the food leftover as I came back late
thanks to my work for providing me with enough money to dance
thanks for my flat where I do feel home
thanks to my heart for opening up
thanks for being able to love and be loved
thanks to my family members whom I am starting to meet
thanks for the coming winter so that the seeds can rest and get prepared
thanks for some recent meetings that bring some new into my life
thanks for the good night I'll have in a warm bed
thanks for this new year full of possibilities

liberté d'expression...

Vendredi soir mon intention était de retirer ce manteau que je porte depuis 36 ans, manteau épais d'hiver fait de honte et de culpabilité d'être un être humain désireux de vivre ma sensualité et sexualité, honte et culpabilité doublées du fait que je suis femme...

Depuis j'ai découvert que ce n'est sans doute pas un manteau que je porte, mais plusieurs, empilés les uns sur les autres en une masse épaisse... les manteaux des nombreuses générations de femmes de mes lignées familiales, ancêtres féminies plus ou moins proches n'ayant jamais peut-être eu l'occasion ou ressenti la nécessité de les ôter. Leurs raisons pour cela peuvent êtres variées et n'ont pas grande importance...

Samedi soir, j'ai dansé pour moi, pour ces femmes proches ou lointaines, connues et aimées ou aimantes, ou inconnues et j'ai été inondée de leurs larmes, auxquelles certainement les miennes étaient mêlées, sans être dominantes... j'ai versé nos larmes de souffrance, de répression, d'incompréhension, de jugement, de devoir, d'obligation à paraître et je sens qu'une ou plusieurs épaisseurs de manteaux se sont évaporées...

je me suis sentie lavée, vue, exister...
... assez pour trouver en moi le désir de rédiger ces quelques mots en français... pour qu'ils soient compris de vous tous, famille et amis qui me connaiss"iez" si bien mais bien différente...

je me sens exister pour de vrai...
... assez pour vous dire combien je vous aime...

for all our relations

that's the name of the workshop I've started tonight with a 4h 5Rhythms dance meditation... and tonight I really got involved in the meditation and saw the "full" spectrum of it... I gave back body parts then my entire body to the wise dancer inside myself... both overwhelming and beautiful!

my intention for this weekend is to shed a particular layer that i've been living with for 36 years: the coat of shame and guilt that surrounds being a fully sensual and sexual human being doubled/amplified with shame and guilt of being a woman... i chose to make this coat mine as a child through generations and generations of ancestors and I feel tonight that the time might be right to take it off... I'm not too sure of what I'll find underneath, what I look like as a naked woman - I am to create myself and find my own truth as I go along!!

I will be dancing with this intention for myself AND for all my relations... if you are reading these few words, I will be dancing for you, too... whether man or woman...

blessings and gratitude

Clairon et Clairette sont dans un bateau, il pousse les deux à l'eau...

Clairon pleure
Clairette est dans une colère noire
Clairon a vraiment peur
Clairette ne veut pas le savoir

Puis la musique s'enroule autour de leurs corps

Clairon refuse que ça passe
Clairette lui en veut à vie, à mort, à mer
Clairon garde la tête basse
Clairette est entrée en guerre

Puis les notes s'égrennent dans leurs coeurs

Clairon se laisse amadouer
Clairette le previent, "fais tes prières"

Puis le rythme roule et redouble

Clairon se fait oublier
Clairette n'en a que faire
Puis les basses et les aigus viennent frapper plus fort

Clairon et ses larmes ont disparu
Clairette et ses menaces ne sont plus

Puis c'est tout l'orchestre qui donne le tempo
d'une mélodie qui vient caresser un coeur nouveau
Vivant sur un rythme encore inconnu

another Monday
another dance
another edge
another discovery

new steps
new flowing
new breathing
new opening

send blessings
give thanks
receive love
heal the hearts

newness friendy tornado

The last two days have gone cold and if I needed reminded I feel that I've missed the warmth. My body, skin, insides need some warmth. Summer simply forgot London over these last few months and I feel like going away in a nice and warm place somewhere in the world. Anywhere.

I dream of going to California to dance with Gabrielle Roth but cannot make my mind.
I imagine my skin giving thanks to the sun while lying on the beach in Dahab, Egypt.
I compare flight fares to Majorca or Barbados only to close the websites and get back to Earth.

My clay feet are glued on British soil. Shamanic training in the West country. Dance classes and workshops in London. Maybe this is what I need rather than what I want. Keep my feet on the ground, be earthy, well balanced and centered to sustain the strong winds of transformation that have battered my life for the last few months...

After 3.5 years living in the same flat and experiencing a variety of flatmates, I knew that it was time to move on. On a rainy Monday morning in the middle of November 2006 I just knew. It wasn't time for the how, when, where... but the seed had been planted next to a Cornish sacred well. About 3 months later, a opportunity came up and by the 1st of April, I moved in my very good friend Mick's flat for 6 months while he was backpacking in Central and South America. This brought a life change by itself.

2 weeks later I made an offer to buy a ground floor flat close to the river Thames - after 10 years in the UK and approximately 2 to 3 years during which I knew that my life was to be here, it was sending the world, and mostly my friends and family the tangible signal that my life was in London - for the foreseeable future.

A week after that I was meeting P. and the relationship is a real learning curve for me: learn to respect both what he is in all his qualities and limitations and what I am in all my qualities and limitations, be present to him, me and us, opened and vulnerable, human, woman... It had been a 2 and a half year "gap" between love relationships and the fear factor was very much present... especially as this new relationship did not resemble any I'd had before

At the beginning of June a dance worshop mixed up with strong influence of shamanism ripped off part of my hiding place. I discovered I had no right to lie to myself any longer in one specific department - I am a sexual being and a sensual woman, who likes and needs to be touched and touch others. I am still busy integrating this in my life and going through ups and down in accepting this new reality with no reference model to follow.

Finally (?) the recent entering into the world of shamanism is opening more doors. I have become a child again over the weekend and I am noticing that the rhythms of my steps have changed, that I sometimes feel awkard and broken in a movement I have practiced for nearly 36 years and that could not be more unconsciously done (except maybe breathing). I keep forgetting things and meetings at work and this makes me laugh. My clocks at home (mobile phone, ipod, cooker...) are playing up with me giving me wrong (and all different) times making me late for work. My heart recurrently opens up and his fire spreads to the rest of my chest. If this sensation made me feel extremely vulnerable and terrified of all others just a few days ago, it somehow makes me feel closer to all creations of the world tonight, including human beings. Yet I have no reference point (again!!) to adjust and I have difficulties finding the balance between feeling compassion and fear of carrying someone else's burden. Yet I feel confident that I am learning and a new way will emerge.

I've now moved into this new flat nearly 2 weeks ago. I do not have furniture inside and boxes are still lying around. I feel some pressure for "sorting it out" asap and be settled. I'm pleased I am not surrendering to this pressure as the new space is slowly infusing into me and I discover day after day the way I want to make it mine - I refuse the IKEA/Habitat reference and it is not always easy...

Two days ago, I've found my power place - facing the south pilar of Tower Bridge from the "beach" at low tide. I've found an overwhelming need to receive the steadfastness of these stones, the majesty and proudness of the towers and above all the strength of the bridges legs playing with the coming and going waters of the river. The bridge not only connects both sides of the river it also brings together the earth and the sky, and the elements air, water, earth. And fire makes it shine.

Maybe there's so much happening within and without, there's no need for me to go anywhere in search of newness.

an unusual dance class

It was 34 years before I was introduced to the 5Rhythms ecstatic dance, meditation in movement by Gabrielle Roth (www.gabrielleroth.com) and I've hardly missed a weekly class. Because I love it, for once. But also because it's transformed my life. Because something happens on the dance floor that is difficult to describe with words. Because there are openings and closings, hopes and fears, terrifying anger contained in the safety of the class, terrible sadness of which I fear I won't come out...
But the worst is none of these. No, the worst, to my experience, is when "nothing" happens. No big drama, no ecstasy, no elation, no inflation, no diving, no flying... nothing.

And tonight was one of those nights. I had great expectations because it was full moon, and without being able to see it in Europe, an eclipse... and so I came with an intention. But I soon found myself limited physically by some rare feet pain, tiredness, thigh muscles as hard as rock, and a bad and painful sting or bite under my left ankle but which thought best to venture across half the foot...

I came out quiet, frustrated, sad and maybe even disappointed... (I hate to think that but I reckon it is true...) I became aware of my limitations, both physical and mental, and it just hits me as I write these words that rather than being kind and sending love and support I judged myself for my "failings" and felt resentment and anger.

I am truly sorry. It is now time to make amend with gentleness and nurturing.

Exquisite week end

I've had a trully enthralling week end, full of twists and turns and if there was a plot, well, it never unfolded the way you'd expect in a Hollywood movie...

I was producer, director and actress in the movie being made as we went along, yet I didn't have full control of the situation as the lead male character (yet little known to me at that point) had at least as much power as I had in the movie making. I am writing the American word "movie" because I'm talking about Hollywood, but maybe I should be using the British word "film", as I was told that to an extent "film" relates to good art while "movie" contains it all, good and bad (at least that was my understanding of it). And this scenario would most definitely enter the "film" section.

As the producer, I was very much aware of the difficulties that one has to put up with, the moral barriers that cannot be crossed, the collective pressure to go with the flow and keep to wide and crowded avenues, the practical constraints that are there to stay and that cannot be avoided or forgotten, the time ticking away when a scene has to be shot again because it's not quite good enough but you know deep down that nothing better will come out of the actors at that moment...

As the director, I had scribbled down and planned a scenario, thought through the lights and pace of the opening scene, heard in my head the music accompanying the romantic encounter between the two lead characters, imagined the costumes perfectly fitting their period and status in the world, put myself in the shoes of a spectator paying his ticket entrance at the cinema door and coming to watch the finished product with a critical eye...

As the main female character, I was to follow my director's instructions given to him mostly by my producer, yet interacting and adjusting to the other part of the film, the man, without whom there would have been no scenario; I felt free and strong to behave as I wished knowing full well that I would need to report any wrongdoings in the eyes of my director and producer; it was the role of my life, experiencing all possible emotions from exhaltation to boredom, worthlessness, despair, love and excrutiating heart pain, fear and sadness... you name it, I felt it!

Of course, my difficulties, moral barriers, constraints, timing considerations were plain different to those of the male character and his own on site producer/supervisor. It cannot be helped, and negociations were to take place...
Of course, my ideas for a scenario, ambiance, interpretation and cuts were not shared by the male character's own cinema director. It cannot be helped and negociations were to take place...
Of course the realm of my emotions cannot compare to that of the male character and little of it can be said here as I have not much knowledge of it. Feelings that the emotional range experienced by him might not have been as wild as mine, but it is only my side of the story...
Would I have signed in to watch such a story? Yes, triple yes, several times. The making of it was intense, sometimes bringing all persons involved to the limit of insanity as each scene was emotionally charged to the limit.

In the end, the finished product gave a snapshot without a beginning or an end showing the meeting of a man and a woman on a dance floor, their paths crossing again in a big city over the course of a few days before parting at rush hour in an underground station. Plain, simple. Yet not "Before sunrise".

(Disclaimer: I cannot speak for the persons involved with the lead male character and you will have to keep in mind and accept that this view is extremely partial)

5 days which transform a lifetime

I have come back last night from an intensive workshop that counts as 5 days of Heartbeat in the pre-requisite to enter the 5 Rhythms teacher training. To me who doesn't at this minute think about the training it counts as a life transforming experience.

Alchemy of stillness it was called. Or in my own words, how to explore the emotions (and their shadows) of fear, anger and passion, sadness and joy in the body, let them dance me as I pay attention and learn to recognise and consciously release them, and finally allow these new allies or friends to blend into compassion and love at the centre of my heart. Intense it was indeed.

Thorny or daunting at times, gratifying and fun at others, the work opens the door of possibilies, catalyses questions or intentions and leads through transformation to newness. If it will take some time to integrate the experience it already revealed to me my own continuous - if not regular - movement on the spiral of life and my capacity to be more grounded in my own power.

I am extremely grateful to all spirits to have conspired so that I could be present for this work, to the much dedicated teacher Ya'Acov and his assistants Jo and Sue and all the students who made this work what it was.

In the heart of Spring

Sunday rain, rain, rain.. more rain still and there's no stopping it. That's been the story of the day, half way though the Bank Holiday Monday. Somehow I love it. The same way I love it when it's sunny or warm or windy or cold. I just take it as it comes.

But today there is an extra-something to this rain. I'm going tomorrow to a week-long 5Rhythms workshop and I feel that the ground and the Earth are being softened by this blessed water and that more life will come as a result of it. More life through the ground but also more life though my body. I don't know yet what, how, when but I feel it grow inside and gather strength to push out and be seen eventually.

I'll keep all my senses in full alert and welcome every single new shoot.