After Basic Emotional Healing – What Next?

The Next Stage in Personal Evolution

Maybe We’re ALL Autistic – to Some Extent

Albert Einstein. — Albert Einstein reportedly quipped, ‘Any man who can drive safely while kissing a pretty girl is simply not giving the kiss the attention it deserves.’

In last week’s post, I asked you (my readers) the question: Are you autistic?

I’d assumed (erroneously) that most of you would say something like: Me? Of course not!

I was wrong.

I got an email back from one of my readers, Yes, I am autistic, and dance helps my symptoms.

What Is It Like to Use Belly Dance for Personal Healing?

I know the woman who wrote back to me; she’s actually very well integrated – she has a strong role in society, is a valuable member of several groups, and is overall an absolute dear and delight.

I was surprised that she labeled herself autistic, although that I knew she used belly dance strongly as a healing modality.

I also knew, though, that she attended strongly to the beat of a “different drum” – she listened more to her inner self than to the external world.

Belly dance has been important for her as a means of tapping into her body’s secret storehouse of knowledge. For her, as for many of us, belly dance (Oriental dance), truly is an integration pathway.

As I reflected on what she wrote, I thought: I’ve used belly dance for healing myself, just as she has. And many, many of my students have said the same.

In fact, probably most of the women who come to me (and yes, like attracts like), have come less because they want to put on the glitzy costume and perform on stage. They come because they want to tap into who they are in a deeper way.

That, and do some serious healing and integration.

And for some of us, of course, performances and other stage opportunities do ensue. (This in fact may be part of the healing process.)

We Heal Ourselves from Being Emotionally and Energetically Fractured

In that sense, maybe we’re all dealing – to at least some extent – with the challenge of having various aspects of who-we-are fractured, and our conscious awareness sometimes not fully tied into either our surroundings or our bodies.

A couple of months ago, I wrote about How Belly Dance Healed My Life.

From the stories that I hear; I suspect that I’m just one among many.

We may not all use the term autistic to describe ourselves, but many of us – due to a range of factors – may feel that it is difficult to be present in this world. Co-opting the title of one of Robert Heinlein’s most famous science fiction novels, many of us feel that we are a Stranger in a Strange Land.

Robert Heinlein’s “Stranger in a Strange Land”

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Meaning from Movement Applies to Our Dance

One of the things that I love most about Oriental dance is that it allows us to both access and express the full range of who we are.

This is important, because most of us – in our day-to-day lives – find that we access only a limited part of our emotional range.

Through movement, we express ourselves through a much more complex emotional vocabulary.

In that sense, the phrase coined by autism researcher Dr. Geoffrey Waldon, Meaning [comes] from movement, is useful for all of us.

What’s the Next Step after Basic Emotional Healing?

Our emotional healing progresses throughout our entire lives. Most of us – unless we are a very advanced soul – will not finish in this lifetime.

However, we do move on to progressively deeper – and more refined – aspects of inner healing.

Specifically, we start to work more with our full energetic being.

Carolyn Myss, in her book Why People Don’t Heal and How They Can, writes (in Section One on “Your ‘Cellular Bank Account'”):

Each of us has hundreds of circuits of energy connecting to us, energy that different cultures have named in different ways as the Divine breath of life that animates each of us. What the Indians call prana and the Chinese call ch’i, Christians refer to as grace or the Holy Spirit, and secularists might call vitality or simply life-force. [p. 16]
Although the life-force is equally available to all of us and flows into us whether or not we are aware of it … it’s possible to maximize our intake and use of it. In fact, consciousness means awareness of the flow of life-force into us and the ability to direct it into certain areas of the body, without unknowingly releasing it from other areas of the body.

Imagine this flow of energy as a financial allowance … positive investments will earn you positive returns… Negative investments, on the other hand, will create debt. [p. 16]
The only way to release the pattern into which we have locked ourselves is to release the weight of the past – to get out of the energy debt we can no longer afford to carry. Forgiveness is one sure way out of debt. Forgiving does not mean saying that what happened to you doesn’t matter, or that it is all right for someone to have violated you. It simply means releasing the negative feelings you have about that event and the person or persons involved.[p. 18]

Dr. Carolyn Myss, “Why People Don’t Heal and How They Can”

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What Caroline Myss teaches gives us an important and valuable connection:

To use belly dance as a sacred pathway for body/mind/psyche/energy healing and integration, we also have to do some spiritual work. Most especially, we have to learn forgiveness.

First, we start forgiving ourselves. Then, we also forgive others.

The Course in Miracles also teaches forgiveness as a basic principle.

We’re going to be working with this – and with other spiritual principles (gratitude, giving love, and taking responsibility for our thoughts) over the next months.

For today, it may be sufficient to simply start being gentle with yourself.

First step: Ease up on the judging.

We are much harsher with ourselves than we are with anyone else.

Cultivate – to the best extent that you can, just for today – the art of gentleness. (You do this, and I’ll try to do this also.)

How Being Gentle with Ourselves Is the Key to Our Next Stage of Personal Growth

Belly dance gives us the means to be with our bodies, and our feelings. It helps us access our inner feminine core, and express the feminine aspects of ourselves.

There is one more step that we can take, though.

If you’ve been following me on the Unveiling blog, you’ll know that we’ve been working towards the goal of core archetype integration. This is often typified by the seventh card in the Tarot’s Major Arcana; the Chariot. (For those of you familiar with the Tarot, this sounds like a masculine archetype, right? Read Unveiling’s Chapter 7: “A Real Woman’s Path (Really Does Exist!),” to learn the original meaning for this card. It started off as a feminine archetype: the Winged Goddess.)

Beyond the Chariot or Winged Goddess stage, where we literally force our archetypal polar opposites to work together, we open up a brand new stage of learning.

We introduce this with the notion of Strength, Major Arcana Card VIII.

The Tarot card <em>Strength</em> (Major Arcana Card VIII) shows us that after we have strong and firm control over our inner selves, we can begin gentling and taming our inner beast. — The Tarot card *Strength* (Major Arcana Card VIII) shows us that after we have strong and firm control over our inner selves, we can begin gentling and taming our inner beast.

Have a look at the figure to the left.

It shows us the Tarot card Strength (Major Arcana Card VIII). This is the first card in the second series of major life journeys.

Notice how the woman is easing her “inner beast” to the ground; she’s subduing it not with force, but with gentleness.

In most of my Unveiling blog, and in my book, Unveiling: The Inner Journey, I focus on the first major life journey: getting to access, understand, and integrate our eight core power archetypes.

I briefly mention the second and third journeys adult life journeys. The second journey deals with accessing our inner Fountain of Youth – our intrinsic personal energy.

Martial arts masters – especially of the internal martial arts (T’ai Ch’i Chuan being a premier example) use their internal energy, or ch’i, as part of their practice.

In our second adult life journey, we learn to do the same. (Read Unveiling’s Chapter 29, Pragmatic Esoterics, for a start on this.)

Forgiveness Leads to Gentleness; Gentleness Leads to Tension Release, Tension Release Leads to Better Dance

For a practical start, as you do your belly dance exercises this week, focus on softening your body. Use the force of gravity to help you align, not muscular tension. See how much you can release tension throughout your body.

Saint Francis de Sales, practical and wise (1567-1622)

We’re beginning to learn effectiveness while staying soft, relaxed, and gentle.

As Saint Frances de Sales is credited with saying:

Nothing is so strong as gentleness, nothing so gentle as real strength.

Let’s try putting this into action together, shall we?

And we’ll check in with each other next week.

Very best wishes as you use Oriental dance (belly dance) for personal growth and healing!

Yours in dance –

Alay'nya - author of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Unveiling-The-Inner-Journey-Alaynya/dp/0982901305/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1368123419&sr=8-1&keywords=unveiling+the+inner+journey">Unveiling: The Inner Journey</a> — Alay’nya – author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey

Alay’nya
Author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey
You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. Become the Jewel!

Founder and Artistic Director, The Alay’nya Studio
Bellydance a courtesan would envy!

Check out Alay’nya’s YouTube Channel
Connect with Alay’nya on Facebook
Follow Unveiling: The Inner Journey on Facebook

Oriental Dancer Nimeera on Unveiling: The Inner Journey

What does Oriental dancer Nimeera have to say about Unveiling: The Inner Journey?

NImeera Nazmine performing with a shamadan (candle headdress); photo courtesy Washington Post.

This is a wonderful book! Unlike so much of the fluff out there, this one is by no means an “casual read” to read in the little stolen moments of the day. Rather, it is something with many layers of depth to be explored in meditation and contemplation, with a cup of tea, away from the demands of children and husbands. And then not to read all at once, but section by section with time for reflection between readings… It has resonated with me and given me validation for the things I feel and do that don’t always fit with society’s expectations for me, and given me ideas for how to further mold my life path to my greatest satisfaction.

Nimeera Nazmine performs in North Virginia (Fairfax and Woodbridge), as well as in Washington D.C. She also teaches classes in both belly dance and Bollywood-style Indian dance.

Alay’nya, Unveiling: The Inner Journey

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Belly Dance Breakthrough – from Autism Research?

Some researchers speculate that Albert Einstein was autistic.

Are you autistic?

Very likely, you’re not.

You are – most likely – professionally successful, emotionally mature, socially well-integrated, and a fully responsive and responsible member of society.

Also – very likely – you are performance-driven; a high-achiever in every respect.

This may be the problem.

We May As Well Have Been Giving Powerpoint(TM) Presentations

Is your dance as exciting as a Powerpoint(TM) presentation?

In a recent dance show, one of several put on by leading teachers here in Northern Virginia, I thought sadly to myself, “We may as well have been giving Powerpoint(TM) presentations.”

What was going on?

Well, each dancer was delivering her choreography step-perfect. She did the right moves, right sequence, right timing and tempo.

There were even some efforts towards the higher aspects of choreography; tempo variations, level changes, technique combinations and different kinds of movement across the stage, and good use of props.

Yet I was bored. I felt stilted and stultified. And, I suspect, many of the dancers themselves felt stilted and stultified.

Probably way too many of them felt as though they were stuck in a box – and had no idea of how to get out.

But “getting out of the box” is – most likely – precisely why they first started their passionate study of Oriental dance, or – as we often call it – belly dance.

They wanted to be in touch with that luscious, passionate, emotionally-expressive creature that they knew lurked inside their corporate suit.

Yet here they each were – counting out the steps, and trying desperately to remember what step came next.

What Do We Really Want When We Study Oriental Dance?

Years ago, my dear friend Stella Grey described Oriental dance:

I believe that the dance is at its best when it is a spontaneous three-way conversation … among the musicians, the dancer and audience. The dancer makes the music visible to the audience, the audience’s appreciation is heightened and feeds back to the musicians. [from a blog series originally published by Stella Grey, and now removed from the internet; this quote was captured and reproduced in Unveiling: The Inner Journey, p. 178.]

The key words are “spontaneous” and “conversation.”

A rehearsed set-piece is neither spontaneous nor conversational. No matter how brilliant in concept and execution, it is a monologue. And don’t we tend to avoid those who have much to say, but never an ear to hear?

What we really desire – when we do Oriental dance – goes even deeper as a conversation.

Ultimately, we desire to have this “conversation” with ourselves.

In particular, we’re seeking to give voice to that aspect of who-we-are whom we so often stifle, because our day-to-day survival considerations often require that we wrap our heads around Powerpoint(TM) presentations.

I’m joking.

No, I’m not.

We are collectively – especially those of us in Northern Virginia and the Metro DC area – way too involved with our cognitive, task-oriented, high-performance selves. We find it difficult to let go.

More than that, we find it difficult to find a pathway or mechanism by which we can let go.

Obviously, most of us are not doing it through dance – or at least not in the way in which we’re being taught to dance.

We envision any kind of performance as something that must be carefully scripted. Spontaneity – improvisation – seems terrifying. We apply the same control to our dance as we do to our professional presentations, and wonder why we’re not getting the emotional release that we truly desire.

That’s why the introductory sentence given by the author of a book about helping autistic children caught my attention so strongly.

Meaning from Movement

Dr. Geoffrey Waldon, famous for the Waldon Approach to helping autistic children develop fully functional and normal lives, has developed a protocol based around a core concept:

Meaning [comes] from movement.

In the Waldon Approach, an autistic child is guided by his or her therapist in an asocial manner. The therapist is behind the child, and moves the child’s limbs to help that child perform the kinds of movement patterns that lead to certain levels of cognitive development.

It works.

In “Autism and Understanding,” author Walter Solomon (along with co-authors Chris Holland and Mary Jo Middleton) vividly portrays the challenges – and the potential way forward – for helping an autistic child. This book was inspired when Mr. Solomon’s own autistic son, Robert, was significantly helped through the protocols developed by Dr. Geoffrey Waldon.

I was initially intrigued by the book’s intellectual premise, and then had an opportunity to hear both Walter and Robert speak at a book signing for Walter Solomon’s Autism and Understanding. Their story was moving and eloquent. Robert, in particular, was inspiring – he holds down a professional job and is happily married. His ability to lead a successful life in mainstream society bears tribute to the Waldon Approach’s effectiveness.

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The phrase, “meaning comes from movement,” is foundational to the Waldon Approach – and is now being found relevant to other forms of learning and creative expression. This premise also underlies the importance of early mother-child play; particularly play that involves moving with the child.

Waldon’s unique insight that motor facilitation should be “asocial” is pivotal to this entire approach; this is something that is a bit novel to those of us who think that talking something through or giving verbal and visual feedback are essential to learning. Instead, this offers a radically different – yet extremely effective – approach.

On a more personal note, I am excited about applying some insights gained from this book – very indirectly – to working with adult dance students. Although I have a long-term interest in the brain and in neurophysiology (my first book, the Handbook of Neural Computing Applications, Academic, 1981, built on that interest), it is not the research represented here that intrigues me as much as the potential for using these insights in a practical way with people who are already very functional – and typically highly-qualified professionals with full and active social lives. It is these people who may benefit from a more holistic approach to dance that helps them reconnect with early childhood experiences. This may potentially lead to a less intellectual, and more spontaneous and playful self-expression through dance.

If this proves to be useful at all, then Dr. Waldon’s work will have influenced far more than the community helping those afflicted with autism. Further, Mr. Solomon’s work, together with his co-authors, will have brought a great deal of insight and understanding – a possible avenue for greater personal integration and healing – to a wider audience.

Those of you who study with me throughout the coming year may find us doing unusual movements to help break through our usual cognitive mindsets, and access a more primitive (and possibly more playful and self-aware) aspect of ourselves.

If you’re a dance teacher and you’ve signed up to receive emails from me, I’ll share with you in these emails how these “experiments” are coming along – and pass on to you what works, and what doesn’t.

For all of us – one of the best things that we can do is to temporarily forego choreography, and seek to access the more feeling and expressive side of who we are – to take time to play with dance.

Which is why I’ll close with you for now, and go head off for some dance play!

yours in dance – Alay’nya

The Single Biggest Challenge that Women Face Today

Psychic Splitting – The Single Biggest Challenge for Women

Sometimes, a tree can be so damaged by some environmental influence or natural catastrophe that it splits down its center.

A split tree can sometimes be repaired - and the same holds for our psyches. — A split tree can sometimes be repaired – and the same holds for our psyches. Photo courtesy Chris, from the Gardeningblog.net.

Many women today are like this tree.

A dear friend of mine – let’s call her Jess – had a wonderful affair with an exciting man some years ago. He brought out her sensual, playful, pleasure-loving aspect – her inner Hathor (one of the core power archetypes that each of us has).

She felt free to be laughing and playful with his masculine strength encircling her.

When the man left her, she was devastated. She also went through some financially scary times, as her company downsized and she found herself without a job. Although she had a bequest tiding her over, she was in a very uncomfortable, scary situation.

What she did was to call – almost exclusively – on her inner Emperor (the strongest of her masculine archetypes) in moving forward.

All this makes enormously good sense. In essence, she became her own man.

Many of us adopt this strategy.

Hiding in Our “Emperor-Clothing” – Our Psychic Survival Strategy

When we are stressed, when we are fearful about our survival, we become our own man. We put on masculine “armor” and masculine ways-of-thinking.

Mother Henna writes about her experience of seeing her "pain body" as separate from her "light body." — Mother Henna writes about her experience of seeing her “pain body” as separate from her “light body.”

We may even, as my friend Jess did, take a job that has us dominantly in a masculine role. In Jess’s case, the kind of job that she sought – and the one that she finally took – was an Emperor-style job. It was all about facts and figures, projects and timelines, deliverables and task completions.

For Jess, as for many of us, being an Emperor is being in our “safe” mode.

Many of us remember the childhood fairy tale about the Emperor who was deceived (by his own ego, along with some willing tricksters) into believing that he was fully clothed, when in fact he was naked.

We do something similar, but different.

Instead of going about wearing nothing at all, we clothe ourselves in our Emperor-role. We don this to such an extent that we almost believe that this is who and what we are.

We banish the feminine aspects of ourselves to a deep, dark closet, from whence they are not allowed to emerge.

We think that we are protecting ourselves.

Instead, we create an internal “psychic split” that can be profoundly self-destructive.

The Psychic Split Is the Most Devastating Thing That Women Do to Themselves

I did this psychic split myself, beginning when I was about twelve years old.

{More story will follow.}

Healing Our Split Psyches

Chris, who writes the the Gardening Blog from which the first picture used in this post was taken, describes how to repair the split within a tree. Essentially, he forced the two split parts to join together.

… [after] severe pruning to reduce the weight load of the branch… I temporarily tied the branch up with twine. [Then,] I got out my power drill and bored a hole through the tree at the site of the split. Then I … found some large brass bolts, these were perfect. I put a large bolt through the hole and secured it.

I then drilled another hole a few inches above the split and put a longer bolt through there, … and I used a wrench to tighten nuts on both.

So what do we do to heal the psychic split in ourselves?

Obviously, we can’t just bore a hole in our psyches and use a couple of brass bolts and nuts to force our “feminine selves” and “masculine selves” back together.

But let’s look at Chris’s three steps.

Lighten the load. Way too often, we make huge demands on ourselves; on our time, our energy, our resources. Our first step in healing is to lighten the load as much as possible; at home, at work, at outside commitments, and even in our expectations of ourselves. Healing is hard work. It will require our own time and energy.
Make a temporary fix.
Force the two “selves” to come together.

Kabbalistic Wisdom for Healing Our Inner Psychic Wounds

It might be no surprise to realize that for millenia, both men and women have been dealing with this issue.

In fact, the Kabbalah teaches us that on our personal evolution, we go through three major journeys. In the first of these, we encounter and develop each of our six core power archetypes. Each of these is very strong; each wants to have the “deciding voice” in governing our lives.

How do we handle this?

We invoke (cultivate, and develop) a sort of “super-archetype” – the Winged Goddess.

{more on the Winged Goddess to follow}

The Chariot (Major Arcana Card VII) refers not just to victory, but to uniting opposing forces.

http://fullmoontarot.blogspot.com/2011/04/card-of-week-chariot.html

Belly Dance – A Physical Pathway to Promote Inner Healing

Oriental dance (aka belly dance) is a valuable means by which we women can encourage our own inner healing.

{more on dance as a healing and integration pathway to follow}

There are just three physical practices devoted to mind/body healing and integration: yoga (literally meaning “union”), T’ai Ch’i Chuan, and Oriental dance. And while T’ai Ch’i is a wonderful art, it is fundamentally a martial art – appealing to those who are oriented towards Mars, the god of war.

For a more feminine orientation, we need a more feminine art. This is the role of Oriental dance, or belly dance, for many women today.

Alay'nya - author of "Unveiling: The Inner Journey" — Alay’nya – author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey

Very best wishes as you use Oriental dance (belly dance) to heal and integrate all aspects of who you are!

Yours in dance –

Alay’nya
Author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey
You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. Become the Jewel!

Founder and Artistic Director, The Alay’nya Studio
Bellydance a courtesan would envy!

Check out Alay’nya’s YouTube Channel
Connect with Alay’nya on Facebook
Follow Unveiling: The Inner Journey on Facebook

P.S. What can you read that will help you understand yourself more?

Julie Marie Rahm, America’s Mindset Mechanic

Check out Julie Marie Rahm!

Julie Marie Rahm, America’s Mindset Mechanic and author of Handle Everything: Eight Tools You Need to Live Well and Prosper and also Military Kids Speak (great for parents, teachers, and coaches of military kids) uses a great technique that can help you clear energy blockages, ranging from those from this life through the influence of your ancestral karma. Connect with Julie at info (at) americasmindsetmechanic (dot) com to learn more about how she can help you.

Books by Julie Marie Rahm, America’s Mindset Mechanic

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Julie Marie Rahm, aka America’s Mindset Mechanic on Unveiling: The Inner Journey

What does Julie Rahm, America’s Mindset Mechanic and author of Handle Everything: Eight Tools You Need to Live Well and Prosper have to say about Unveiling: The Inner Journey?

Julie writes:

Alay’nya takes readers on an adventure of the body, mind, and spirit from the inside out, strengthening each independently from the other and aligning all three in support of each other. And then, the adventure continues as readers learn how to create the physical environment that supports and reflects the body, mind and spirit, from personal style to the home and office. Each chapter finishes with Personal Pathworking exercises. When readers choose to stop and do the exercises, opportunities for instant positive changes result.

Read this and more reviews of Unveiling: The Inner Journey.

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Does Your Walk Give Away Your Age?

The "Dior Lady" by <a href="http://overgaard.dk/the-story-behind-that-picture-0070_gb.html">Thorsten Overgaard</a>; Image No 5 from "The Salzburg Collection," available from The Leica Gallerie Salzberg — The “Dior Lady” by Thorsten Overgaard; Image No 5 from “The Salzburg Collection,” available from The Leica Gallerie Salzberg

Since then, I’ve noticed that all my Master Dance Teachers have this quality of “eternal youth” to their gait; to their walk. This comes from their “dance walk.”

This isn’t as easy as it sounds.

One Master Teacher, Anahid Sofian, produced Passage Through Light and Shadow (a major dance dramatic story) a few years ago. One of the dance segments had women walking in a somber, dignified pattern; each holding a (battery-operated) votive candle.

Anahid says that she spent weeks teaching her dancers “how to walk.”

The reason that this is so difficult?

Most people just use their legs when they walk.

A Graceful Walk Makes You Look Ageless and Beautiful

A woman's walk moved George Gordon (Lord Byron) to pen the opening lines of his famous poem, 'She Walks in Beauty.' — A woman’s walk moved George Gordon (Lord Byron) to pen the opening lines of his famous poem, ‘She Walks in Beauty.’

She Walks in Beauty Like the Night
(“She Walks in Beauty,” by Lord Byron (George Gordon)

Dancers – especially Oriental dancers – use their abdominal muscles to generate their walk.

This isn’t overt; it’s based on very subtly incorporating a lower body undulation.

Your first step to claiming this ageless, supple walk?

Learn the basic undulation walk.

The next step?

Apply what you’ve learned not only to your dance, but to your life.

Panther-Like Grace and Power

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Can transforming your walk transform your life?

You bet it can!

A smooth, effortless, graceful walk is a power statement.

The reason?

Most people let go of their abdominal muscles; their inner core. And most people have very tight lower backs.

So if you gain control of your abdominal muscles, and use them – so subtly that it seems imperceptible – you’ll transform the way you present yourself.

If you release tension in your lower back, and get your abs to pull you forward – you’ll move with the panther-like grace, confidence, and power.

Your walk will communicate that you are totally present and aware of what’s going on, and that you are in charge of your life.

People defer to those who have confidence.

You’ll find that without changing anything else in your life, people will be eager to give you what you want.

When you have a beautiful, powerful, graceful walk, people will respond to you positively. They will feel better knowing that they’ve served you well.

What Happens If You Don’t Transform Your Walk?

May I say it bluntly?

Women who have not mastered the secret of a beautiful walk look graceless and awkward. No matter how much they spend on cosmetic surgery, or how much time they spend at the gym – if all they do is “work their muscles,” then – they look clunky and old.

As Shakespeare put it:

Youth is nimble, Age is lame …

No amount of cosmetic surgery, dieting, or exercise will give you the same supple, youthful appearance as well as a beautiful walk.

From Unveiling: The Inner Journey:

[On some talk-show makeovers or reality programming:] … stories of full-body transformations of different women… At the end, each woman was, in her own right, as gorgeous as she could possibly be – until she started to walk!
Typically, these women didn’t learn how to move in a beautiful and graceful manner. As a result, although each woman became more beautiful in a simply physical sense … there was still an element of awkwardness. [p. 305]

How To Create a Beautiful Walk

Here’s the secret:

Your walk will be luminous, sensual, and magnetically attractive when you:

Release tension,
Use your core, and
Generate your movement from your center.

Tension release is your most important first step. Pay attention to your:

Lumber area and your sacro-iliac joint,
Hip flexors, and
Psoas muscles.

Alay'nya at the Tiraz Belly Dance Convention, 2013. Photo by Melissa Brooker. — Alay’nya at the Tiraz Belly Dance Convention, 2013. Photo by Melissa Brooker.

Then, engage your core muscles – particularly your internal and external obliques.

Finally, generate your walk using your abs, not just moving your legs. You will use both your tension release and your ability to work with your abdominal muscles as you do this.

This actually is the crucial mechanism underlying your undulation walk; essential to sensual belly dance.

What happens then?

Your walk becomes effortless and compelling.

What happens next?

Standard repertoire “walks” – such as the beautiful “touch-step” – become natural.
Your beautiful, sensual, and graceful walk emerges – without your “efforting” at it.
Without stress, without any sense of “trying” on your part, people feel compelled to watch you.

To help you transform, I’ve put together an Online Guide. It’s my carefully-selected, “best of the best” YouTube resources that will help you develop a walk that will give you turning heads – and admiring glances – wherever you go.

Whenever someone sees you walking – onto the stage, down a grocery aisle, to walking or onto the red carpet – these techniques will empower you to draw attention, and communicate a subtle message that you are “someone important.”

Join me using the form on the right.

When you do, I’ll send you an email with a link to my Online Guide, She Walks in Beauty.

You’ll get my personally-selected, “best of the best” YouTube links for creating a sensual, compelling, ageless walk:

Three great YouTube performances – with notes about what to look for (and when) – so you get examples of the best “walks” in action,
Five of the best YouTube belly dance instructional clips on the all-important undulation walk, and
Special Bonus: My top selected Red Carpet training YouTube links – the “best of the best”: how walk in high heels, how to sashay down the runway, how to take charge of any room and any situation – just with your walk!

Special Bonus:

Once you get access to this special Online Guide, She Walks in Beauty, look for the link to my touch-step walk as I introduce a candle dance. Compare my approach with that of Horatio Cifuentes, a master dancer from Berlin, Germany. How are we similar? How are we different?

Very best wishes as you use Oriental dance (belly dance) to bring youthful vitality, movement, and expressiveness into your life!

Yours in dance –

Alay’nya
Author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey
You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. Become the Jewel!

Founder and Artistic Director, The Alay’nya Studio
Bellydance a courtesan would envy!

Check out Alay’nya’s YouTube Channel
Connect with Alay’nya on Facebook
Follow Unveiling: The Inner Journey on Facebook

P.S. Would you like to use a sensual, graceful walk to open one of your specialty dances? Learn how Alay’nya opens a candle dance with this beautiful “touch-step” belly dance walk!

P.P.S. Learning the sexiest walk in the world involves lengthening our lower back, strengthening and using our abdominal core, and generating your movement from within.

As a side benefit from doing this, you will automatically begin to strengthen your pelvic floor.

There are additional health benefits from doing this. Dr. Christiane Northrup, New York Times best-selling author of Women’s Bodies, Women’s Wisdom and The Wisdom of Menopause, tells us that developing a strong pelvic floor is necessary for our overall health – including mitigating urinary incontinence.

Dr. Christiane Northrup, The Wisdom of Menopause

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Dr. Christiane Northrup on Unveiling: The Inner Journey

What Does Dr. Christiane Northrup, New York Times best-selling author of Women’s Bodies, Women’s Wisdom and The Wisdom of Menopause, have to say about Unveiling: The Inner Journey?

Dr. Northrup notes:
“Alay’nya brings divine sensuality to women in the ancient forum of dance. This book is delightful.” Read this and more reviews of Unveiling: The Inner Journey.

Alay’nya, Unveiling: The Inner Journey

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How Old Is Belly Dance – Really?

The Healing Power of Belly Dance in Water – The Evolution of Belly Dance

Belly Dance Breakthrough via Dancing in the Water

Belly dance in water is a natural hydrotherapy for tension release and a great way to reduce stress and promote natural healing. Energy healing comes as we release stress and let go of back tension. We learn belly dance effortlessly as water shows us natural belly dance techniques.

Tension release has been a big goal for most of my life. I sought stress relief in many ways; many of these involved natural healing and emotional healing. I sought out various energy healing methods, and I saw my chiropractor regularly, got massage, stretched, did dance, and all the “right stuff” to ease the tension. And yes, I had lots of “release breakthroughs” – but this has been one of my core problem areas throughout my life.

Belly dancing in water helps release tension and makes movements more graceful and supple.

Not surprisingly, I’m always on a quest to learn how to release muscle tension.

One breakthrough happened when a business trip took me to Hawai’i. I took a few extra days to enjoy the exotic locale.

Natural hydrotherapy, or water therapy, was not something that I expected to find – but I learned how to reduce stress when the soft beach waves gave me a natural water therapy treatment!

I had already been giving belly dance lessons for years, and had taught many women how to belly dance. We all found that belly dance was one of the best stress relievers in our life! But on this trip, I learned how to reduce stress – and release muscle tension – in a very new way!

I was surprised to find that even the world-famous Waikiki beach was nearly deserted after the sun went down. I went out into the water – and found that the beach-shelf extended far out beneath the shore; it was a very gradual and gentle slope. That meant that I could walk out quite a ways before the water really came up to chest-level.

The waves were very gentle; really just a rhythmic swelling. I began to feel calmer; more tranquil and and peace with the world.

I tried “playing” with my belly dance moves in the water, resting my hands and arms very lightly on the water’s surface. It’s then that something new started happening.

Belly Dance in Water – How Surprisingly Right It Feels!

The natural buoyancy of the warm sea-salt water, coupled with the gently swelling waves, helped me relax from the long flight and the meetings. I began to let go of some body tension.

Woman in water. Photo by <a href="http://flickrhivemind.net/Tags/coper">Ton Haex</a>. Used with permission. — Woman in water. Photo by Ton Haex. Used with permission.

I flexed my knees just a little bit. This helped me keep my balance. Then, I found that my back was naturally undulating in response to the gentle swells.

Since I was much more buoyant, my hips and pelvis freed up. I started doing all the pelvic techniques – hip circles, Figure 8’s, and others – in a much more natural way.

Resting my hands and arms gently on the water, I found that snake arms simply “happened.” I didn’t have to force them. The “right technique” simply emerged.

This was one of the “transformation moments” in my dance. Now, every time I’m at the beach or in a pool, I try belly dancing in water again. It feels so good to recapture the body-memory of how natural belly dance really is!

The Healing Moment

The healing moment came when I tried undulations. Or rather, I relaxed and let the gentle water swells cause the undulations to happen.

Undulations – upper, lower, and combined – are how our bodies respond to the gentle rhythm of the waves. Releasing ourselves to this healing movement in water helps us integrate, heal, and nourish body, mind, psyche, and soul.

You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus.
Become the Jewel!

Do you want this kind of healing in your life? Do you want the kind of total body/mind/energy healing that comes as you release and let the water carry you?

Join me – be the first to learn about workshops where I’ll coach you through what has worked for me!

The Real Origins of Belly Dance – From Our Pliocene Ancestresses!

So it’s not hard to wonder why belly dance feels so right in the water – almost as though it is the most natural thing in the world. And perhaps, it feels that way because it is natural for belly dance to happen in the water; this is very possibly how our dance began!

I remembered reading Elaine Morgan’s The Descent of Woman many years ago. (Fascinating read; and I so recommend finding a copy and taking it to the beach with you!)

Elephants evolved long trunks. — Elephants evolved long trunks that helped them breathe when standing in water, and to cool themselves. Photo by Kendra Crowell.

Morgan’s thesis is that humankind went through a major evolutionary growth spurt during the heat wave of the Pliocene era, when temperatures in some parts of the world were higher. She suggests that humans (along with several other highly evolved and intelligent species, including dolphins and elephants) took to the waters during this time. Dolphins became completely water-adapted. Elephants evolved their long trunks, so they could breathe while cooling themselves.

And we humans? Basically, we “became human.” We stood upright (in the water of the beaches and lagoons). We evolved language. A number of our social – and sexual – behaviors come from this time.

My guess?

We also evolved belly dance.

Summertime Good Beach & Pool Reads

What will you read at the beach this summer? Try Elaine Morgan’s Descent of Woman, which kicked off a firestorm in the 1970’s. Her insights and logical reasoning hugely upset the apple cart of “how we humans came to be,” devised by male anthropologists promoting the “great male hunter” myth.

Morgan received widespread interest, a good deal of acclaim, and a lot of criticism, as Descent of Woman was written for general readership, and was not tied to references in the same way as would be an academic book or paper.

Her next book, the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis, added rich references – but is still enormously readable!

Read either, or both, while at the beach or pool – and then use some of her fascinating anectodes and insights to launch your evening conversations. With the right crowd, you’ll get a lively discussion going!

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Belly Dance Comes Out of the Water

Naturally, we progressed beyond our early hominid stages. But we still had a fondness for going to the beach!

Belly dance was born in water - and came to fullness as we danced around fires at night! — Belly dance was born in water – and came to fullness as we danced around fires at night! Photo from Deva Coaching.

Let’s move forward to the time of our ancestresses; a time in which we had recognizable humans – but not yet societies with written language. We had fire, though.

So after a day at the beach, spending our time in the gentle waters, what would we do in the evenings?

Build a driftwood fire, and dance.

Our movements? Those that we had been doing all day long – in the water. Now, though – dancing on the beach sand around a fire – we could leap and turn much more easily.

We lost the buoyancy of water, but gained the ability to turn, leap, and spin.

Early ancestors developed percussion instruments, which spurred the percussive movements of belly dance.

We gained the ability to put “sharpness” into our techniques – to do more “percussive” work with our hips and ribs. (These were more emphatic on land, without water slowing the movement’s impact.)

Of course, we were also making our first musical instruments around that time. And these first instruments were percussive; things that we could drum or strike – even clapping our hands. So we had the impetus of percussive accompaniment to spur on our evolution of “percussive” techniques (hip drops, hip and rib accents, etc.).

And thus, belly dance evolved – a combination of movements that were born in water, and completed on land.

To bring the natural buoyancy of water into your technique, check out the video in my previous post. Let let me know via comments if this works for you!

Very best wishes as you make your dances more fluid and expressive by including the joy of “water play” in your practice!

Yours in dance –

Alay’nya
Author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey
You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. Become the Jewel!

Founder and Artistic Director, The Alay’nya Studio
Bellydance a courtesan would envy!

Check out Alay’nya’s YouTube Channel
Connect with Alay’nya on Facebook
Follow Unveiling: The Inner Journey on Facebook

P.S. “Water therapy” helps emotional healing through belly dance – see how Alay’nya uses belly dance in water to release neck, shoulder, and back tension, minimize carpal-tunnel-like stress in the wrists, and create beautiful snake arm movements!

What Does a Leading Belly Dance Teacher Have to Say about Unveiling: The Inner Journey?

From a much-respected Oriental Dancer writing under the Amazon nom de plume of SapphoandRumi, read her Amazon review of “Unveiling: The Inner Journey”: “Even though I’m familiar with much of what she says because I’m a long time belly dance instructor with similar slant; belly dance is more than a dance on a stage; but there is a great deal of new insights I find provocative. She has my ear. Her voice is intelligent and the contents [are] well written and excellently laid out. Bravo!”

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P.P.S. – Do you want the healing power of belly dance in water?

Try doing your belly dance when in a pool this summer – or (better yet) – get into a saltwater pool. This can be a hydrotherapy pool, or water in a sheltered lagoon or beach.

Want more? Delilah usually offers a winter belly dance workshop in Hawai’i – what better place?

Delilah's Belly Dance Retreat — Delilah’s Belly Dance Retreat

Belly Dance Was Born in the Water!

Belly Dancing in Water – Creating More Natural, Graceful, and Sensual Snake Arms

Alay'nya helps women learn belly dance "snake arms" technique by practicing in water. — Alay’nya helps women learn belly dance “snake arms” technique by practicing in water. This approach also releases neck, spine, and wrist tension, and gives a more natural and graceful expressiveness to dance!

Do you feel that your belly dance snake arms, your undulations, and your pelvic techniques are as supple, fluid, and graceful as you want them to be?

Do you want to finally master good snake arm techniques?

Your “secret weapon” to gaining fluidity and expressiveness is to play with your belly dance movements in water!

Study with Alay’nya in this YouTube clip to get ideas and inspiration:
Belly dance snake arms – practice in the water!

Filmed live at the first private book signing for Unveiling: The Inner Journey, hosted by Nicole Cutts, Ph.D., Founder of Vision Quest Retreats.

Belly Dancing in Water

When you try your belly dance moves in the water, the natural buoyancy helps you release tight spots and mobilize your neck, spine, and pelvis. Try it! You’ll find that not only your “snake arms,” but your undulations and pelvic rotations/Figure 8’s all become much more soft, natural, and expressive.

It’s great to find out how well your classic belly dance moves work when you are not feeling the effects of gravity so much. A new body awareness can come through this practice, and you can take this into your regular dance.

Very best wishes as you make your dances more fluid and expressive by adding “water play” to your practice!

Yours in dance –

Alay’nya
Author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey
You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. Become the Jewel!

Founder and Artistic Director, The Alay’nya Studio
Bellydance a courtesan would envy!

Check out Alay’nya’s YouTube Channel
Connect with Alay’nya on Facebook
Follow Unveiling: The Inner Journey on Facebook

From Dr. Nicole Cutts’ Amazon review of “Unveiling: The Inner Journey”: “I love, love, love this book! It is like the g*ddess mother, mentor I never had and always needed. Finally a book that just tells it like it is for women. It is well written, intelligent and enlightening. For any woman who wants to live a life of adventure,joy and love. It is rich with so much wisdom and grounded in thorough research, which I love! I can’t say enough about it. All I can say is read it if you are looking for something new to take you to the next level of womanhood.”

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Nicole Cutts, Ph.D., with Alay'nya, at the first private signing of "Unveiling: The Inner Journey" — Nicole Cutts, Ph.D., with Alay’nya, at the first private signing of “Unveiling: The Inner Journey”

P.S. – Are you seeking to revamp and rev up your life? Do you have goals, desires, dreams that seem almost within your reach?

Nicole Cutts, Ph.D., Success Coach and Founder of Vision Quest Retreats, can help you map the strategic plan to achieve your dreams.

Vintage-Style Oriental Dance: Veil Dancing and Floorwork

Alay’nya – Veil Dance and Floorwork – YouTube Link

Alay'nya performing improvisational veil dance with floorwork — Alay’nya performing improvisational veil dance with floorwork, Tiraz Dance Network 7th Annual Belly Dance Convention, Herndon, VA, May 11, 2013.

Improvisational Oriental dance – vintage-style: veil work, moving across the floor, floorwork: Alay’nya in veil dance.

Very best wishes as you use experiment with your own improvisational dance!

Yours in dance –

Alay’nya
Author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey
You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. Become the Jewel!

Founder and Artistic Director, The Alay’nya Studio
Bellydance a courtesan would envy!

Check out Alay’nya’s YouTube Channel
Connect with Alay’nya on Facebook
Follow Unveiling: The Inner Journey on Facebook

7 Tips to Make Your Veil Your Friend

Seven Tips to Making Friends with Your Veil – and Getting It to Do What You Want!

Belly dancing with a veil helps make our dance much more interesting and exciting. Veil dancing is one of the most important aspects of learning belly dance (Oriental dance). Your “dance of veils” – if done right – can enrapture your audience. Veils help make your belly dance costumes more beautiful, complete, and satisfying.

Alay'nya with veil — Veil dancing: Alay’nya shows how a belly dancing veil can frame us and give greater expressiveness.

Not all belly dance lessons include veil technique. This blog post introduces tips to improve your veil dance, and give you links to some good belly dance DVD and YouTube resources. It will help you learn belly dance online with useful free resources. With some practice, you can do a “veil belly dance” that will add to your repertoire and let you be more artistically creative and emotionally expressive.

Nothing – absolutely nothing – increases our “glamour-factor” more than dancing with a good veil. It’s not just that our veils immediately give us more “presence” on stage. They also frame us (naturally, in the best color possible). They also extend our “reach” – allowing even the most petite of dancers to command the stage more readily.

Swirling, “big-scale” veil dynamics provide an exciting counterpoint to the often more delicate, understated, or precise vocabulary of undulations and pelvic techniques. For this alone, they are a valuable part of a dancer’s “expressive vocabulary.”

Veils give us an opportunity to build up the dramatic tension – the excitement, the anticipation – as we slowly unveil ourselves during certain dances. Also, they give us the most dramatic options for entrances and finales, especially when we are “circling the stage.”

In short, nothing enhances our expressiveness, our excitement, and our emotional range more than a good veil.

Some of us, though, feel that our veil is more of an enemy than a friend.

How do we “tame” our veil? How can we make it an extension of ourselves, so that we seem to naturally, gracefully, and effortlessly control the stage, command the veil, and compel our audience’s rapt attention?

This blog will present: Seven Tips to Make Your Veil Your Friend

Briefly, these are:

Make Sure Your Veil is the Right Length and Color for You
Make Sure Your Veil is the Right Material and Weight for Yourself
Three-Point Control
Learn How to “Frame Yourself” with Your Veil
Put Enough “Oomph” Into Your Veil Moves
Move Your Body When You Move Your Veil
The Power of Nuance – It’s All in the Wrist!

Tip #1: Your Veil is an Important Part of Your Belly Dance Costume: Make Sure It is the Right Color and Length for You

While 2 1/2 yards was the “standard” length for years, many of us now use at least 3 yards. Over the years, I’ve moved away from shorter to progressively longer veils.

The most important length factor relates how long the veil is – when you are holding it – to how much length there is from the tips of your fingers to the floor.

My favorite veil – the one with the best length, color, weight, and “lift” – is 3 yards long. When I hold it in “basic veil” position – across my neck and shoulders, and down at each side, the each side of the veil is just 6 inches off the floor. This is a very good and workable length. I have about 18 1/2 inches of veil “trailing” from each of my fingertips. This is enough to be dramatic on stage.

Less veil (2 1/2 yards), and I lose stage drama. Too much veil, and it gets unwieldy; it’s harder to put enough “oomph” into it to keep the edges from getting fouled, and there’s increased risk of stepping on the veil.

To sum the length suggestion: About 6 inches from veil edge to floor, while you hold the veil centered on the back of your neck, is about right. For me at 5 feet, 4 inches, this means a 3-yard veil. If you are much taller – say 5′ 10″ or more – you could seriously think about a longer veil; up to 3 1/2 yards.

I’ve worked with long veils – 4 yards and more. They require more proficiency, and also more stamina. Longer veils mean more effort to keep them “floating,” so it helps to be in good shape and to have good technique before progressing to a really long veil.

Color is also important. If you haven’t had a professional color analysis done, use online resources to help you figure out your best colors. Your veil will reflect onto your face and body, so you want a color that will make you look your best.

For more on how to select your veil, you may wish to read Chapter 4: “Playtime for Grown-Up Girls,” in Unveiling: The Inner Journey.

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Tip #2: Make Sure Your Belly Dance Veil is the Right Material and Weight for Yourself

Silk is infinitely preferable to any man-made fiber. Silk “floats” better, drapes better, and is more responsive. Katia teaches some wonderful moves for dancing with a silk veil in this Katia Silk Veil Dancing YouTube clip, based on her longer instructional DVD (see below). While sometimes silk chiffon can float beautifully, I prefer a heavier weight china silk – heavier than that used for linings. However, silk crepe is too heavy, and won’t give you the right “loft” in your moves.

Some dancers use rayon veils or polyester chiffon veils with lurex-stripes (mostly popular with beginning dancers). Aziza dances with a silk veil in Aziza’s veil dance YouTube clip. In this same clip, though, she also discusses rayon veils, as well as the issue of “trim” on your veil.

Some dancers prefer polyester – Petite Jamila (of Bellydance Superstars fame) works with two rather large and heavy half-circle polyester veils. But these are SO not for beginners! The simple weight of these makes for an upper-body and arms workout that would exhaust many weight-lifters.

See the link to Katia’s and Aziza’s instructional veil belly dance DVDs below; between these two, you can’t go wrong for good instructional basics, with some advanced techniques thrown in.

Two Good Veil Belly Dance DVDs

Katia and Aziza both have excellent introductory belly dance veil instructional DVDs.

DVD

Tip #3: Three-Point Control to Improve Your Veil Dance

When you take up your veil, and hold it behind you, you should “connect” with your veil at three points: in each hand (one point for each), and the back of your neck. That “back of the neck” connection is what gives you control. (This tip is courtesy of Anahid Sofian, who is one of the “great masters” of veil dancing.)

Tip #4: Learn How to “Frame Yourself” During Your Veil Dancing

Anahid Sofian, Master Teacher of Oriental Dance with impeccable veil technique and interesting veil choreographies

In the previous blog, I gave links to Two YouTube Veil Dance Resources featuring Anahid Sofian and her protégé Eva Cernik, who is now a master dance teacher and performer in her own right.

These two teachers, along with those given in this post, will give you a great sense of how to frame yourself when you hold your veil. For more hints, you can (again) read Chapter 4: “Every Woman Needs a Veil,” from Unveiling: The Inner Journey.

Tip #5: Put Enough “Oomph” Into Your “Dance of Veils”

Evalina Papazova - veil dance — Evalina Papazova in an exciting and dynamic veil dance

Veil dancing can be – and should be – highly dynamic.

Evalina Papazova does some beautiful – and very dynamic and demanding – veil dancing in this YouTube clip.

Evalina’s dance is particularly interesting – she commands a large stage in a solo dance with a combination of veil spins and turns, coupled with good movement patterns across the floor. Her dance shows very well, even on a large stage – this is difficult even for experienced dancers!

Alay'nya with veil. Photo courtesy Crystal Barnes. — Alay’nya with veil. Photo courtesy Crystal Barnes.

Even if you’re new to veil belly dance, you can learn not only from online belly dance lessons and belly dance DVDs, but also from your own body.

From Unveiling: The Inner Journey, Chapter 4: “Playtime for Grown-Up Girls”:

“Now that you have your veil, play with it! First, find a “safe” time and a “safe” place. A safe time is when no one else is around. This time is for you … You need to get your feedback directly from yourself; from how your body feels, and what emotions you are feeling.” [p. 47, Unveiling: The Inner Journey]

Tip #6: Move Your Body When You Move Your Veil

Not many teachers include veil technique in their belly dance lessons. Even fewer teach students to use their whole bodies when they move their veils. All too often, dancers wind up using their arms alone.

Sira - dancer from New York — Sira, a belly dancer from NYC, demonstrates beautiful veil work.

Sira was featured in Anahid Sofian’s 2011 Atelier, showcasing some of NYC’s finest dancers. In this veil belly dance YouTube clip Sira’s beautiful vintage-style dance shows excellent and fluid veil work, including lots of spins and turns.

In this “vintage style” dance, I particularly like the hypnotic quality of Sira’s sustained spins; she demonstrates the important reminder that we need to stay with a technique long enough to give the audience the full impact of what we are doing – something that might seem “too long” for us will be just incredibly right for our audience!

Sira’s dance also included an equally hypnotic floorwork (taqsim) section, with exceptional hands and arms. It concluded with an exotic and exciting Za’ar (trance dance) finale; probably the best Za’ar that I’ve ever seen!

You study and perform belly dance (Oriental dance) because it brings forth a special aspect of who you are – the full range of your emotional expressiveness; both the sensual and sacred aspects of your being.

Join me – get the latest on how to become the jewel (a fully expressive you) in the heart of the lotus (your life, and all that surrounds you)!

Aziza is another dancer who has excellent veil techniques.

Aziza has a lovely veil DVD. However, you can learn good veil belly dance techniques online simply by studying Aziza’s veil dance YouTube clip.

The DVDs given earlier in this post provide good starting belly dance veil instruction. In future posts, I’ll provide my own YouTube links so that you can learn belly dance online, especially belly dance with veil.

Tip #7: The Power of Nuance – It’s All in the Wrist!

Kaeshi teaches belly dance veil technique online — Kaeshi helps you learn belly dance veil technique online in this YouTube clip

Study Kaeshi (of Bellydance Superstars fame). In this Online Veil Belly Dance Instruction YouTube with Kaeshi, you’ll see her demonstrate some very expressive and powerful veil techniques. Although it’s difficult to see her wrist action in this YouTube clip, you’ll find that you really need to work your wrists (and your whole body) to get the same effect when you practice veil dancing at home.

Kaeshi also has a performance YouTube clip, featuring beautiful veil dancing.

For “extra credit”: Study the vintage clip of Elena Lentini. Can you see how Elena has influenced Kaeshi’s style? One of fascinating study in learning belly dance online is to trace the influence of major dancers on some of today’s most well-known and rising stars! Kaeshi has been with Bellydance Superstars, and has a strong following in her own right. However, I’ve seen her for years in New York belly dance workshops with Elena Lentini and others, and have observed how she’s integrated important aspects of their styles and made them her own.

Many belly dance veil techniques require good wrist action – rotating your wrist and moving it in a “figure-eight” pattern – in order to control the far edge of your veil and to give it a good “swirl” in the air as it moves.

See Petite Jamilla’s DVD for good examples; her basic veil techniques often require good wrist work to be effective, so this is a good training DVD.

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Belly Dancing with Veil: Summary

Veil belly dancing requires more strength, stamina, fine-tuned coordination, and movement than does “regular” belly dance. However, as you develop your veil repertoire, you’ll gain confidence and exceptional stage presence, along with a much more expressive “artistic vocabulary” for your dance. This is a challenging study, but so worth the effort!

Very best wishes as you make your dances more dramatic, interesting, and exciting by including a veil!

Yours in dance –

Alay’nya
Author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey
You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. Become the Jewel!

Founder and Artistic Director, The Alay’nya Studio
Bellydance a courtesan would envy!

Check out Alay’nya’s YouTube Channel
Connect with Alay’nya on Facebook
Follow Unveiling: The Inner Journey on Facebook

From Morocco’s Amazon review of “Unveiling: The Inner Journey”: “Unveiling – the Inner Journey” by Alay’nya (Alianna J. Maren, PhD.) is an important book that I wish had been written much sooner. It’s not just for dancers, but a book that mothers and aunts should give to the young women in their families before they go forth to forge their own lives and one I recommend others read to determine how close they are to “getting it.”

P.S. – Have you read Morocco’s book, You Asked Aunt Rocky: Answers & Advice About Raqs Sharqi and Raqs Shaabi? Should be on every serious dancer’s bookshelf!

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Dancing with Your Veil – YouTube Resources

Veil Dances: YouTube Resources Featuring Acclaimed Dancers

As part of the Study Resources for the Spring: The Season of Air (Veils and Swords), this Post introduces some good YouTube clips that form great study resources for veil dancing, especially for “moving across the floor” and “creating veil patterns in space,” two of our Spring Season themes.

Anahid Sofian – Master of Veil Patterns, Spins, & Turns

Anahid Sofian, a master dancer, teacher, and choreographer in Oriental dance.

Anahid Sofian – One of the world’s most renowned Master Teachers of Oriental dance. I reference her substantially in Unveiling: The Inner Journey. See her in:
Anahid Sofian – excerpts of veil movements.

This is a compilation of snippets from three of Anahid’s live performances.

The footage of Anahid in this short montage is assembled from three of her most widely-revered performances:

Theatre of Riverside Church Dance Festival NYC (1986); the music is a taxsim by the legendary oud player, Oudi Hrant, who lived in Istanbul and was considered the greatest oud player In the world; he is still revered today as a master musician,
Town Hall NYC (1999), with musicians Haig Manoukian, Souren Baronian, Harold Hagopian, Sabah Nissan, Lee Baronian, and
Town Hall NYC (2000), with musicians Elias Sarkar, Michael Hess, John Vartan, Emanuel Mann, Amir Naoum, Seido Salifoski.

You may wish to read Chapter 26: “Unveiling: Selective Revelation,” in Unveiling: The Inner Journey, describing how I learned a crucial veil secret from Anahid:

“In my dance, I had started the way many dancers start these days; holding my veil behind me, and using it to frame myself as I moved across the floor. There is nothing wrong with this. In fact, if the music is very active and dynamic, this can be a great dance opening! However (and this is important), this approach lacks the power of mystery and suggestion.

“In the dance that Anahid showed me, she started by staying in one place, with the veil wrapped around herself. She held the veil edges in such a way that her hands were covered. She held her hands high enough so that, with the veil wrapped around her from behind, it covered her face as well.

“Slowly, hypnotically, she moved her hands in an alternating, graceful up and down pattern. She managed this in such a way that I couldn’t get a glimpse of her face, or any part of her body. She was a mystery. Later, as she “unveiled” herself, she had total control over the timing, the pacing, the very selective revelation that she offered.” [Unveiling: The Inner Journey, pp. 359-360]

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Eva Cernik – Veil Patterns: Floats and Spins

Eva Cernik in trademark spinning veil. Photo from the <a href="http://bellydancedvds.blogspot.com/2011/11/turkish-belly-dance.html">Second (Annual) Awards of Belly Dance</a>. — Eva Cernik in trademark spinning veil. Photo from the Second (Annual) Awards of Belly Dance.

Eva Cernik – Eva, a protégé of the renowned Anahid Sofian, carries on Anahid’s tradition of exquisite veil dancing. See her in:

Eva Cernik with veil – in a 2008 performance in 2008 with Rachid Halihal – there is a little veil work at about 3 min, 30 secs, but the most interesting starts at about 5 minutes and continues to the end.

I love Eva’s veil dancing! Here are two more of her veil dance vids:

Eva Cernik – Veil and Turkish Style – beautiful and hypnotic!
Eva Cernik @ Tribal Fest 15 – so supple and eloquent!

Eva is possibly one of the best to study for improvisational work with a veil – even if you have to work with VHS instead of DVD format. She works with single and double veils, and with regular rectangular as well as half-circle veils. Great study!

You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. <br>Become the Jewel! — You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus.
Become the Jewel!

Join me – get the latest on how to become the jewel (a fully expressive you) in the heart of the lotus (your life, and all that surrounds you)!

Alay’nya – author of "Unveiling: The Inner Journey"

Very best wishes as you make your dances more dramatic, interesting, and exciting by including a veil!

Yours in dance –

Alay’nya
Author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey
You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. Become the Jewel!

Founder and Artistic Director, The Alay’nya Studio
Bellydance a courtesan would envy!

Check out Alay’nya’s YouTube Channel
Connect with Alay’nya on Facebook
Follow Unveiling: The Inner Journey on Facebook

Nizana el Rassan, reviewing Unveiling: The Inner Journey for iShimmy.com:

“serious and yet fascinating material … a culmination of all disciplines wise and helpful all in one place, with belly dance woven throughout … Unveiling is a fascinating read with so much wisdom and solid advice, and it’s all about improving balance in your life in a well rounded way.” – iShimmy.com.

Esoteric Belly Dance – Pre-Ascension Training

Esoteric Belly Dance (Oriental Dance) Uses Energy Work, Emotional Healing, and Spiritual Disciplines to Support “Pre-Ascension Training”

First question: What is “ascension”?

In brief, it is expanding ourselves vibrationally. It is a culmination of spiritual growth. For a reference, please check out Wanda Lasseter-Lundy’s blog. You can also read some useful material in The Soul and the Ascension by John Van Horne. You can also take a look at A Complete Ascension Manual: How to Achieve Ascension in This Lifetime (Easy-To-Read Encyclopedia of the Spiritual Path) by Joshua David Stone. For each of the books, use Amazon’s “Look Inside” feature; it will give you enough to get started.

Some of this is pretty strange; pretty weird. But definitely points the way to a form of spiritual growth.

Even the most cursory read will probably have you saying, “Really great; really cool – but so far beyond me!”

That’s ok. It’s far beyond me also.

But let’s not over-task ourselves with the whole “ascension” thing just yet. Let’s do baby steps.

In a recent blog, Static on the Brain, I pointed to – essentially – “corrosion of our spiritual/energetic selves” as causing us to function poorly; in dance and in life. I promised some resources.

Here they are. These are the ones that I’ve used to “pull myself together” after my Daddy died late this last autumn. I realized that I needed to do some pretty deep spiritual healing work. These “baby steps” worked for me (and they’re still working, and I’m still working them). They might work for you as well.

Here’s the four-point overview, freely adapted from Joshua David Stone’s book (pages 2-4).

Gratitude: Give regular love and gratitude to all levels of the spiritual realm – and invoke their transforming, ascending light for the earth,
Forgiveness: Clear out our karma, through persistently invoking the Law of Forgiveness, requesting karmic dispensation, ethical living, etc.
Meditation/Contemplation: Meditate on pure awareness or pure adoration of the Divine, and
Integration: Integrate the increasing light of God and the Soul into the body, through practices such as hatha yoga, working with energy centers, and cleansing our diet; work also with our mind through study of spiritual laws, and into our cultural/social institutions through service.

Alice (“Alicja”) Jones, in her forthcoming book, Own Your Power, similarly identifies these points. In her Jan. 12th section on “Forgiving All,” she writes:

Forgiveness is one of the three major reasons for incarnating on this planet. The other two are learning unconditional love, and learning to be of service to others.

In her January 14th section, she devotes attention to the “Law of Attraction” – which really becomes a lesson in responsibility.

So let’s do a wrap-up. And let’s keep in mind that, for each of us, the more important the lesson, the simpler we need to make the content. Let’s treat ourselves as Winnie-the-Pooh did, when he said of himself, “I am a Bear of a Very Little Brain, and long words bother me.”

Thus, here are our lessons. They are a combination of Joshua Stone’s and Alice Jones’ writings, and will undoubtedly resonate with works of every spiritual teacher/path on this planet:

Lesson 1: Forgiveness – We’re just going to have to suck it up and do this. (You know, it’s ok to pray for help if you feel that you get stuck here; I do also, and prayer helps.)
Lesson 2: Gratitude – A really good practice,
Lesson 3: Take Responsibility for Ourselves – This is very close to the “Law of Attraction,” and
Lesson 4: Give love – Practice “giving love” as much as possible; this also includes refraining from judging others.

There are a set of books that are useful for this. Those will be the subject of a near-term posting.

Very best wishes as you use Oriental dance (belly dance) as part of your own personal evolution!

Yours in dance –

Alay’nya
Author of Unveiling: The Inner Journey
You are the Jewel in the Heart of the Lotus. Become the Jewel!

Founder and Artistic Director, The Alay’nya Studio
Bellydance a courtesan would envy!

Check out Alay’nya’s YouTube Channel
Connect with Alay’nya on Facebook
Follow Unveiling: The Inner Journey on Facebook

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