I’m going to miss my connection to Switzerland but I dare say, there’ll be another. As I
ran into the bar, my friend pointed at his watch and laughed. ‘Slaves to time,’
he said. I slumped down in my chair and felt the tension I’d allowed to stiffen
my muscles through the story I was telling about how awful it was to be 10
minutes late drain from me. I stopped, took a breath and had to laugh. ‘Yep,
slaves to time,’ I replied. Friendships that last are places where the watch dissolves,
the shackles fall away and the timeless nature of reality opens like a door
into eternity; and all over a cup of tea. This time thing is why I’m always
asking you to take your watches off when you’re dancing with us! A little
organic ‘no time’ thrown into the mix of 21st century rush is good medicine!
How my life has
changed since we began working with Movement Medicine in January 2007. The
sense of contentment and the feeling of rightness have quite simply opened me
up to a much richer source of energy and creativity than I ever had before. And
this past year, as the fruits of our first apprenticeship journey started to
ripen before our eyes and our first Teacher Training has started to take shape,
has seen a deepening of my understanding of the principles and practices that
make up Movement Medicine.
For many years,
we have travelled to find our teachings and the places where we can do our own
work. The journey has taken me to Peru and the Amazon Rainforest, to Colombia, and many times to the Arctic Circle. In 2010, I found myself in a beautiful
ritual in South Africa, led by new Sangoma friends, welcoming me
back to the original land, the mother land that is Africa. I wept tears of relief and happiness.
Isn’t it funny how when something is given that we didn’t even know we needed,
the heart just seems to grow. For me, when this happens, and in 2010 it has
happened a lot, I discover that what I thought was love, was only the gateway
to something I hadn’t yet imagined. The heart seems to be made of some kind of
super stretchy fabric! I was also initiated into a relationship with my new
drum, made by my old friend Bikko Matthe up in the far north of the Arctic Circle. As we drummed together, he spoke of
Polar angels and shamans in North and South America who were with us in our ceremony. Again, the sense
of not working alone, of being connected to so many others working in similar
ways, blew my little heart through into another super-stretchy dimension. The
deer that I hunted as a result of that initiation has been my greatest teacher
this year and very recently, I have been give the drum made from his skin. To
play that drum is something that is hard to find words for – it’s pure heart.
On that note, a big thank you to Dorrie
Joy who is the amazing artist who makes and looks after our medicine items.
Each of the
journeys to other traditions and teachings that I’ve taken has revealed a new
facet of understanding about who I am and my place in the circle of life. Each
has strengthened my resolve to travel further and deeper into the mysteries and
to give everything I can back to this life in gratitude for the beautifully
blessed existence I have. This summer, during the long weeks spent at home, the
work happened in our living room. I danced regularly to Susannah’s new Elemental
journey. I loved it. The simplicity of being guided by Susannah’s voice and
music into the dance of the four elements was so rich, varied and awakening. As
well as being visited by a beautiful Wirarika shaman called Don Tono with whom
we did some beautiful work, we danced. We danced with the doors open and the
sweet Devon air filling our lungs. I danced deeper
than I had ever danced before. All that we had studied in our travels was here,
right here, in the centre of our own circle, in the ritual space, the mesa that
sustains, guides and keeps us on the road. Home it seems is a feeling as much
as it is a place. And home is most definitely where the heart is. What a
delight to rediscover that our very own practice is the place where we are
perfectly held as we are and encouraged to keep on evolving and becoming
everything we can become. Knowing this, behind my mind, beyond poetry and way
beyond imagination, I knew that I had to go and do a Movement Medicine workshop
with Susannah.
We’ve been
together for more than 23 years and we both felt our relationship could not
only hold me becoming Susannah’s student for a weekend, but that most likely,
it would bring more harvest in from the fields. I looked for a free weekend
when Susannah was teaching and lo and behold, there it was, the perfect
workshop: The Way of the Dancing Warrior in London. I signed up.
It’s been more
than 10 years since I first dreamt The Way of the Dancing Warrior and a journey
to go with it. But we hadn’t yet taught it in its Movement Medicine format. As
chance had it, I was due to teach the very same workshop in Padova just two
weeks before Susannah’s in London. I was very curious how the mandala that
we work with now would hold the teachings of the Dancing Warrior and I wasn’t
to be disappointed. Whilst teaching in Padova, I had two deep nights dreaming.
For me, the Way of
the Dancing Warrior is right at the very heart of what Movement Medicine is
about. It takes the dancer on a very deep journey from unconsciousness (or
unexplored potential) to the super-conscious archetype of the Dancing Warrior.
To clarify, by warrior, we don’t mean someone who is fighting all the time. To
fight against means to give energy to. Check out this great little You Tube video to get the
picture! We mean a human being who has, through dedication, discipline and
without doubt, a good sense of humour, released themselves entirely from the
story that they are a victim of life’s comings and goings. The Dancing Warrior
has done their work and continues to do so, with a great deal of gratitude for
what already is, and the delicate balance of confidence and humility to dance
with whatever the Great Choreographer brings along. Along the road, they will
have discovered the source of untapped life force that is hidden in their
roots. Just as the Tree of Life looks like it is sleeping throughout the winter
and yet all that it will become in the spring is being dreamed in the beautiful
velvet embrace of the dark winter earth, so for us humans, what is unconscious
for us is a storehouse of potential. The Dancing Warrior will have explored
some of the stories of the victim and persecutor that make up such a large part
of our collective human stories. They will have seen this dance in relationship
to their own personal story and to the stories we play out between nations/cultures
and different belief systems and they will have danced themselves free from the
belief that this story is the only possible story a human being can tell. They
will have arrived with both feet on the ground, connected to the great mother
beneath them and the great papa above, here and now, at the centre of their own
circle, a survivor of all that has been. They will have opened their eyes and
begun to sing the gratitude song that wraps itself to strongly around the roots
of our freedom, nourishing and encouraging us to wake up and see the truth of
who, what and where we are. And they will have taken that cosmic leap into
recognising themselves as the artist of their own perception, and therefore
their own experience of reality. From there, it’s only a short hop into
embodying the everyday reality and ultimate paradox of a dancer who is, on the
one hand surrendered to the great river of life, and on the other, not separate
from it. The creator and the created dancing in harmony, yin and yang, form and
formlessness spiralling around each other in the greatest dance of them all,
the great mystery.
Mmm, I seem to be
quite passionate about this journey. No surprise then that I have given my life
over to it. And then, yumminess of yumminesses, I had the chance to go and be a
student and in the company of a whole gang of dancing lunatics, disappear in
the dance. What a joy that was! I loved every single moment of the workshop and
I exaggerate not at all. And all the dancers who were there were so very kind with
me and just let me get on with my own dance and follow the unfolding journey. I
love Movement Medicine. And ain’t that a good job! And, oh yes, I loved the
teacher too. And the music, and no-one telling me how to move my body but
simply providing a super strong container and some powerful tools for me to let
go, connect, disappear and re-appear in the ten thousand forms. And, I had the
nerve to ask the teacher out to dinner, not that I’m recommending that as a
course of action in general you understand! The workshop (and the dinner) was
the icing on the cake of my year and it certainly won’t be the last time I show
up as a student of Movement Medicine. And with our pathfinders, Caroline Carey,
Christian de Sousa and Mark Boylan already out there teaching and a whole lot
more Movement Medicine teachers to be birthed into the world in 2011 and
beyond, I and you won’t be short on opportunities!
By the way, though
there was a fine cohort of men dancing at the workshop, as usual, we were
somewhat outnumbered by the women. So here’s a little aside to the men out
there who’ve yet to discover the Dancing Warrior. WHERE ARE YOU? Dancing all
day, great music, gorgeous beings in all directions and the dynamic learning
ground that is the dance….Maybe it’s because you don’t yet know what you’re
missing? I wonder? Answers by e-mail please. Maybe we’ll give a free workshop
to the best answer to the question: ‘What’s stopping you?’
Finally, this
past week in Israel and Palestine, I had the opportunity to move a step closer
to the Phoenix Festival that it is my ultimate dream to bring into being. The
festival will happen at places in the world where there has been great
suffering and will take the form of a week of healing and creativity followed
by a performance party and ritual for peace. It’s a celebration of any and
every human being’s ability to rise from the ashes of suffering and create
transformation, deeper understanding and peace. Ben Yaeger, an apprentice and
an active member of Combatants for Peace, set
up an evening in Shuffra for us to work with a group of Palestinian and Israeli
ex-combatants who have all with great courage, chosen to give up violence; Dancing
Warriors, one and all! Accompanied by Ben, Sabine and Silvana, we danced for
just an hour, in an old castle on a hard floor with no sound system. In one
hour, we went very deep and for me, it was one of the most moving experiences
of 2010. Check out this little video and let me know if
you agree.
All that remains
is for me to say to you dear dancing friend, is that I am praying my little
socks off for peace and the evolution of many thousands of dancing warriors in
the year to come. May 2011 bring you contentment in who you are, free entrance
to the imaginative paradise of your own heart, and the blessing of good health,
harmony and L.O.V.E. in all areas of your life. Thank you for all the dances of
2010. Here’s to an indeterminate amount more in the New Year.
Until we meet
again, I bow to the freedom within you.
Ya’Acov Darling
Khan
December 2011
p.s. School of Movement Medicine’s 4th birthday
If you would like
to join us in our prayer ceremony to celebrate the fourth birthday of the School of Movement Medicine, we’ll be out there at 5.26 in the
morning UK time on the 10th January, sending out
prayers in all directions. Feel free to join us.
Both Ya’Acov and
Susannah will be teaching Way of
the Dancing Warrior
intensives and weekend workshops in 2011.
Susannah’s
intensive will happen in the beautiful Orval in Belgium March 30th to April 3rd.
Ya’Acov is bringing
the workshop to Norway May 4th to 8th.
Please check our
website for full details.