Just got a question from a reader named Claudia …

And I haven’t the foggiest notion of how to answer this.

Other than renting the film in question …

So I’m putting this out to you guys. Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?*

*See? I have seen movies. On occasion. Okay, fine. I am completely culturally inept. But curious.

Havi,
Just watched Jim Jarmusch’s “Limits of Control”.

Question: Is this, what the artist-killer is practicing a form of Shiva Nata??? It would explain the magic he’s able to do…

Okay, so my initial guess is … hmmm, probably not. Just because that would surprise me to no end.

But? I honestly don’t know.

Who wants to help us out here?

Now, with extra science!

Okay, now I’m just being silly.

I’ll stop talking now and let her do her thing!
– Havi

What’s the brain got to do with it?

Shiva Nata has changed my life immeasurably, delivering mind-boggling emotional and work-related breakthroughs. And yet my stubbornly ungrateful intellectual-side can’t help thinking but WHYYYYYYYYYY?

“Pattern-shifting. Epiphanies. That sounds just lovely”, says my airy-fairy side.

“But what the f—- does that meeeeeeannnn?” demands the eye-rolling, intellectual-side.

Enter neuroplasticity.

Oooh, yes! [vigorous head-nodding] We both like that word. Nice and science-y, yet somewhat mysterious at the same time.

The accepted doctrine in medical and scientific circles for most of the 20th century was that the human brain was like a machine. That it had certain locations which corresponded to specific functions, and these were fixed in place after the critical period of brain-development in childhood.

So, for example, if a stroke victim had damage to the physical part of the brain that was “mapped” to move their right leg, then there was no hope of ever recovering that ability, because that part of the brain-machine was simply broken.

Neuroplasticity is the idea that the brain is more like a fluid organism than a fixed machine.

As recently as the 1970s rogue scientists would be laughed out of their labs for suggesting such heresy, but today it is pretty well-accepted that the adult human brain is capable of re-mapping its pathways.*

This concept of the changeable adult brain has far-reaching effects. It is what stands behind the most promising treatments for stokes, autistism, blindness, deafness (the cochlear implant works because of neuroplasticity), and depression.

The rest of us get to experience this concept on a slightly less dramatic scale.

If the pathways that neurons travel in our brains are plastic, that means that we can change them. We can physically create connections where there were none before.

Which means we can shift entrenched habits and old patterns of thought, while allowing a bigger capacity for un-learning and re-learning.

This knowledge brings all sides of me into harmonious alignment.

Now during Shiva Nata when my leg spazzes forward when I meant for it to go back, and I experience that delicious brain-scramble feeling, my internal dialogue goes something like this:

Airy-fairy-side: Ooh fun!

Intellectual-side: Aha yes, neuroplasticity at work.

*A great book on this topic is The Brain That Changes Itself by Norman Doidge, MD.

(And another useful resource for learning more about this subject is Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain by Sharon Begley. — Ed.)

ANNOUNCEMENT!

Selma and I will teaching a three hour workshop in San Francisco.

Three hours of “work through your stucknesses with Dance of Shiva and Havi-inspired wackiness” magic. And epiphanies. Bring it.

It’s really, really, really soon. Like, practically now.

Sunday, July 12 from 2:30 - 5:30 p.m.

What you need to know:

• There is only room for ten people. We might even have to close it at eight.
• My workshops sell out very quickly.
• It’s in the Castro. Details, directions and possible ride-share info when you sign up.
• It’s going to be outrageously great. Admittedly, it’s not an entire weekend in North Carolina, but still, we can do a hell of a lot of destuckifying in three hours.

What you need to bring:

• A stuckified pattern that you want some insights/shifting with (you won’t need to tell anyone what it is so no worries there).
• Something comfortable to wear (we’ll be Shiva-ing it up).
• Pen and paper.
• Bottle of water.

That’s it.

Details and sign-up stuff. And the SECRET CODE.

My assistant made a lovely page.

It’s on my other website.

–> This is the link!

Take a look because it would be so completely amazing to hang out with you in person and be wacky together and have breakthroughs.

Also I set up a coupon for my readers and students. So if you use it (please use it!) you save $25. The coupon code is SECRET (see, it’s a secret) and you have to press the button that says “Apply” or it won’t work.

That’s it.

Other than that, general rejoicing. Rejoicing!

EDIT: ALREADY SOLD OUT. Sorry sorry sorry. That was just under 30 hours, so yeah, pretty quick. Sorry about that — we’ll set up some more events soon …

And a question …

For those of you who can’t make it to the San Francisco workshop, do you want to be updated when stuff gets added to my schedule?

Should we start a very specific mailing list thingy that’s just for events? I can’t imagine I’ll update it more than a few times a year, but would that be something that interests you? Let me know in the comments and I can set something up.

It’s about that time again.

Because twice a year I teach a class (by phone) where I answer everyone’s Dance of Shiva questions.

This class is free to everyone who owns the Starter Kit and you can totally take it as many times as you like.

What kinds of questions?

Oh, let’s see. Theory, practice, random stuff you wonder about. It’s all good.

Surprise me. :)

Boring questions are welcome. Wacky and bizarre questions are welcome. It really doesn’t matter. My duck and I will do our best to help you out.

Details?

Here they are.

TUESDAY JUNE 30, 2009 at 12:00 PM Pacific

You can use the time zone converter to figure out what time that is for you.

And in case you have questions now …

So yeah, you’ll probably want paper and something to write with.

You don’t have to participate if you don’t want to. If you’re more comfortable listening in than talking, that’s fine.

If you aren’t already signed up, you can sign up here.

And maybe I’ll get to talk to you next Tuesday!

xo
Havi & Selma

Okay. This is a letter that I’m reprinting (with permission, of course) from Frank Mitchell, a new-ish Shivanaut who wrote to us with the most beautiful story.

Man, you just have to read this.
– Havi

Transformation, skeletons and the most beautiful story.

Dear Havi (and Selma),

Thank you, thank you, thank you, for creating the Dance of Shiva Starter Kit. I bought the kit last Saturday without really knowing what I was doing or why.

But I loved that it was endorsed by a duck, and I had a feeling inside me that said, “You need to own this.”

So I read the worksheets, puzzled my way through the arm movements, and started keeping a daily journal. I got confused, felt lost, and loved the warm fuzzy brain feeling that came afterwards. Six days later, I had the most amazing experience.

For the first time in twenty six years, I can stand on my own two feet, and it doesn’t feel wrong.

I have always hunched. It’s a caved chest gangly neck look my mother, grandfather, and cousins share. I never thought much of it. It was simply the way I stood, and I didn’t know how to stand any differently.

Last Thursday I did my morning Dance of Shiva. During shavasana, I saw this image of a skeleton cringing as if from a blow.

It was the pattern of that familial hunch, and I knew I didn’t have to do it any more.

I stood up.

I didn’t hunch.

My head balanced on my spine. My spine balanced on my hips. My hips balanced on my legs. My legs balanced on my feet. It was the first time in my life I’ve been able to stand without it feeling wrong, or awkward, or graceless.

I can look people in the eye, because my gaze no longer follows a hunched spine to their feet. It’s one of the most profound experiences I have ever had.

So thank you for bring Dance of Shiva to me. It’s an amazing, crazy, scary, awesome treasure, and I’m loving every minute of it.

Namaste,
Frank Mitchell

Am I right or am I right?

Beautiful.

And then make it harder.

The other day I overheard (well, it was on Twitter, so I saw rather than heard) someone say that Level 2 Dance of Shiva wasn’t as hard as he thought it would be.

Yeah?

Good. Then make it hard.

Do it with your eyes closed.

• With squares.
• With colors instead of numbers.
• With different numbers (try 5-8 instead of 1-4).
• With legs super high.
• With transquarters.
• With music.
• With serious speed.
• With complex breathing patterns.

It’s your job to find the challenge.

Unfortunately, it’s not the job of the dance to make you work at it. That’s your job.

It’s only the job of the dance to transform your brain. And it will. Like crazy.

The second something is easy for you, it’s your responsibility to move to the next level. Or to shake up the level you’re currently working on.

Or you can always come to the weekend epiphanies workshop in North Carolina (three spots left, by the way) and get the mind-expanding experience of a lifetime.

You’ll hate it.

This workshop won’t be fun. But you definitely won’t think that it’s easy anymore.

And you’ll learn lots of ways to find the challenge and make it work for you.

There is no learning without challenge.

This is one of the reasons why Dance of Shiva transforms perfectionism.

Perfectionism isn’t possible in a practice where the goal is to do it badly.

Because you’re constantly trying to do it wrong.

There is no glory in getting it right. It’s all about taking on the challenge and stepping up to the yeah, I’m ready to shift stuff and it’s kind of going to suck for a while point.

Not that you can’t rest into the dance sometimes. Because you can.

Because the practice will carry you. It’s strong enough to hold you in complete safety while you do this wacky, hard, frustrating transformational work.

But ultimately you’re going to have to invite yourself to find the next challenge.

And I’ll be there to help you.

Someone recently asked the question I always forget to answer. It’s the one thing that just about everyone wants to know… and still, I forget about it.

The reason I forget about it is actually almost part of the answer, but now I’m getting ahead of myself.

So here it is:

Is “coordination” a pre-req for Shiva Nata?

The short answer is: “Oh dear God, no!”

But it’s the longer answer that’s more interesting.

Actually, the less coordinated you are the better.

Here’s the thing you have to understand about Shiva Nata.

We’re training your brain to be faster, better and more powerful. More capable of quickly making and accessing new neural connections.

But we’re doing that by intentionally practicing the parts that are too hard for us. We’re challenging our coordination, not using it.

More than that, though …

We’re trying to mess it up. We’re trying to get it wrong. No, more wrong!

You’re only doing it right when you’re doing it wrong.

So if you’re really coordinated? It’s going to be more work for you to make sure you’re getting challenged. It will still kick your ass, don’t get me wrong. You’ll just have to work a little harder.

And if you’re not so coordinated — or not at all — that’s good news.

Because you won’t have to work as hard. You’ll already be lost from the get-go, which is what you want. I mean, that’s the whole point.

So yes. Lack of coordination is a huge advantage in Dance of Shiva.

Now here’s the irony.

Unfortunately for you (hahahahaha), the more you do Dance of Shiva, the more coordinated you will become. Which means you’ll have to work harder.

It may, in fact, turn you into a ninja. Or something. For example, my teacher. I have never, ever seen him drop anything. If something falls he catches it. He’s just that fast.

So your days of being completely uncoordinated are sadly numbered.

On the other hand, Shiva Nata only gets harder and harder. And each new level is crazier and crazier. So as your brain evolves and your body catches up, there’s still work to do.

You’re still going to be bad at it. And feel completely uncoordinated, incompetent and generally befuddled. Which is a good thing! Confused yet?

The reason I always forget about this question.

I guess I’ve just been doing this for too long.

The idea — however revolutionary it may be — that I’m trying to do everything wrong in this practice, that I’m trying to be bad at it… it’s already ingrained in my system.

It’s a part of me.

It’s just so obvious to me (from years of practice) that of course you actually want to be uncoordinated. And on the other hand, that you will constantly be getting more coordinated…

Oh the paradox. Oh the conundrum. Oh the frustration, madness and joy that is the Dance of Shiva.

So I forget to reassure people. Let me reassure you now.

If you are hopelessly uncoordinated, revel in it! Because you’re going to be getting your hot buttered epiphanies faster and with less effort.

Though yeah, if you keep at it, it won’t be long until you won’t get to call yourself “uncoordinated” any more.

And if you’re a dancer or a choreographer or have done a ton of martial arts, come to one of my workshops or use the DVD in the Starter Kit. And you’ll also get to feel like an uncoordinated, flailing mess like the rest of us. :)

We’ll just have to work a little harder.

The hardest class I ever taught was a group of professional dancers and choreographers in Berlin. They were all from Argentina and Spain. I taught in a mixture of English and German… and they could do pretty much anything I threw at them.

Yeah, I got them — finally — to the point where they were utterly and completely lost confused and overwhelmed (which is, after all, the goal).

But man, it was so so so hard. And I was sore for a week afterwards!

Moral of the story?

You don’t need to be coordinated.

You don’t need to be graceful.

You don’t need any experience with dance or movement. Because all these things that seem and feel to you right now like a lack or a hindrance are actually going to be the key to your success.

The oven door, if you will, to those hot buttered epiphanies.

Where you are right now — wherever that is — is a good thing. I promise.

Conflicted heart? Meet the symbolic power of taking stuff apart.

If only it were that easy.

No kidding. I’d be making introductions all day.

Anyway.

One of the most common things that people tell me (or write to me about) is how conflicted they feel when they think about getting ready to maybe eventually get around to committing to the general idea of possibly eventually starting a Dance of Shiva practice. Whew.

Complicated, no? And also totally understandable.

I hear stuff like …

I’m so attracted to the idea of doing it, and so completely nervous about it at the same time.

Or

My heart wants to do this but my head is kind of freaking out.

Or

I’ve never been so excited and so terrified. Mostly terrified. But I can feel that this is going to help me.

Actually, the absolute best summing-up of this kind of yes-I-want-it-no-I-don’t emotional roller coaster is this sweet, insightful bit right here:

I’m pretty chicken shit of change sometimes. And transformation and things that are going to make me “not me” in terms of my usual identity stories.

And yet at the same time, I want that kind of change because being me in the way I am is pretty painful sometimes. Know what I mean?

Wow. Right?

What a beautiful and hard thing to realize.

If you’re starting (or about to start) a Dance of Shiva practice, nervous is par for the course.

Of course you’re nervous. You SHOULD be. This is some crazy life-changing stuff.

If you’re drawn to it, yeah that’s probably a sign that it’s something you need.

But scared? Absolutely.

Feeling “chicken shit about change”? Oh yeah, me too. There’s nothing scarier.

And there’s also always a lot of heavy symbolic weight and identity stuff in there too.

I don’t want to lie to you - this stuff will mess with some of those perceptions of who you are.

It will make painfully clear some things about your patterns and habits that you really probably didn’t want to know.

You will learn some things you don’t like.

But ideally your Shiva Nata practice will bring you closer to who you are in your heart, you know?

It’s about taking things apart, but it’s also about connection.

So …. whenever you’re ready to start, my duck and I are wishing you lots of support and strength and kindness.

We know you’ll go at your own pace and give yourself love with it because yeah, it’s totally scary.

You’re allowed to be scared. You’re allowed to take your time. And you’re allowed to start. Five minutes a day. Or even five minutes a week.

It can only help.

This very useful question comes (with permission, of course) from Lynn Jacobs in California.

Hello Havi,
I’ve been reading your Fluent Self blog lately and really enjoy it.  

I’m considering ordering the Shiva Nata materials, but am not sure if I should do so.  I have only a little bit of experience with yoga, and wonder if I should already be good at that before I try Shiva Nata.  

Should I begin a yoga practice and then try Shiva Nata?  Or just go for it?
Thanks and Happy New Year to you!
Lynn

Good question. And one I always forget to make explicitly clear. Because, of course, I suffer from the classic problem of Knowing Too Much.

You absolutely don’t need any yoga experience for Shiva Nata.

Traditional yoga won’t make you better at Shiva Nata, though actually Shiva Nata will definitely make it easier and more fun for you to do traditional yoga, if that’s something you’d like. 

It’s for the brain much more than it is for the body (though yes, it does give you a nice work out too). 

Also, keep in mind that starting a physical yoga practice is all about getting into the habit of it, and Shiva Nata is very useful for building and creating new habits that support you, because it teaches you so much about your patterns and how they work. 

So yeah, I’d say just go for it. 

And anyway, if you wait until you’re “good at yoga” you’ll be waiting a long time …

The truth is, there’s kind of no such thing as being good at yoga.

Admittedly, this is more of a philosophical point, but still.

The more yoga you do, the stronger and more flexible you’ll get, absolutely.

Certain poses will get slightly easier, other poses will get a lot easier, and some you may never be able to do because of how your bones fit together or a thousand other things.

It will get easier to focus, easier to be kind to yourself, easier to breathe.

But good at it? Mmm. Probably not. Because yoga is one of those unending life-process-ey things.

It is — as I say at least six times a day — the science of learning how you work and then liking yourself anyway.

So can you get good at that? Better at it, sure. It becomes easier for you to be in this process. Or it comes to you more naturally.

To be truly good at it, though … I tend to think that’s not really possible.

And there’s definitely no such thing as being good at Shiva Nata.

Okay, so whether or not you can be good at yoga is a philosophical debate. Agree with me or disagree with me, either way.

But Shiva Nata? Hahahahaha, no. You won’t be good at it, and moreover, you can’t be good at it because it’s all about making sure that you’re always doing it wrong.

In other words, the only way you can be good at it … is by being bad at it.

Which kind of ruins the whole “good at it” part.

Since the goal is always to be doing it wrong, you’re constantly looking for and choosing to be in a state of challenge, chaos and confusion.

Because once you start “doing it right”, you stop getting the cool effects.

Oh, the paradox. Oh, the pain-in-the-ass-ness of it all.

I know. I’m sorry. Honest I am.

But hey, totally worth it.

Seriously, the epiphanies rock. The wonderful-ideas-coming-to-you-regularly is really great.

And you learn so many fascinating things about yourself.

So yeah, my advice would be to jump right in and start playing with it. See what happens. Some wild and crazy stuff, for sure.

Take care, Lynn! I can’t wait to hear how you like it. It will be fun to have another Shivanaut on board.

And warm wishes for a wonderful, happy, healthy year to you too,
Havi (and Selma the duck)

Selma the duck could not happier …

… about having her picture in the front page of the Thursday Style section of the New York Times today.*

*I think they make you sign in to read it (sorry). And in the online version, it’s the second page, yes.

I think you’ll all join me in saying: !!!!

And the Shiva Nata connection …?

Well, the picture was taken at a Shiva Nata yoga class here in Portland.

Actually I was hoping that fellow Shivanauts Shannon and Carolyn would be in the picture too but you know, Selma kind of took over.

Because she’s a superstar and has been on German television and everything …

God, that duck is such a diva. It’s out of control.

And one more Shiva Nata connection …

This is very exciting, yes.

And here’s the interesting part.

Dance of Shiva is, like all forms of yoga, about the ongoing practice of learning how you work and then loving yourself anyway.

And — more specifically — it’s about using your brain to deconstruct your patterns so you can build better ones, right? And the big pattern I’ve been working on all year is getting more comfortable with being seen and acknowledged.

So big huge thanks to whatever universal forces are at work there. Thanks, wacky and wonderful Shiva Nata. And thanks to Abby Ellin who wrote the lovely piece in the Times.

And thanks, sweet Selma. I couldn’t do this without you.

p.s. All Selma references and goofiness aside, it’s a terrifically thoughtful and well-written article about what it means to bring more levity, light-heartedness and love into yoga, while respecting tradition and the spirit of the self-work process.