Shiva Nata: the Dance of Shiva
Havi | August 9th, 2009
Dance of Shiva: report from Taos.
So I had the time of my life teaching at Jennifer Louden’s Writer’s Retreat in Taos.
Getting to do Shiva Nata every single morning was the most awesome thing in the entire world.
As was working on the new Shivanaut Manual for the Advanced Kit.
You know what else was incredibly great?
- We worked with words instead of numbers.
- We wrote poetry with our bodies.
- Twenty-seven women spiraling in unison, getting lost in unison, cracking up hysterically when the too-fast became impossible.
- At some point, someone started referring to it as shiva shit – as in, “I love it when you do your shiva shit and weird stuff happens” — which was sticky.
- And somehow, in the wrongest way, this brought the right balance of levity to the chaotic madness that was our practice.
- Epiphanies were had right and left.
- We wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote.
- We asked hard questions.
- We created intentions.
- One woman said that she was able to write poetry again after our Shiva Nata class — for the first time in thirty four years. I know. It was amazing.
- We messed around with each of the first four levels. We did all sorts of ridiculous things with transquarters.
- We danced to music. We danced to the patterns of language. We danced to the stars.
- We combined opening with protection, sensing with giving, accepting with receiving, grounding with growth.
- We opened up to new combinations, new possibilities, new movement, new stillness.
- It was beautiful.
CATEGORIES: workshops |
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I know soooo many writers and other creative types who live solely in their heads. Myself too at times, if I’m not careful. Typically though, I regard it as an either/or thing. EITHER I’m being mentally creative using my mind, OR I’m being athletic and somatically aware. Though I know each affects the other (I’m always more centered/creative after exercise or yoga), it’s never occurred to me to explicitly focus on the point of intersection. That must have been one cool writing retreat.
I can’t even express how excited I am to have found your site(s) yesterday. So many delicious synchronicities. One case in point: a blog post I made last week re breaking habits.
http://www.nomapnoguidenolimits.com/2009/08/03/breaking-habits/
The authors/psychologist I quote seem to “get it” on a meta level, but Shiva Nata apparently goes right to the neural core and rewires things from the outside in … and the inside out … simultaneously! (Interestingly, my closing thoughts imply that I get it more than I think I do.)
Many years ago a friend trained in Laban/Bartenieff Movement Analysis showed me the benefits of cross-crawling. After an hour of crawling around on the floor, I experienced random flashes of memories from early childhood for a week. It was as if I had somatically released them from the depths of my mind. A very strange and compelling feeling. I’m guessing that Shiva Nata is like this, but even better.
Now, my explorations continue. I’ll order the Starter Kit … and get started!
“# We worked with words instead of numbers.
# We wrote poetry with our bodies.”
That is beautiful and genius.
Holy crap. Gotta try that.
We sure did!
I loved loved loved using words and will continue to in regular practice. What I loved even more was practicing / l earning with you live. So much better than a DVD!
As a newbie Shivanaut, I fell in love in Taos with this Dance. It’s truly magical! And the words with the motion create such a stirring inside…it’s like an invitation or something.
Last fall, I created a sand tray by pulling figures and things that attracted me and placing them in the sand. The intention was to invite my intuition and unconcious mind to talk to me. At the end of what appeared to be a journey in the sand I had placed a Shiva statue. I had no idea of what it meant besides leading me to peace and joy.
The next thing I know, I’m signed up for a retreat and here comes the Dance of Shiva!
Thank you for bringing the dance to us on retreat and for sharing yourself with us–what a gift!
Here’s a poem I wrote during the retreat (it’s a double dactyl, which is an eight-line poem with a specific syllabic stress pattern that makes it perfect for wacky observations — also the stress pattern helps me remember the correct way to pronounce “shavasana”):
Higgledy-piggledy,
Holy shavasana!
Dancing with Shiva is
breaking my brain.
Molecules, neurons and
thoughts reassembling
into a radical
new kind of sane.
I feel obligated to explain that there’s an implied “Batman” after the “Holy shavasana!” line. Because I always hear it in an excited cartoony voice in my head.
Time to submit this comment before I chicken out…
Twitter: williehewes
“A new kind of sane.” I like that.
Sorry to be off topic, but did someone mention a twitter tag/group of shivanauts? I’m just getting started, and could really do with someone to kvetch at. (SRSLY, will the verticals EVER make sense? ;__; )
Twitter: havi
@Mike – Whoooooo! AWESOME. I like you.
@Wendy – ohmygod, you are so much fun. Extra love for the “implied Batman”. Really, there are so many things that should have an implied batman.
Holy shavasana, Batman!
@Willie – yes, tag stuff “shivanauts” and kvetch away. I *astonished* to learn (the hard way, of course) that just about half my students find the verticals easier and the other half find the horizontals easier. :)
I’m really new… but I find the horizontals easier. :) But I think I have a reason for that: as a bellydancer, I’ve been doing them for years with the name: wait for it…
Hands of Kali… Hmmm. have we got a destruction/creation archetype going on here? LOL
I love synchronicity and the whole IDEA of synchronicity. (and the song by the Police, but that’s a whole ‘nother topic…)
Looking forward to dancing it up with everyone.
Twitter: kimianak
It was indeed beautiful!
Now, I must admit to feeling a bit frustrated at hearing about the epiphanies that were had left and right, and not having anything hot and buttered myself despite doing my best to mess up as much as I can… And yet, I’m happy. It was fabulous to do Dance of Shiva every morning with you. You also told me important things that will no doubt help me a lot in my practice, and I’m really thankful for that. I sincerely appreciate that you took the time to meet me where I was… and that you sealed it with a heartfelt hug.
(Gosh, I’m crying again!)
Thank you, Havi.
@Wendy: I totally can see and hear you saying “Holy shavasana, Batman!” – this thing is so, so you! And this little glimpse of you totally makes my day! :)