Kierra Foster-Ba
United States
5Rhythms Teacher since 2007
Tribe Member since 1997
Laughing while crying; standing while falling; opening while closing… I have long been attracted to paradox and the intersection of polar opposites. This serious yet playful bent to my personality is what first attracted me to the 5Rhythms®, the work of Gabrielle Roth. This body of work is at once simple yet complex; personal yet global; and new and innovative yet ancient and ordinary.
At first, I literally thought of 5Rhythms classes as a chance to play! My inner 5 year old was super delighted. In Flowing I got to explore all the ways I am like a circle and can use my body to create circles. In Staccato I could be angler and definite. In Chaos, I got to make like a washing machine and explode. In Lyrical, I got to float like a fairy princess and in Stillness, I got to be in contact with my own timelessness.
Then, one day the shapes I was making in Chaos took me to a very dark place. I did not have a clear memory of why (even while it was happening), but my movements, my dance triggered something in my body that was ready to be released. Terror and rage in equal parts erupted out of me. My teacher, Jane Selzer, encouraged me to keep moving, which I did. My Chaos dance literally cracked me open and in Lyrical I was significantly lighter in ways that felt measurable. After that I was hooked. I knew that my own healing and transformation were rooted in my body not in my mind.
When I got to hear Gabrielle Roth talk in my first class with her, I was fascinated. “Put the body in motion and the psyche will heal itself,” she said. She was teaching a class in the village, subbing for a teacher named Marianne. In that 90 minute class a whole new world opened up to me. She asked us to go across the floor in Tribal taking on the shapes of sorrow from (at the time) war torn Bosnia. In that embodiment we gave expression both to what was happening in the world and our own individual pain. Gabrielle gave us a visceral experience of one of the tenets of this wonderful philosophy: we are all connected or as Gabrielle would say, “There is only one of us here.”
In my upcoming workshop we will explore the paradox of Light and Shadow and the ways in which we are held and supported by both.
Light & Shadow
with Kierra Foster-Ba
05 November 2016 - 05 November 2016
Martha Graham Studio, New York
REGISTER HERE!
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In Memory of Visudha de los Santos
United States
5Rhythms Teacher since 2007
Tribe Member since 1995
"Into the light, into the dark, it is all the same"
Gabrielle gave us many maps within the cosmology of the 5Rhythms. One that has been particularly fascinating to me right now is the Light and Shadow map. The body, your body, holds all of the energy that you've drawn into it. Yes, your thoughts, beliefs, and actions have swirled, jumped, crawled and weaseled their way into your body. Some of this energy is heavy and forms as density and tightness. Discomfort and pain. Other energy may be lighter and expresses as openness and lightness.
This line from my song Into The Light is a reflection of what this map offers. Have you ever felt duality within your own physical being - where your body is simultaneously heavy and light? Contracted and expanded? Have you desired a different form and energy? Have you ever had or desired the experience of tight spots dissolving? Of a heavy energy lifted? Have you had a cathartic release from moving and peering into your own dark and scary parts?
I have. That's why I do this work. I discovered that some energy in me was captivated for a long time. I found awareness to my body helped me to transmute and release my pain, discomfort, dis-ease into lightness. Some of my work was released in this layers, and other times I've been completely torn apart. No matter. It is all the same. Healing. Transformation. A better human being. I've found power in the shamanic aspects of this work as I've been worked and dismembered, dying into liberation.
That's what I want for you the profound experience of true liberation, and that's what I believe Gabrielle wanted for all of us. Please join me in this exploration of Light and Shadow in Mallorca, Spain. Follow your instinct. Come along. Discover yourself.
“The Wound Is The Place The Light Enters” Rumi
Light & Shadow
with In Memory of Visudha de los Santos
25 November 2016 - 27 November 2016
Ling Tai, Palma
REGISTER HERE!
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