Announcing: Conversational Belly Dance!

Conversational Belly Dance Illustration

Greetings!

A cultural dance can be seen as a language, including a new vocabulary, with its own inflections and conventions. In our last FUN Class session, we looked at dance moves as letters in an alphabet, writing in cursive script as opposed to printing in block letters. This time we look at individual moves as words in sentences.  

For many of us, our ability to improvise (to have off-the-cuff conversations with the music), is hampered when we can’t remember our dance vocabulary, and our minds are yelling at us the whole time as our palms get sweaty and we wish the ground would just open up and swallow us. Simply drilling words in rote sentences is not the answer—ou est la plume de ma tante, anyone? 

To really speak a language, we must engage in conversation! So this improvisational ease is our focus in…

Conversational Belly Dance
Engaging the music with comfort and confidence!

What we’ll do each week

1. Introduce one or two classic moves (aka words). Combine and recombine them them with other basic moves into small combinations (aka sentences ; ). 

These combinations and moves will change every week—however, we will add our previous moves into our rotation, so we will become comfortable with them in many different combinations. In learning science, this is known as creating a constellation—we add new stars every week and mix them around in the context of actual dancing to varied actual music. 

2. Facilitate daily practice using TinyHabits.com models. Since conversational language gets better with practice, we will to find time each day to at least listen to music from provided playlists, and at best dance from just one song to to up to 20 minutes a day, incorporating our words of the week into our existing vocabulary however many days a week we choose. We will also help you troubleshoot your workflow to make the act of opening the practice session as simple and seamless as possible. 

3. Offer accountability for this practice. We’ll provide daily check-ins via app or text. Let us know you’ve practiced, and we’ll respond! Participants are free to choose accountability buddies from Alia, the class, or outside of it. 

4. Provide playlists of suitable practice music. We’ll include a fallback song or two—something you can have ready on your phone to turn on at a moment’s notice to get your daily practice happening. 

Conversational Belly dance promises to be a fun way to gain confidence in your ability to dance without having to think of moves, even as you increase your vocabulary and and your ease in connecting words into sentences on the fly. 

Conversational Belly Dance runs Tuesdays at 4pm EST for five weeks, from April 25 to May 23, 2023. See this in your time zone. Each class is recorded (instructor view only). Each recording is available during the run of the class.

I hope to see you there!
With all my love,
Alia

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PS Speaking of accountability!

Watch out for our NEW ACE Mastermind series! Our kickoff event is a FREE group Target Practice, as we set our sights on getting some things done and HOW we’re going to do them.


AND! Upcoming Local VT/NH Events

In other news, things are opening up and folks are doing things in person again–including me 0.o. For example,

I have an office!

It’s in St. Johnsbury, VT for in-person SE sessions (yes, I even have an air purifier!). I’ll be talking more about the benefits of SE for artists and dancers in the coming weeks.


I’m teaching a live class!

It’s suitable for all levels, a fun social class for relaxation and enlivening! The class is Thursdays from 6-7pm in St. Johnsbury, VT. We’ll do a a free sample class on April 20th, and start a 6-week session on April 27. More information is here. Please do share the page with anyone you think might be interested.


Coming soon: Live Tuning In sessions.
Probably in Lyndonville, VT. More on that in the next few weeks.


Noteworthy Online Events

Click the links for more information

Classes with the legendary Amani of Lebanon, April 29 and 30, 2023, sponsored by Tammy Stanzione

Nawarra of Morocco, on the state of folklore dances in our industry with Walladah Valladah

Lecture by Tamalyn Dallal on the the Arabic diaspora in South America, sponsored by Mahin

How to Dance–in Cursive?!

Back in the 70s I was learning to write (and speak) Tibetan.  Which has an alphabet, but it is entirely unlike the English alphabet. As I struggled to form the unfamiliar characters, I came to appreciate those first-grade workbooks, with their little arrows showing which order and direction to make the strokes.

Since then, I have observed grade-school children struggle to make letters and numbers. A character that should take 2 strokes can take several more strokes, much more time, and infinitely more frustration–unless you have that vital instruction in how to make each character. And that’s just printing! No wonder schools have given up teaching cursive–something I, for one, find tragic. And a problem I see in dance all the time. 

I have long puzzled over dancers making each move a separate entity. There are little spaces in between, as they mentally finish each “character” and then begin the next. I finally began to liken this to print dancing. Each letter separate. Where what we want is to dance in cursive–each letter seamlessly joined to the next, in a beautiful, mellifluous, calligraphic stream. I’ve written briefly about the connection of oriental dance and calligraphy. But of course calligraphy can be print or cursive. 

It took me a while to see the cursive angle. 

Basmalah

Cursive writing is all about the effortless transitions between the letters. And belly dance is all about the effortless transitions between the moves. Specific moves aren’t as important and the freedom, agency, and joy. And that little transitional space is where improvisation and micromovement–freedom, agency, and joy–thrive. 

Back in the 70s I was also taking Ibrahim Bobby Farrah’s classes every week. Bobby taught transitions like they were moves in and of themselves. Bobby presented new combinations every single class, and those combos were tuned to the music, and composed of classic moves. He broke those transitions down for us, the weight, directional, and intentional changes. Because of this, we quickly grew adept at transitioning from one move to another, at effortlessly combining moves on the fly–and at improvisation. 

So this is what I want to do in Bobby Style 3: Transitions

Each week, we will take a short combination of classic moves and attend to the transitions between them–so that we can lilt from move to move easily. What this gives us the time and space to enrich each element of the move with those calligraphic attributes of thick and thin lines, flourishes, and adaption of size, speed, force, and so on–all of the dynamics and intentionality that make dance surprising and wonderful. 

Transitions is suitable for most levels of dancer. We won’t spend much time breaking down the classic moves–our focus will be in transitions and musicality. Dancers will gain confidence in combining movements on the fly. Teachers will learn how to improve students’ movement quality and improv confidence). We’ll have fun, dance better, and find our own style over the five-week program. 

Bobby Style 3: Transitions​ begins Tuesday, January 24 at 4pm est. See this in your time zone (add to calendar button in link).
Yes, I pushed it back a tad.  It will run through Tuesday, March 7 (no classes on Feb 7 or 14). 

See more and register here: https://aliathabit.com/shop/#live

I look forward to dancing with you!

Love, 
Alia

PS THANK YOU to the intrepid dancers who joined me to film Heart of the Heart! The video is almost all edited and will be posted shortly!

How quantum physics illuminates personal style

Strange Attractor myriad infinites

Quantum physics is weird. There is a degree to which we ought to be able to walk into a store and find exactly what we want every time (and on sale!), because, in quantum land, the likelihood of it being there is about as high as the likelihood that it won’t. There’s a level of trust, of confidence, in the appearance of the exact right thing. It’s kind of like the confidence and trust we bring to dancing with live music.

Imagine you are watching a dancer. You have no idea what the hell she is doing, but everything is moving in complete accord with the music, and that music is live. There are half a dozen instruments, multiple accents, and a wild assortment of inputs, yet she is totally in sync. How do we arrive at this level of embodied expression?

We start out by copying–that’s how we learn.

Copying different artists and styles gives us the tools, models, and permission to be different. Through learning from a range of sources, we increase the variety of spaces in which we give ourselves permission to be. Each time we reset the pattern, we increase our understanding of and relationship to the dance.

All the movement models we experience form a cloud of possibilities for the “how” of any step, any move. Micro-movement has that quantum element of infinite variation. So does the multiplicity of interpretation, the way in which we construct each move. Through this quantum density, this strange attractor of a shape, we find our own path.

Strange Atrractor

This is why it’s important to study with many teachers. And not just any teachers. Follow the visionaries! When we learn/copy from a variety of expressive masters, through our exposure to varied models we gain an ever more expansive range of possibility. Our range of motion increases, literally—and of thought, imagination, expression.

Over time, our eyes open. Every dance we see, every teacher whose class we take contributes to this.  Seek out the best teachers, see great artists, as this is how we develop our range of possibility.

But we can’t copy forever.

As we grow, we find new ways of being in the world. We find out how our bodies want to express the move, the music, the feeling. We branch out on our own. We give ourselves permission to do this. We let go of following. We lead.

Our own style comes from giving ourselves permission to find our own way. The confidence we gain from seeing, learning the variety of ways is the key. I believe our style is already inside us, waiting. The effort and study help us find it, accept it, refine it.

Our path develops in relation to the myriad paths we have followed. It may lie within or without the experienced range of possibility—through the effort of building the range, we see how there could be an outside, and that we might go there. We allow our body to choose whatever move comes forward. We trust that it will be there. 

We begin by copying. We learn to trust…

Welcome to the bright world of possibility.

Love,

Alia

Here’s some Merçan Dede…

Samuel Davies: Twice, Then Quit: How to Train for Resistance to Change

Your Brain on Joy

In honor of next year’s 90 Days, our upcoming newsletters will feature Love Notes from previous 90 Days. They are examples of the sort of wide-ranging musing that powers the Love Notes–and the daily music suggestions that accompany them ; ). And all this thoughtfulness gets explored and reinforced in the private Bonus Pack of Joy group. It is a unique personal journey to your real self, and your true dance. More about that soon!

Here is one of my favorite Love Notes.

Day 16 from 2018. This is your brain on joy

There was this story of folks who imagined themselves playing darts, and their dart game improved. Then there was a lot of flak about what a fake load of crap that was. But the truth is out. It works.

The  brain can’t tell the difference between the real and the imaginary.

There is AMPLE evidence to show that imagining something is almost as good as doing it.

Here are some of the results of one such study.

“Volunteers were asked to play a simple sequence of piano notes each day for five consecutive days. Their brains were scanned each day in the region connected to the finger muscles. Another set of volunteers were asked to imagine playing the notes instead, also having their brains scanned each day.

“The top two rows in the image show the changes in the brain in those who played the notes. The middle two rows show the changes in those who simply imagined playing the notes. Compare this with the bottom two rows showing the brain regions of the control group, who didn’t play nor imagine playing, piano.”  —David R. Hamilton PhD

http://drdavidhamilton.com/does-your-brain-distinguish-real-from-imaginary/

Pretty amazing, right?

What does this mean for us?

It means we can visualize our choreography or a challenging transition as a means of practice (and we will focus on transitions in the next FUN Class ; ). But it also means we can lie on the floor and visualize dancing when we are not able to dance physically. Listening to the music and letting our bodies respond, even when we do not “move” is remarkably powerful. Small impulses slip into our muscles, activating them, connecting them.

But it also means more than this.

What we think is powerful.

The stories we tell ourselves, the words we say to ourselves, they have bigger results than we may know. 

We say things to ourselves, and we mean them—even when they are, well, sorta mean. I know, people laugh at affirmations. “It’s just a lie,” is the most common complaint. But I would submit that the self-hating acid drip in which we daily bathe is at least as much of a lie, and far more toxic.

What if we told ourselves better stories?

What if we visualized our own success? In detail. And stuck to that.

One of the things I do is what I call Mapping. I pay attention to my body in certain emotional states. The joy of connection in dance. Feeling successful. Happiness. Things like that. I map my body’s posture and physical sensations while I experience these positive feelings. So I can recreate that state later on. So when I am going to perform, I place myself in a body map created from a generous expression  of joy.

And, Lo, I let that feeling infuse my body. I “Just Say No” to toxic whispers of doubt. This didn’t come easily. It took practice and perseverance to notice these feelings and learn to create them. But it was worth the effort.

I do a lot of little things. At night before I go to sleep, I relax my jaw. I make sure none of my teeth are touching. I relax my eyes, my mouth, my face. Habitually holding tension in various body areas doesn’t go away by itself. We have to take action. And we are in good company. 

Olympic athletes visualize their success.

They visualize their whole event—their technique, strategy, competitors, the whole thing. They see it in their heads, their most perfect performance—and it’s serious business. They mean it.

If it’s good enough for Olympic athletes, it’s good enough for us.

So…

Next time you have a moment of joy, I invite you to notice what you feel, physically, in your body. What sensations do you notice? What is the shape of that joy? How does your body hold itself when it is happy? What is on your face?  Map that. Go there.

Practice feeling joy.

Smiling brings joy. Smiling at ourselves in the mirror, a real smile, makes a difference. Let’s make that difference.

Improv brings joy too. Here’s a tiny little improv video. Let your brain think your body is doing it ; ) 

Our next FUN Class, Bobby Style 3: Transitions will explore Bobby’s strategy of teaching transitions between moves as moves in and of themselves. Come dance with us and level up your transitions!
I invite you to check it out ; )
Love,
Alia

And now for something completely different! Astor Piazzola, a playlist. Tangueros have told me you can’t really dance tango to this music as it’s so complex, so feel free to let your imagination soar (or your body move as it wishes 😉 and have super-dramatic blast!


Bringing Joy: Tito for the Win

I’ve been thinking a lot about Presence lately, partly because that’s the upcoming FUN Class, partly from all the reading and prep I did for Create Your Glorious Self. I can across this this article I wrote for 2013 90 Days. It struck me as relevant, so here it is.

When I was a kid, my Mom had a NYC art scene friend, Fé Weinstein, who was a belly dancer. My Mom said her best feature was this quality of “Isn’t this fun? Aren’t we all having a great time?” So this is what I filed away as what a belly dancer should be–which stood me in good stead, as it turned out. My Mom is a WASP from the midwest, but somehow she totally nailed this central quality of our dance.

Tito Seif embodies bringing joy

I’m going to talk about this video from 2011; I have also seen him live. He strikes me as very genuine. So I am happy to share this with you today. I like Tito’s attention to traditional style, his gorgeous technique, theatricality, and stage presence, and especially his radiant smile. Besides, the video quality is quite good, with lots of closeups.

Here’s the video

When a performer is having fun, we enjoy also. Tito’s genuine delight, his infectious joy ignites our smiles. When we smile, we feel happier. This is biology. It’s encoded. Watch how he uses his eyes to include the guests–looks at his body, glances up the people, like, “Neat, huh?” When he dances on the drum (and yes, he practiced that the hell out of that bit), what you see is not, isn’t this hard, but instead, Isn’t this fun?

Notice his relaxation

It’s all the way through, but especially as he adjusts his belt–he is in no hurry. He jokes with his guests and takes his time. He teases them, starting to take it off, then retying it several times. This showmanship all leads to the glute isolations at 4:50 (Jim Boz does this same trick), when we also find out Tito is wearing underwear (Leila Farid says, it’s never bad to show you are wearing underwear). Notice also, particularly in the drum solo, but also in the first section, how he uses slow movement to cruise over the music and just hit a few accents–sometimes dramatic accents, but often not even locks, just gentle stops.

Tito stumbles getting up on the drum at 2:10–which may be because he really stumbles, but more likely so we appreciate the difficulty of the task. Everyone who does balance acts stumbles to show the audience how hard it is (witness any high-wire, slack wire, or wire walking act). Maybe he is also testing the stability of the drum before going any further. (His dismount is a wide, two- legged leap; getting smoothly on and off is, in fact, extra hard, so with that stumble he accomplishes several tasks at once.)

He is not particularly flustered by the apparent slip. He flashes a look of omg, oops, laughs genuinely and then stands up to his full height on the drum and shrugs magnanimously–eh, mistakes happen. He forgives himself, and so do we. He then proceeds into a section of slow movement (the opening of the baladi progression), which includes very challenging weight changes, all of which are perfectly executed–mastery in direct opposition to the stumble. Notice also that his directional changes are accomplished by moving the drum. With his feet.

He purposely unties his belt at 3:06 to show off his hip work–notice the duff player behind him clapping–then jokes with the audience as if they do not sufficiently appreciate it. He reties his belt (he does spend a lot of time adjusting his clothes–maybe because he is wearing a modern-style costume instead of his signature galabeya), and continues to interact w the audience, utterly ignoring the opening of the drum solo. Finally he claps a few times to get the audience going, and joins the drum solo at the shimmy.

Is it choreographed or improv?

I don’t know. Tito is famous for his intricate, musical choreographies. And his relaxation is so much a part of his style, it would be impossible to know without asking, or seeing several shows in a row– which is as it should be. He does have some bits that he repeats in several videos (including the dismount). On the other hand, a baladi progression is usually improvised; this one also serves to underscore his performance on the drum. Besides, when we dance to the same music many times, it often kind of choreographs itself.

And I have heard him bemoan the tightly choreographed entries in a contest of which he was a judge. This is not the dance, he said. Which made me like him even more.

Certainly he cues the orchestra several times–he addresses them directly just before the baladi progression/drum solo, at 1:46. He also cues them for several changes, for example, at 6:16, 7:06, 8:18, and then at 8:30 when he shows them the kiss he blows to end the section.

At such events (this is a Nile Group Festival show), the big names bring their own orchestra, so the odds are excellent that these are established cues and they know exactly what he wants. So if it’s choreographed, it’s loose; at the very least there is leeway in what he does, the order of the dances, how long, etc.

It’s his show, so he needs to be able to adjust it how he sees fit in the moment. Um Kaltsoum’s orchestra was famous for following her wherever she went–repeating passages and even entire sections, as needed.

In any case, it’s a great show by an engaging artist who has developed a walloping amount of skill.

All that being said, who would like to have (and be!) as much fun as Tito?

We’d all love to be that comfortable, that relaxed, open, warm and inviting. That’s why we’re doing Presence in the FUN Class this month.  We’ll use pinning, breakouts, and other strategies to increase our capacity for connection, openness, warmth, and joy. Come improvise with us, and start to get comfortable sharing your joy with your guests!

It turns out my video didn’t come through last week–it had disappeared since 2018 when I first wrote that article (also for the 90 Days–more about that very soon!). So here is a recent clip from the FUN Class that shows both Presence and self-enjoyment (in fact, I took the screenshot that is the image for Presence from this clip ; ).

 

Presence runs Tuesdays at 4pm ET from Sept 27 through Oct 26. ). See this in your time zone (add to calendar button in link). Each class is recorded (instructor view only). Each recording is available during the session.

Will you join us? It’s going to be joyfully liberating!

More info and register here!

Love,
Alia

How to develop stage presence at home (and on video)

Alexander the Great conquered the known world. Everywhere there was fell to him. He did a good job, too, keeping the local culture culture intact. But his big love was conquering. When he got as far as there was to go, when there were no more countries to to invade, Alexander broke down and cried.

Alexander the Great
Mosaic of Alexander and his horse, Bucephalus (c. first century AD), ancient Roman floor mosaic from the House of the Faunin Pompeii showing Alexander fighting king Darius III of Persia in the Battle of Issus (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_the_Great)

Sometimes it seems we can only go so far by dancing for our pets, stuffed animals, and furniture. Where else is there to go? Many of us do not perform, or we have few chances. We need some real live interaction!

Well, here is an an idea.

Dance with the mirror.

Most of us have been trained to squint at ourselves critically. What if we enjoyed ourselves instead?

I started by just smiling at and reassuring myself in the bathroom mirror. Then I moved on to a little mirror in my living room. Then when I danced in that room, I found I danced to myself in that little mirror—just my face. I would dance and smile and twinkle, and it was so much nicer.

A while back, at an improv class of Leila Farid’s, people were asking about using mirrors to practice improv. This is generally a terrible idea, since we all squint and judge ourselves so much in the mirror, focusing upon what we look like and tweaking our visual.

I mentioned that I was developing a new relationship with my mirror, dancing with rather than staring at, and I danced a little bit, twinkling at my reflection, enjoying the moment.

The reaction was interesting. Everyone’s jaw dropped. Clearly, no one had done this before. So I mention it today. What if we all reclaimed our self-relationship? What if we all used the mirror to reinforce our self-love and enjoyment? I think that could be one hell of a revolutionary gesture.

This also works on video.

I first noticed this when I was making 90 Days practice videos. I see what the camera does on my computer screen. I keep an eye on the monitor to be sure that I am in the frame, and I smile and send love out through the camera to to all of my guests. But I realized I was doing more than that—I was dancing with myself. Instead of squinting and judging, I was twinkling and smiling and playing!

Well! That was a fun surprise. I find it is becoming a habit. And what a nice habit! Because I smile at myself, it comes through the camera as though I smile into it, so it has a double benefit of love to myself and love towards my guests.

I usually position the cam so it is at waist height, which I understand as the best angle for recording dance, as neither half of the body is lengthened or foreshortened. I do all the normal video things, check the light, mark the space I have, remove any clutter, and then I have a good time dancing with myself! I even like the way the videos have been coming out. So it is a win-win.

I have a video for you below, so you can see what I mean. I made this for the 90 Days; now you get to see it, too ; ). 

I invite you to try it for yourself!

Start with mirrors or video as you like—just smile and twinkle at yourself. Dance and have fun!

This is exactly what we will do in PRESENCE!

Our next FUN Class Deep Dive is alll about developing a joyful, confident, connection to ourselves, our dance, and anyone with whom we care to share it. We’ll use pinning, breakouts, and other strategies to increase our capacity for connection, openness, warmth, and joy.

Presence runs Tuesdays at 4pm ET from Sept 27 through Oct 26 2022. Each class is recorded (instructor view only). Each recording is available during the session.

More info and register here!

Will you join us? It’s going to be joyfully liberating!

Love,
Alia

Music: Maewood, by Abdel Halim Hafez!



How to Develop Stage Presence (or any kind of Presence) in 20 minutes a day

Courage for Stage Presence

Last week, we talked about practicing presence. Here is a little more on that.

When we talk about performance we talk about “stage presence.” 

What is it that makes one dancer mesmerizing, even when they are a beginner or don’t do very much, and another, of equal or better technical skill, kind of… meh? Is it their ability to interact with the guests? 

No. Some dancers’ style may involve interacting with their guests. Others may be more aloof. But either one can have magnificent presence—or none at all. It’s not so much what you do, but the the way that you do it. Except for shrinking back or looking down. That tends to mess up everyone ; ).

Some of us choose to perform; others dance at home, or with friends at a party. And, as someone who often dances with eyes closed and head down, trust me, even home and party dancing involves presence. And it is practice that makes presence happen. So we don’t need a stage at all–we can just connect–with ourselves, our surrounding, our friends and family!

We do in performance what we do in practice. And performance is basically real life. Presence is useful for all of us.

So how do we develop stage presence?

Because it is a skill, something we can learn. Or rather it is a combination of skills that mix together into something the whole of which is greater then the sum of its parts. So let’s unpack presence and see what we see. 

When we are present, we are fully engaged in the moment—the music, the movement, the guests, everything. Since engagement is a big interest of our practice, we can include the main skills of presence during our 20 minutes. 

We’ll look today at Confidence. Your questions and observation are welcome, as always.

Confidence 

This is one of our most important skills. It’s funny to think of confidence as a skill. It seems like an innate thing—either we have it or we don’t. But confidence comes from experience and success. So how do we cultivate confidence? 

Act As If.

Think about this—in studies, folks who held a pencil in their mouths, which made them hold the mouth in a smile, cheered up. People given grainy photocopies to read had to frown to do it—and retained more information than those given clean copies. So it follows that adopting the shape of confidence can help bring us into its reality.  This is not the same thing as faking.

We are talking about using our practice to develop skills. Practicing the attitudes and methods of confidence leads to skill. Remember, behavior creates emotion. When we hold ourselves as if we are confident, we feel confident.

Opening.

Opening means allowing ourselves to be vulnerable, and nobody likes that. It’s scary. Closing generally means our posture is compressed, often in the upper chest, around the collar bones. It tends to sink in. The usual prescription is to lift the chest. This is tricky. When we are closed and we force an opening in one area, we often close harder around the area. So we need a better solution.

Certainly some of us have lovely posture, and we’ve gotten it through good luck or a lot of work. I’ve had terrible posture, and the work never really seemed to help. But I noticed when I left the acupuncturist’s that I was effortlessly upright. So I think the work is more about feeling better than doing pushups, though upper body strength is good, too.  

One of the things that made a difference for me was something Amar Garcia said in a workshop: “Your confidence is in your throat.” I was so struck by this that I spent most of the rest of the workshop experimenting with relaxing and opening my throat. This is something I invite you to try. 

Caution

Above I noted the challenge of opening in one area only to close in another, and that’s something to beware of here, too. The first thought is to lift the chin, but when the head is thrust forward, as it often is, lifting the chin just compounds the problem.  So try this.

Gently pull the back of the neck back. Then focus on the front of the neck—the throat. Let the whole area from the mouth to the collarbones soften. Allow yourself to feel the sensuality of the throat. The mouth may want to open. Let it. Let the softness spread. Just feel the feelings of that openness. 

Exposing the throat and letting it soften can feel sensual, even sexual, and this may be scary. But this is your practice time, so it is okay. You are safe in your practice space.  It wasn’t until I started doing this softening practice that I noticed how I tucked my chin, protecting my throat. Old habits and feelings of unhappiness can be stubborn, so hold yourself kindly in your heart. 

Integration

As you get the hang of the softening the throat, bring it into your movement. Allow yourself to move with the throat softened, open and exposed. Allow the head and neck to float upward. Extend the arms, wrists up, and notice the vulnerability in that move, too, the longing to be kissed. Bring that tenderness into your dance. 

Allow other areas to open—the spine, the stomach, the low back, the inner thighs, the legs. 

If you’d like to get a head start on confidence, as you dance, for some of the time, look at and include all your beloved guests as you move in self-loving, ways with your open, relaxed throat. 

If you have a mirror, dance with yourself. We usually look at ourselves critically while we dance. Instead, enjoy dancing with yourself in the mirror. Even in a bathroom mirror we can smile and flirt with ourselves.  

It’s fun ; )

For music, Beata and Horacio Cifuentes, Enchanted Gardens full show. Check out that presence! 

Love,
Alia
PS look for the next FUN Class: Presence! A Deep Dive into openness and connection in Oriental Dance.

3 Ways to Thrive (and create your Glorious Self)

Mind the Gap

Recently, I’ve written about improving self-talk, celebrating tiny moments of success, resolving trauma, strengthening willpower, and many more. I’ve talked about how Behavior Creates Emotion, and devoted the FUN Class series to exploring behavior as a way to bring emotional resonance into our dance. And now 3 more ways to thrive.

These are just some of the methods we will use in Create Your Glorious Self to develop our personae and activate our agency. I love them because they are based in science–each of them has been studied many many times and found to be practical, repeatable methods–and because they work. Try them and see! These are methods you can start using right now. You can change how you react to challenges–and become more chill, relaxed, and present.

As you change yourself, your circumstances change as well. We are all engaged in patterns of behavior. Some of which are very old and may no longer serve us–but they are so ingrained as to be automatic. The good news is that patterns are a sort of fractal–when you change one element, the whole pattern gets interrupted, and there is a sudden opening for change and growth. So…

3 Ways to Thrive

1. Choose Your Own Adventure

It’s a pattern. My kid snipes at me. Annoyed, I snipe back. Huh. Not so helpful. What would serve me better than this conditioned response of joining the snipe-fest? And how would I put that into play?

The same goes for all of us. What is the pattern, the behavior loop in which we are trapped? What happens first? What next? Where is the gap into which we can insert an exit? Once the pattern is interrupted, there is an opportunity for everyone’s behavior to change. First, we choose how we want to be, who we want to be in any specific interaction. It could be dance, home, work, play–anywhere something is happening that we want to change. Where is one such place for you? How would you prefer to respond?

2. Mind the Gap

Between a “stimulus” (eg, our kid breaks a plate, or we see the audience all staring at us, or our boss ignores us again, or whatever), and our “response” (eg, scream at the kid, start panicking, shrink into a hurt-ball or whatever), there is a tiny little gap. A space. A breath. Literally. This is the place to pause, breathe, and choose. It’s small, so it usually flits past before we even notice. But it’s there. We can often find it in retrospect. Track back from the moment everything fell apart–there will have been a stimulus and a response. And that tiny little gap.

The first step is to become aware of it. To notice it. Once we see it coming it, we can use it. However we have decided to be different, this tiny gap is the place where our new tire has a chance to meet a new road. Where we offramp out of the old, and into the new.

Rather than speeding forward, however, the trick is to s l o w t h i n g s d o w n . . .

3. Take the Red Pill

Once we are in the gap, we can move way more slowly than everything around us. We can breathe. Observe. Make a choice about how to respond.

Slowing down our breath is a prime strategy here. Not only does it increase willpower (which we need right now), it also increases our presence and our options. It pays to practice in less dire circumstances, too.

So here is the Red Pill: Inhale slowly for 5-6 seconds. Exhale slowly for 5-6 seconds. Let the breath be so gentle it forms a circle, with no real beginning or end. Do this five times. Do it often throughout the day so it becomes second nature. If you want to get fancy, you can gently hold the breath at the end of each inhale and exhale for another couple of seconds. Celebrate after each breath session. Woohoo! This is a win!

Then, when you hit the gap in your challenging situations, breathe. Honestly, just pausing will break the pattern. Shifting into a present, ready state will break the pattern. So we are already ahead of the game just by doing this one thing.

I invite you to try the breath now. Take note of how you feel before you start, and after you finish. What is different afterwards? Please let me know! Comment here on the blog or email me.

Change Takes Effort

If you want change, you have to do things differently. That’s just how it is. Me, personally, I am an efficient person. I love wasting time for my own ends, but I like my workflow to be smooooth. Everything I’ve been sharing about habit formation, willpower enhancement and so on, all these things help. I’ve integrated all of it into Create Your Glorious Self, built it all in, designed the support and accountability that I’ve found over the years to e the most useful and satisfying for so many dancers. I’ve been teaching online classes for a long time, and teaching professionally for decades. I know what I’m doing.

CYGS will help you. What you get out of it will reflect what you put into it. It will also reflect what I’ve put into it–and that’s a LOT ; ). The tools I’ve been collecting for Create Your Glorious Self thrill me beyond measure. I so look forward to sharing the whole process with you! CYGS is all about designing your Glorious Self and having the support and accountability to bring them into your life.

If you would like to show up differently–more open, more assertive, more confident, smarter, kinder, better–as a dancer, creator, worker, parent, lover, or human being in general, have a look at this program. It’s outstanding.

Love,
Alia

How does LUSCIOUS feel?

how does luscious feel?

I did my first ever Instagram Live yesterday. I had to look up how to do it ; ). The day went kinda south, so I girded myself with the improviser’s axiom, “Don’t Prepare; Just Show Up.” I had this idea of lusciousness, and that’s it.

So here is that IG Live. Skip in about 35 seconds to the actual start (lol, learning curves ; ).

Alia’s First IG Live!

LOTS of tips on feeling/moving Luscious!


Which brings me to…

Luscious

Hub the cat kind of needs a fez. He reminds me here of all those dear guys in Egyptian movies, caught up in the music, gazing affectionately at the dancer.

This is what I’m feeling, anyway. I’m liking where we’ve been going, and I kind of want to stay with that for a while. The last one was BOLD and we did soak on the bold side of things (Sekhmet, anyone?). I like how it was a little bit challenging, gender-bending, pushing our comfort zones a bit. Gave us a taste of a different way to be. 

I’d like Luscious to be transgressive in a different way.

I’ve had a lot of shame around sexuality to unpack on my journey. It took time and patience. We steep in the mixed messages of our social programming. Must not be sexy! NO! Must be sexy–for the other. Must not like sex! Ew, dirty! Must like sex or at least pretend to–for the other. Must not look sexy! Will get in trouble. BAD. Must look sexy! For the other…

And for us as dancers, it’s even more complicated–our costumes, the public side-eye, the even more mixed messages from the countries of origin. It’s tough to pick apart our own feelings, wants, and desires from the layers of shame and blame. 

Folk of the culture maintain that this is a woman’s dance. Everyone dances this dance, yet it’s a woman’s dance. Interesting. Gender binaries aside, to me, this means egg energy as opposed to sperm energy. The sperm goes out. It rushes. It has a goal. Swift, like an arrow! Get out there! Make those calls! Go get ’em! Rah!

The egg…. attracts. It’s magnetic. It’s engaged within and of itself. It doesn’t have to go anywhere, do anything. It doesn’t even have to put on eyeliner. It’s that juicy and… luscious. 

What if we don’t have a female body, or don’t identify as female?

Who cares? 
Sperm energy is generally valorized in Western culture–we’re allll expected to run around like little do-bees, busy busy productive extraverts. All the genders are expected to act like sperm, so why shouldn’t we all act like eggs, too? It might be a bit outside of our comfort zone–true learning is uncomfortable. And learning new skills increases our capacity for learning skills. So that pays off. And we could all benefit from seeing ourselves as luscious–self-love, affection, cherishing, magnetic, fragrant, mmmm…. 

And we could all use an hour on the sofa with with a nice little dish of bonbons. Right? And getting to enjoy those bonbons, as a choice, nibbling them slowly, for the creamy pleasure of it …

Lusciousness, Dala3, playful sensual/sexual confidence, ​is a core component of the cultural dance. It is NOT about the other. It IS about ourselves and our own self-love, affection, cherishing. Soooo…

Announcing!
Alia’s Inspiring FUN Class,

Luscious

What we’ll do
  • Explore and embody lusciousness
  • Translate simple combinations into lusciousness
  • Bring our luscious movement quality to a range of musical styles, tempos, and genres
  • Make space for self-love, affection, cherishing
  • Practice grounded, present, agency

Luscious runs Tuesday at 4pm EDT from August 9 through Sept 13 (no class Sept 6). Each class is recorded (instructor view only). Each recording is available during the session.

Will you please join us? It’s going to be… luscious ; )
Register here https://aliathabit.com/shop/#live/

Love,
Alia



How to Reprogram Your Self Talk (and why it’s worth the effort)

Behavior Creates Emotion

Yep, I’m reading another book. What to Say When You Talk to Yourself, by Shad Helmststter, PhD is alll about the power of self talk, both positive and negative. I’m not sure what I think of it, yet (I’m a little more than halfway through). But it has made me think, and you might also find this interesting.

As dancers, what we say to ourselves can make allll the difference between our shows feeling great vs feeling like a hideous disaster.

Background–I used to be very, very unkind to myself. I said things to myself that I would never say to another person. I hated myself and told myself so at every opportunity. (It wasn’t until I found Somatic Experiencing® (SE) that those cruel voices resolved, and stayed that way.) And I am not alone in this!

Perfectionist fault-finding and vicious self-talk is wayyyy common. Something like 50% of folks report feeling like imposters. So, of course I had to read this book (plus self talk is a piece of the puzzle I’m putting together for Create Your Glorious Self…) Anyway…

Create Your Glorious Self

The advice is to first listen to your own self talk.

What are you saying? Is it self-compassionate? “There there honey, we’re doing okay. We’ll get through this!” Or self-empowering? “Wow, you did it! that’s awesome! Woo-hoo!” Or even, “Oops! Hmm. Okay, let’s try that differently next time.

Or is it more along the lines of, you stupid cow, what were you thinking?! Or, I suck at this! Or, this is the worst day of my life!

The toxic rain of negative voices can be so constant we don’t even notice it anymore. But that’s what trips us up when we want to shine. That litany of, I suck, I can’t do this, they are looking at me, they hate me, that’ll never work, who am I to ____, I don’t know what I’m doing… is self-programming, and it is also self-fulfilling. When we think this way, we feel powerless, so we act powerless., so we feel powerless, and on and on, in a miserable feedback loop.

(Side note–I’ve had some serious dental infections in the last few years, and one thing I noticed was a rise of anxious, weepy self talk along the lines of “I don’t know what I’m doing…” So sometimes there are other roots (haha), to the problem.)

Anyway…

Listen.

What are you saying? How often do you say it? What happened just before the cascade of negative? Sometimes there is a trigger. Sometimes it’s just an all day party ; ). How do you see yourself? When you look in the mirror, what do you say to yourself? Do you have your own back? Or are you busy stabbing it?

Maybe you are lucky and you feel good about yourself! WOO!!! You can sit back right now and have a bonbon! Well done.

If not, take action.

How to Reprogram Your Self Talk

Helmstetter advises us to reverse the things we say to ourselves, in the moment that we hear them. I suck at this, becomes, “I am competent and I can do this!” They hate me, becomes “They don’t know me yet, so here I am!” Today is disaster, I just don’t have it in me, becomes “Today is a great day! I have plenty of energy, today especially!”

I have been playing with this, and sometimes I have to laugh at the ludicrous irony of these upbeat re-framings. So I have also been engaging in “interrogative” self talk, which means questioning my own inner statements. “Is this really the worst day ever?!” Um, well, no. “Do you really not know what you’re doing?” Well, actually, I am pretty competent. That’s been pretty interesting, too. If the affirming piece is tough for you, the interrogative option might be a nice bridge.

On the other hand, I recognize the value of the process, and I do find a lift follows the shift. Saying things out load makes a difference too, as does writing them down and reading them, and reading them aloud. However we get these new things into our heads, they get into our heads.

Next Steps

We can move on from reversal to general good news about ourselves on a regular basis, saying kind words to ourselves, out loud–and saying kind words about ourselves to others! Speaking of the mirror, I love the bathroom mirror to check in with myself, to smile and cheerfully greet myself and say some nice things. I’m in there several times a day, so that’s several times a day I can check in and smile at myself.

Behavior Creates Emotion
Plus there are practical applications….

Say you want to quit something–smoking (or playing solitaire on your phone, or whatever). Helmstetter advises saying something along the lines of, “I never smoke.” or “I no longer enjoy smoking, and I have quit” He suggests we say these things to ourselves, and out loud, and to others–even as we light up and inhale.

Just continue to say the words, as we continue to smoke. We became conditioned to smoking, and we will become conditioned to the idea that we do not smoke. It will take some time, maybe a few weeks or so. One day we will be lighting up, and our now-reprogrammed subconscious mind will say, then what are you doing with that ciggie?! Yuck!

The trick is remembering to do that. Helmstetter explains how much more valuable it is to generate positive self talk ourselves–but he has built an empire on pre-recorded self talk for every conceivable issue. Which is funny, but everyone’s got to make a living, I guess.

Anyway, I’m planning to play with this in the coming week <cough solitaire cough>. I invite you to join me at whatever level. Listening, reversing, questioning, or straight up affirming your wonderfulness.

Know that you are wonderful! You are beautiful and loving, and worthy of love.
I invite you to say so to yourself, every day ❤️

And here’s some music (a sound bath, anyway ; ) for self loving self talk.

Love,
Alia

PS Create Your Glorious Self is coming together beautifully! I’ll be doing some cool events leading up to it, so please stay tuned! (Registration opens at noon EDT on August 7, 2022. There are only 15 seats…)