Your Glorious Dance Self

Back in the day when everyone had to have a dance name, I thought about making one for myself. I already have a perfectly good Arabic name (being SWANA), but part of the dance name thing was separating one’s dance identity from one’s every life. Safety being one of the concerns, also sounding more glamorous (and sounding more “ethnic,” now regarded as brownface, kinda racist, and best avoided*). However,

Safety and glamour are entirely legit–scads of performers have stage names, authors have pen names, and they can make a big difference in our sense of confidence as artists.

So I was wondering about a stage name for myself. I love my name, Alia–it means sublime, exalted–“the high clear place at the top,” my mom told me. But you know, the safety and everything. So I thought about borrowing my cousins’ name–AbuSamra. Talk about Glamour!

Alia AbuSamra!

But then I thought about keeping track of two names (I can barely keep track of the one I have). And I thought about divorcing my dance self from the rest of my life-accomplishments. And I though about how much more glam Alia AbuSamra would be than I am. I did not want to be jealous of myself, and I wanted to own all my facets, so I let it go.

Recently, I have been thinking about her again….

During Secret Stories, and now Mix n Match, we’ve been playing a lot with different qualities–of movement, but also of attitude–ways of being.

Confidence is a big issue for dancers.

Part of it is the way we’re often taught. We squint into the mirror and criticize ourselves–constantly. We tend to look at what’s wrong, and how we can fix it, generally by developing an ever-more rigid focus on technique. On top of this, we endure an unending deluge of media messaging telling us just how we do not make the cut–too fat, too skinny, not pretty, young, shapely, smart enough–need this cream, that blush, deodorant, shapewear, and so on, day after day after month after year.

It’s no wonder we doubt ourselves.

So how can we increase our confidence?

Part of the problem is that we bring our squinting, criticizing, fault-finding, terrified self to the party. Because that’s the only dance self we’ve ever had, that’s who shows up.

What if it were Alia AbuSamra who showed to dance? Or Aphrodite? Or Astarte, the Phoenician goddess of love, sex, war, and hunting? Or Elena Lentini, the goddess of Oriental dance? Or Taheyya Karioka?

It starts to get interesting, doesn’t it?

Richard Wiseman, author of The As If Principle, reviewed study after study, all of which show that behavior creates emotion. For example, when folks act as if they are cheerful, they start to feel cheerful. So if I started to act as if I were my mythical Alia AbuSamra, I would start to feel like her–to become her. I wouldn’t have to be jealous of her–she would be my secret! And I could BECOME her, as I practiced embodying her qualities.

When we act as if we are Taheyya–embodying our sense of her–we start to feel like her too. We start to embody that mindspace. We start to become it.

I’ve been diving into the research in this and other areas as we explore these qualities of being in the FUN classes. They’re like Secret Identities. We’re having a lot of fun with them–and not just for dance.

Superman has Clark Kent.

Selina Kyle has Catwoman.

Who might you have? Imagine who could show up in other areas of your life!

I’m thinking about a 3-4 month coaching/course to develop and field some Secret Identities.

I wonder if that might be interesting for you. A deep dive with monthly accountability, email updates, and lots of opportunity for exploration and test-driving, reporting back, tweaking–and reveling!

What would you like to see in a course like that? What would make it work for you?

As you ponder that, I invite you to try it out. Act as if you are your heart’s idol!

Please let me know how it goes.

Reply to this email, or comment on the Blog!

Love,
Alia

PS it’s Recital Season again!

Wouldn’t you love to show up to your recital with a mesmerizing dance you made yourself? Without all the frustration and tears?

You can!

Announcing

How to Make a Dance in FIVE Days!

From entrance to applause without setting a single step
Learn a time-tested, systematic approach to dance composition that you can use over and over again.

MD5 opens Sunday, May 22 through Saturday, June 4th. I’ll be monitoring the forum during that time to answer your questions and help troubleshoot any roadblocks that arise.

I invite you to have a look, and see if MD5 is a good fit for you:
alia.teachable.com/p/make-a-dance-in-five-days

*Of of course, if you have a vintage Eastern dance name, please go right ahead with it. Currently we can do better, but anyone who already has an established name, kinda gets grandmothered in ; )

Announcing! THRIVE with Alia!

For the past 6 months or so, I’ve been envisioning a new web presence that highlights my unique skillset. Finally, I have made that vision a reality!

I invite you to check out my NEW home,

THRIVE with Alia!

It’s got clear portals to the services I provide, updated pages, a simplified nav, and general ease of use. Our new domain, ThriveWithAlia.com will soon be live (aliathabit.com still works, and still goes to the same place. I just like this option ; )

In celebration, I’ll be rolling out some special new events and classes over the next several months. Our Free FUN Class last week was the first of these. Look for more coming up in the next week or so!

THANK YOU for being part of my life–and evolution!
Love,
Alia

Wonderland starts Sunday!

I am so excited for Wonderland! And part of my excitement is that Delsarte movement expert Joe Williams will be our guest artist, with a 2-hour live interactive workshop on using Delsarte principles to subtly enhance meaning, emotion, and engagement in our dance! As you may remember, I included Joe’s workshops last year in my professional development post; I am beyond delighted to host him as a guest artist for Wonderland!

Wonderland includes so much material for making meaningful, compelling dances! It is great for creating structures to inform improvisational dances, or to give richness and depth to set choreographies. It can even be used on the fly, with music you’ve never heard before!

This is a major component of the CDA system that I use to make all my dances. CDA incorporates musical structure, narrative and symbolic content, stage pictures, and more to create fully realized dances for improvisation or choreography. Wonderland is the heart of this system.

The course runs 5 weeks, concurrently with Secret Stories, a FUN Class Deep Dive into theatrical expression. Secret Stories (a $65 value) starts Tuesday! It is included free in Wonderland as a bonus! (but you can also just sign up for Secret stories–it’s going to be WONDER-ful ; )

I’ve even included a private lesson with me for each student, to better develop your vision!

This is going to be such a great class! There are still spaces left, along with a modest sliding scale. Wonderland will be hosted on a private forum, just for participants. I hope you will join us!

With all my love,
Alia

Your Holiday Gift!

She raises her hands and brings the return of the light

2021 was a big year for me in many ways. My Mom became very ill on Jan 28. I stopped everything to be everything to be with her. She passed away April 17, and was buried, which was her choice, April 28. Fortunately, a dear friend moved to Vermont just in time to help me though. But it was much harder than I ever imagined it would be, and I only did what could not be put off.

The rest of the year feels like one long lost weekend. I did what I had to do and nothing more.

But I did get some things done. And, to my amazement, they came out rather well.

The FUN Class

We ran SEVEN Fun Class Deep Dives, each with it’s own special topic!

Open Heart: Improvisational belly dance infused with Dancemeditation and Somatic Experiencing®.
BEDROCK I : Re-patterning our foundation movement vocabulary
BEDROCK II: Improvisation with Transitions and Combinations
BEDROCK III: Improvisational Musicality
Entrancing: How to Improvise to Entrance Music
Visionary Veil–Beyond Tricks: How to improvise with the veil
Bobby Style!: Exploring Bobby’s class format from the 70s, small combinations, different every time.
(Our next FUN Class will be Bobby Style II: With Zils on!)

SIX new classes!

SPARK*
Feeling Resistant to Creating?
How to Dance or Speak for the Camera
How to Write a Great Blog Post
How to Map Your Music from Fact to Fantasy
How to Make a Dance in FIVE Days

I’m amazed to have put out all this content. Plus the newsletter!

FORTY-TWO newsletters!

Most of them written this year. Which is pretty darn good.

I also had the good fortune to undertake

Scads of Professional Development

Dandash’s fabulous class series for Zara’s Zouk
Joe Williams’ monthly Delsarte workshops
Kathy Kain’s yearlong Touch Skill Training for Trauma Therapists
Ariel Giarreto’s brilliant Healing Sexual Trauma
The Transformative Power of Eros w/ Dr. Peter Levine & Kimberly Johnson
Eric Maisel’s yearlong Creativity Coach Support Group
Lisa Zahiya’s Make More Online (which I am just beginning)
Peter Levine’s Covid, Post ICU, and Ventilator Trauma
Plus half a dozen excellent trauma skill webinars produced by Somatic Experiencing International
A year of Dunya’s Dancemeditation classes on Zoom (heaven!)
Mary Bond’s superb body reading classes
And a bunch of other things I can’t remember right now ; )

On the personal fulfillment side, I bought a deck of Tarot cards.
I drew ninety-five pictures on my phone (including the one above)
I read over a hundred twenty-five books.

That’s a lotta stuff.

Especially for a year that felt like I wandered through in a fog. While navigating the bizarre cocktail of stressful grief-stricken scary weird shit with which we are all coping. And avoiding Covid.

So here’s to 2022!

Let’s make it the best year we possibly can.

I want to get better at self-care. Regain my health. Nurture my spirit mystic side. Come into my power. Integrate my interests into a full-featured rich resource to help us THRIVE.

What about you?

Where have you been? Where are you going? How will you get there?
Let me know…
Below↓

AND

I have a gift for you.

Well, two.

**The first gift is SPARK* FREE**

I’m giving this because it is about relaxing, rebooting, and nervous system regulation through movement. It’s about feeling better and trusting our bodies. You will find that here, and it will be available all year: https://aliathabit.com/2021-gift/

The second is an invite to a party!

Omicron crashed our local First Night.
We usually draw thousands of folks to our little corner of the middle of nowhere.

So the event hosts are making it free, live, and online.
Dec 21: LIVE streaming performances all evening.
Artists and schedule here: www.firstnightnorth.org

We gotta have fun and enjoy what we can!
Hugs and Love for 2022,
Alia

How to Gather Nectar

bees gather nectar pollen biological mandate

Bees pollinate flowers, right? So so some moths, and a few other insects. The flowers get to reproduce, and the bees get food.

Symbiosis!

Symbiosis is a process in which all parties to the arrangement benefit. Unlike its opposite, parasitism, in which one party benefits at the expense of another, symbiosis is the original win-win.

Bees have it easy. They don’t wonder about the ethical ramifications of their floral relationships. They don’t agonize at night about whether it is fair to drink the flowers’ nectar, to fly off with there pollen. They don’t have existential doubts. They have a biological mandate.

We, on the other hand, have a bit more of a puzzle to solve.

Where is our Biological Mandate?

We wonder about a lot of things–we can’t sleep for the constant questions. Is it okay for me to do X fun thing? Do my words or actions detract from or harm others? Who am I to think my needs are so important? These are important questions. So…

All any soul-nurturing stuff, which, our culture tells us, is selfish frivolity, may demand some soul-searching. And sometimes our discoveries aren’t pretty. For example, when our interests collide with someone else’s.

One such conflict of interest is when we give priority to doing things for other people and don’t make any time for ourselves. I don’t know if you have noticed this, but I find that all I have to do is plan something for myself (or even have a deadline), and the phone starts ringing, or someone needs help.

Women tend to be socialized to help everyone else first.

But you know what they say on every airplane? Please secure your own oxygen mask before helping others. It’s great that we care about our friends and family, and it can be hard to carve out a little space for ourselves without feeling guilty. But the fact is, everyone else gets better service when our own creativity is fed and cared for.

Another conflict is when a loved one has issues with our dance interests. Some of us step back at that point, often for very good reasons. Some of us go forward, for equally good reasons. For myself, I went forward. Those issues were the last straw in a difficult relationship, and I had already compromised myself nearly out of existence. Another friend stepped back. She found other creative outlets that worked for her. Both of these responses were valid, and both took courage.

And sometimes the conflict of interests is with ourselves. Our own doubts and fears can keep us from nurturing ourselves and our creative side. We wonder so hard if we are doing the right thing that we can talk ourselves out of the self-care that dance gives us. We put so much pressure on ourselves. Who are we to dance? We’re not very good. We’re not even “doing anything” with our dance. Well, so what?

Just dancing for fun is plenty. Fun is important! Feeling good is important to our physical and emotional well-being. If we don’t fill our own well, no one else is going to come along and do it for us, nice as that would be.

It’s on us to gather our own nectar.

Yes, sometimes it’s very, very hard to give ourselves that love and care, to give ourselves time to rest, to enjoy things, to dance, whatever it is we need to thrive. Nature abhors a vacuum, they say, and our time tends to fill up fast.

Many of us have been subject to all three of the above scenarios—most of us probably have done at least two out of three. So what helps?

Put yourself first.

I have to learn this lesson over and over. Other things take a LOT more time than doing a little art. And they are never done. So finishing everything else first is a very bad idea. Take 20 minutes to do some fun art stuff first and you are set for the day—you get that little cookie of satisfaction that lasts all day long.

Accountability.

Put yourself fin a position where you have to do it. Courses and intentions are a good choice for that. Marking off the days you dance on a calendar helps to establish a streak. It’s fun to keep the streak going. Having a friend do it with you, so you can check in with each other. I created SPARK* mostly to help myself take care of myself.

Embrace your biological mandate.

Just say YES. Humans have made art since they figured out that charcoal makes marks on rocks. You have the right to make art. To do something enjoyable. Step forward with your unique vision. Give it the nurturing it needs to blossom and grow. No one else in all the world can do what you can. Trust yourself. Let it out. It’s time.

Love,

Alia

PS Want some help?

**SPARK* is here for you.**

For all of us feeling burned out, angry, anxious, alone, lost, sad, or searching, SPARK* can help rekindle our heart, our life, our joy.

I’m collecting alllll my skills and tools for this one. Oriental dance, Dancemeditation, Creativity, and Somatic Experiencing. I like things that are magic, and these are all magical in their practice and their effects. Soothing, enlivening, grounding, energizing! SPARK works on so many levels to bring us back into our bodies, to ourselves, to our balance and comfort in the world. Just tune in and enjoy. I’ll be your flower ; ) Symbiosis!

When is the last time we had actual fun? Enjoyment is a biological mandate, too. We are made for pleasure. Nectar!

Spark FREE is a one-shot reprieve from the daily wtf. August 6 at 5pm edt. YES, there will be a recording. It’s FREE and everyone is welcome. More info is here.
https://alia-thabit.ck.page/sparkfree

SPARK* A 6-week soul vacation is a deeper immersion into soul healing, release, and joy. SPARK* runs Fridays, 5:30-6:30pm edt, August 13 through Friday, Sept 24 (no class Friday, August 27). YES, there is a recording!

Registration is now open. Seating is limited. There’s a special treat for early signups (but it’s a secret. Hint: It will come in the mail). https://aliathabit.com/shop/#trust

Here’s some lovely music…https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjPhXjmrTPE&list=PLqgbyDNJ3NvWoIyjZf0BnSzLP1yzMvf43

How to kill creativity

Imagine you give a kid a cute little toy. It lights up, spins around, the whole deal. Then imagine you spend half an hour explaining to the poor kid how it works. You show them every single thing it does. Then you leave them to play. What happens? Nothing. That toy is dead.

All the magic can be explained out of things. When there is nothing to explore, things lose their shine. The allure fades. With a new concept, the fun is in exploring it—sometimes in bizarre ways. That bizarreness makes all the fun. Play, curiosity, and exploration are ways we learn and grow.

Contrast this with how dance is often taught. A concept or move is introduced. Then it is explained to death. Why? Because people are addicted to explanation. They want to know why and how before they do it.

Information feels safe. We want to do it right. We don’t like mistakes. This is exactly why so much dance is boring, since we learn through making mistakes—and then correcting them. When we are spoon-fed material, we might get to correct mistakes (a lot of them), but they are all related to someone else’s vision. We need to make our own, as we explore and discover for ourselves.

Consider Elena Lentini’s wind exercise. Dance as a leaf blown by the wind. The image is enough. The sound and feel and temperature of the wind engage multiple senses. We can relate to that. We can play with that. What is the wind? Gusty? Warm? Cold? Up to you. What kind of leaf? A red leaf? A huge leaf? A new spring leaf? Up to you.

The fewer specifics, the more the imagination fires up. Our mind and the quilted wonder of our memory supply details, skipping around, swapping them in and out. Try it if you haven’t yet. It’s fun. Of course, there is also purpose to the wind exercise. Several. It does a lot of things at once. I’ll explain, but for now, continue to play with that image (try adding a veil, too). And play.

Here’s some music for that.

Play is key. It opens creativity, happiness, and an inquisitive, open delight in the world. This dance is, at its heart, play. It is exploration, release, communication, shared love. We often lose sight of that while perfecting our hip drops. As teachers, we help our students connect by making time for experimentation, play, and fun.

Sufis say to have the experience first and get the explanation later. Modern learning science backs this up. Learning is more durable when we grapple with a concept or skill on our own before getting an explanation. We turn it upside down, bang it against the wall, poke and prod, and generally get our hands good and dirty. It may feel frustrating (especially if we are concerned about doing it “right”), but it’s far more nourishing.

To recap:

Explanations kill the fun.

Experience first, explain later.

Play is your best friend.

Have fun!

Love,

Alia

More: Why Preschool Shouldn’t Be Like School (cites two interesting studies, from one of which comes the opening story): http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2011/03/why_preschool_shouldnt_be_like_school.html

Crackin’ the Cosmic Egg of 2021: Let’s Dance!

Today is filled with New Year advice, suggestions, and resolutions.

I just want to dance.

I’ll dance every day in January, and post it, too. Care to join me?
#Danceuary21 Insta and FB for me; post wherever you like.

Any music you want. Any outfit you want (your bathrobe or sweats are fine). Any timeframe you want (but let’s make the posts no more than a minute or so). I suggest this as a first song if anyone is wondering what to use: Boom Shakalak

Holiday Hugs and HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Alia

PS The Bellydance Bundle’s Struggle to Strength is a (NOT) competition–all the good stuff of goals and accomplishment, and none of the bad. It’s a 4-month accountability program with professional feedback. https://aliathabit.com/S2S Use my name–ALIA–for a $20 discount.

PPS These are cool. Two different approaches to the sheet music for Alf Leila wi Leila

Season’s Greetings 2020!

It’s that time of year, and I have not one but TWO gifts for you!

One is a video, The Secret of Ramus the Inferior, which we talked about last week. Many thanks to the brave dancers who joined me in making it! I will send that to the newslist on December 25–because I was raised with Christmas and I enjoy it–including carols and all the pagan trimmings ; ). Not on the list? Join here.

The second is an invitation. I usually do Tuning In (a half-hour SE-infused chillout session) on Fridays at 4pm EST. See this in your time zone (add to calendar button in link) This year, Christmas is on a Friday. I thought about canceling, but I am on my own for the holidays, and I know many other folks may be as well. Plus, let’s face it, holidays are stressful enough without a plague, economic uncertainty, and social unrest. So…

I am opening up Tuning In this Friday, December 25, to anyone who might like to hang out and chill out for half an hour.

Here’s how it will go.

We’ll have our Tuning In session, which will be recorded as usual (participants are not visible on the recording). Then we will stop the recording, have a dance break, and then a short general chat session to say hi and connect with each other. I invite you to bring snacks, drinks, what have you.

I will send an email to the list tomorrow at about 3:45pm EST, with the zoom link. You are welcome to invite friends, but please do not post the link anywhere public. Not on the list? Join here.

That’s it!

Thank you for being in my life!

I look forward to dancing with you!

Love,
Alia
PS speaking of carols, here are links to my all-time favorite Christmas music (and we are talking decades). I even gave copies to my kids.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLgWNRSRt0A/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUcHnLTnxNU/
You can get this music straight from the creator, Bob McNally, here.

You’ve heard of Ramses the Great–but what about Ramus the Inferior?

It’s a good thing I’ve been celebrating tiny wins recently! A lot of other things have kind of fallen off the table, like this newsletter (Happy Thanksgiving ; ). But here we are! I’ve missed you, and I’m glad to be back.

It’s a pretty special time, and not just for the holidays. The Age of Aquarius is finally here–when “peace will guide the planets and love will steer the stars.” And not a moment too soon! Well, it will be on Dec 21, when Jupiter and Saturn kiss each other as they pass by in the sky. They are visible now, if you look near the horizon in the SouthWest, about an hour after sunset. They will be getting closer together every night until their Grand Conjunction on the 21st–an event which has not happened for 400 years.

I know, people laugh at astrology, but if the moon can turn the tides here on earth, who am I to judge? The Aquarian Age will last 2000 years, so let’s hope it is a good time for us and our planet ; )

And yes, we have all the seasonal holidays too! One of my favorite things at this time of year is deciding what I will give you as a gift. And I know now what it will be. Of course, it is a secret! BUT!

IF you are available on Sunday Dec 20 from 4-5 PM EST (see this in your time zone (add to calendar button in link), AND you can meet via Zoom, AND you’d like to help me create this gift (and discover the secret of Ramus sooner rather than later–YES this is all about our dance!), then click this link: Ramusize me. You’ll get an email to confirm.

Otherwise, you’ll just have to be patient until the gift arrives (Dec 25, so it’s not a long wait ; ).

THANK YOU for being part of my life this crazy year!
Here’s to 2021–with harmony and understanding.

Love and Joy,
Alia

How about a nice vacation?

We’re getting down to the wire here. In the USA, elections are in less than three weeks. Covid is spiking worldwide. The centuries-long other pandemic of systemic oppression is going strong, too, with a rise in fascism, racism, and xenophobia across the planet. Who wouldn’t like a vacation? Oh, wait. We can’t really travel…

Good thing we dance!

We’ve all gone to a belly dance class feeling crappy and come out feeling light-years better. And even though most of us don’t go in person now, there are so many online options! (Yes, there are issues around bandwidth, and so forth, so I always have recordings, and I edit those recordings to bring down their size.) Mostly we think of classes as things at which we work.

Let’s think of them as mini vacations!

We get to let go of the real world, feed our souls, and nurture our bodies, all at once.

Humans are not suited to suffer endlessly. No living creature is. Chronic stress isn’t just unpleasant; it has serious health effects. We can grit our teeth and get through it, but what will really help is stepping back from our pain, especially when we can do that in nurturing ways.

Like a belly dance vacation!

To really dig in to this, I’ve enriched all my classes with extra vacation goodness–especially now.

Our next Deep Dive, Open Heart Belly Dance,

We’l connect Dancemeditation, Somatic Experiencing, and Oriental dance into a rich, luscious roll in joy. It’s all follow-me and improvisation with centering and grounding, breath, expansion, and interoceptive body-awareness, a soothing balm for the soul. Lower your heart rate, soothe your senses, and dance better, too!

What we’ll do
*Nurture pleasure and self-compassion
* Bask in the moment of improvisation
* Allow our own body’s wisdom to bring the moves to us
This is NOT about perfection, drills, or copying
This IS about enriching personal style, musicality, improv ease, and joy in the moment

Little talk, lots of unique exercises, modeling, and guided practice.

Open Heart runs from Tuesday, October 20 through Tuesday, Nov 17m from 4-5PM EDT See this in your time zone (add to calendar button in link).

Of course, a lot of us are super broke now too, so Open Heart has Pandemic Pricing, including payment plans, sliding scale, and Pay What You Will.

Registration is now open! https://aliathabit.com/shop/#live

With all my love,
Alia

PS Of course, many of us are saving up for The Belly Dance Bundle, because it’s such a deal.

That goes on sale next week. It’s in two tracks this year (or you can get both).
The Dance Track.
The Lecture Track.
There is a STUNNING amount of cool stuff in each track
I contributed a deep dive into Taqsim this year — Here is my podcast on Taqsim, and my Instagram Challenge UnDrill Taqsim video for your enjoyment (I’m Day 6). More on this next week!
Big hugs to everyone!