The eve of the first Professional Development Program

The air is still and night is descending on the Studio and environs. All is in readiness for the first Skeletal Program with seven people arriving from around Australia to deepen their study of Body-Mind Centering and Somatic Research. I am poised and waiting with anticipation for this new beginning and decade of my work. Daniel Troy and Ross have continued to make subtle changes to the studio and the surrounds to make it both more practical and more beautiful. I am indebted to both of them for helping me fulfil a dream and a vision. 

Riddells Creek Studio is situated in a gorgeous little valley, near a village, and the longer I hang around the more folk I meet with interesting lives, and abundant creativity. 

I hope many folk will come and dance or take up an artist's residency in this luscious place. A dancer from Greece has already enquired so I look forward to the unfolding of this space in multiple ways.

Thoughts for the beginning of 2012

To be alive, it seemed to me, as I stood there in all kinds of sorrow, was to be both original and reflection, and to be dead was to be split off, to be reflection alone. Teju Cole, Open City, 2011.

I am reading this book and enjoying the concurrent streaming of awareness the author's character makes as he walks, works and lives through the days and nights of New York City. His attention to the historical detail alongside the nuance of his feeling state is compelling.

This concurrent streaming of different awareness is a familiar experience in my own life, as the imaginary, sensory and intellectual streams of thought converge. At any moment anything might happen ... this morning I thought I heard a helicopter and on venturing outside I saw an eagle soaring high above in the blue blue sky –wing span catching and riding the air currents as I watched in wonder. Last night a Powerful Owl, today an eagle ... watch, wait and breathe ... Blessings and salutations for the New Year!

sensing the summer

It is the end of the year and summer is lurking around ... wonderful. The thought of salt and the ocean on my skin is delicious. It has been a huge and wonderful year of fulfilling a life vision and all of the labour of love to bring it into being. Riddells Creek Studio is a space for dance research and renewal.

I wrote this recently in response to an enquiry:

"I want my work to be incisive, vital and passionate for me and for those who experience it. I want to imagine that this work has the capacity to change lives and social structures over time."

This is my wish for you all for the coming year ... to be challenged in the work of your life and find pleasure in the generative power of that.

Anticipating the opening of the studio

I am back from my trans-continental work and travels between Perth and Sydney. In between arriving home, and driving to the Victorian Alps to teach my annual workshop, I am resting at Riddells Creek. Today the sun is shining, the birds are singing and the insects chirping … bliss! The workshop this weekend in Tawonga is due to the wondrous yoga teacher Mary-lou Hogarth and each year is a delight as we explore BMC in the lush environment of the Keiwa Valley. Outside the doors of the hall we can view Mt Bogong with its snowy peak.

 This morning I made a proprietorial round of the Riddells Creek property … as the mistress/madam (mmm nice double entendre!!) I feel like I am at the service of this glorious piece of earth. The creek is running after heavy rains, and I imagine the pleasure people will have in discovering the many beautiful places on the property when they attend the first retreat in a few weeks. It is a very exciting and exacting time. Ross and Daniel continue to work alongside each other creating the bathroom. Local trades people have added their skills and specialties. The Studio/Retreat has become the source of much local wonder and interest. We recognize we are creating a significant space in a community. I look forward to a time when we welcome both the local folk and the performing community of Melbourne in a celebratory opening ritual.

 In the meantime there is work to be done and I feel thrilled and excited at the emergence of this long held vision. Sometimes it feels surreal and then I venture into the studio and I experience a profound sense of potential. The space is waiting for us to fill it with moving bodies, moving minds, and the luminosity of delicious dancing.

falling into love again ... through the constellation of our endocrine system

“We understand human sexual attraction poorly because it is tied to the invisible and to the imperceptible of the flesh; to the soul, to the breath.” Luce Irigaray, Between East and West: From Singularity to Community, New York, Columbia University Press (2002: 82).

Our Endocrine System is the system of our hormones, which we associate with our sexuality. Culturally I believe, like the French Feminist philosopher Luce Irigaray, that we have an impoverished understanding of sexual attraction. The erotic and the sexual, the fecund and the potent all portend to the life force, which is both fuller and more complex than any of us individually.

The sixteen glands are organized along the vertical axis. In the workshop we will explore the relationship and alignment between the glands and our diaphragms. The diaphragms provide horizontal support throughout the torso enabling the use of voice and integration around the vertical axis. From the base of the spine and the pelvic floor to the cranial diaphragm and the pineal gland we will sound and move our way through the torso and around the vertical axis. This will help to ground the glands in the body through the expression of voice.

The endocrine system connects us beyond the material body to the complexity of existence … pre-conception and post-death … a communication network transported by the fluids and beyond … a constellation!