This is my book The Synergy Game. I am serialising it here a chapter a week. Each chapter will be available for everyone to read because, after all, that’s why I’ve written it, to help others, to share what has helped me to rebuild my life. I will be adding extra insights, sharing my poetry and adding audio to a section below for paying members.
Chapter 6 - Rhythms of Release: Dancing My Way to Freedom
"Dance is the hidden language of the soul." - Martha Graham
Naturally, this follows on from the last chapter as sometimes no matter how dreadful a dancer you are you can't help yourself.
I don't consider myself a very good dancer (pretty awful actually) but I do love to do it. I used to be very self-conscious when I was younger and would only wobble about slightly unless I'd had a drink or two, but as I've gotten older, I really don't care.
It's a wonderful aspect of being in your fifties that I never expected. The fact that you really don't give a shit anymore about so many things. Things that used to worry me in my twenties and thirties don't anymore. In fact, I look back and can hardly believe I put so much store by what other people thought of me, my hair, how I dressed, how I sounded, what I talked about. It's ridiculous now I think about it.
So now when I want to dance, I do. Very often it's on my own in my living room which is wonderful, as I can pretend I'm singing like Celine Dion, and dancing like Beyoncé. I can assure you, however, that there is no resemblance to either when I catch myself in the mirror or hear my voice. But it does something to me. It seems to release any tension, any stress, any anxiety.
I found that I could get the sort of high that I used to need a large whiskey to reach. Putting on some beautiful music that I could get lost in or some dance music with a fantastic beat and literally dancing around my coffee table, into the hallway, around my dining table and back into the living room, out of breath but smiling and feeling great.
It makes me feel alive, the blood is pumping, and my body is moving. Just like music, dance raises my vibration. It's like an automatic injection of feel-good.
To me, dance used to be something I did when I went to parties or concerts. I never thought of it as a regular thing I could do and something that would help me on my healing journey.
I think it's to do with the combination of music and movement. Our bodies are made to move. It's not natural that we sit in front of a computer all day and then sit on a sofa all evening. We were designed to move and be active. I think it's a way of releasing stuck energy and emotions.
Think back to our ancestors. not even very far back. People moved so much more. Before cars and computers, trains and TV, there was so much more moving around. To get anywhere it was either a bicycle or walking. Work was more active both in and out of the home.
Because our lives are so sedentary now it's vitally important that we are aware of just moving and the easiest way to do that is to put on some music and, as Lady Gaga said, just dance!
Sometimes I'd find myself really getting into it and letting my body just go with the music and the beat and then suddenly, I'd start sobbing. Huge deep howls of pain and despair. At first it sort of scared me, the strong emotions I was feeling, the suddenness of it, but then I realised how good I felt after. There was a calmness as if I'd gotten rid of another layer of pain and hurt.
I think my body knew that it was in a safe space, that there were things that needed to leave. I'd added another tool to the kit. Once I realised how good it was, I was even more aware of letting my body do its own thing, tuning in to my emotions and if I needed to cry, I would. If I needed to just enjoy the movement, I did.
I think too that the more I did it the less inhibited I became. It's like my body was learning what it liked to do and how it liked to feel. Although it was just me in my living room, it was like shadowboxing. I had read about the concept of shadowboxing a few weeks earlier.
It's a technique that famous boxers like Jim Corbett and Gene Tunney use and that Billy Graham used. It's a sort of pretending. So what Jim Corbett would do is practice throwing a punch at an imaginary opponent in the mirror so when he met him in the ring his body and mind already knew what to do. Billy Graham would preach his sermons to cypress stumps in a Florida swamp before going out to speak to live audiences.
What made me think my dancing in my living room was like shadowboxing is that I read about a woman who was very nervous in social situations. She and her husband were often invited to parties and other social events, and when she got there, she would be so nervous she wouldn't be able to think of anything to say to anyone. It was suggested to her that she practice at home.
She set up her living room like a party room, with chairs and imagined various guests. She would go up to them and make conversation and interact with them without any fear or nervousness. What she discovered was that the next time she was at a social event with her husband, she was confident and relaxed, and was able to enjoy it and chat to the guests just like she did in her make-believe party at home.
The next time I went out with my friends to a live music event in a nearby town in the summer, I felt freer than I ever had before to just enjoy the music and dance. I didn't worry so much what people thought. My body was remembering what it felt like to be free and dance around my living room, the venue was just a little different.
One thing I learned through this is that often we tell ourselves that we can't do things because we are not very good. Or someone has made a comment about something we do, often years previously and it's stuck.
My parents danced. They were ballroom dancers, not professionally, just for fun, although they did win quite a few competitions, so I grew up seeing them often dancing in the living room when I was a child.
When I left home and started going to parties, someone commented on my lack of dance skills and that was it, for years and years. It affected me so that I was very self-conscious all the time when I was in a situation where there was dancing, even though I absolutely loved to do it. It's taken me this long to enjoy it again. At the age I am now though and the way I feel it wouldn't matter what anyone said, I'd still keep dancing!
Dancing takes energy though, a lot of it. My next chapter talks about something that has always been of interest to me and that was to become my next healing tool. A tool that would not only provide me with the energy to dance but to get through my days. I needed not just physical, but also mental and emotional energy.
Previous Chapter - The Healing Power of Music: Transforming Trauma and Embracing Self-Love Through Sound
Next Chapter - Feeding the Soul: Nutrition's Role in Healing and Strength
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This next section is for paying members only. In it, I’m sharing some poetry and some thoughts I wrote after dipping my toes into the dating pool after a very long absence. There is also an audio reading of the chapter.
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