Somatic means so much more than what you can learn about it in one go...

I've decided to document some feedback after running our movement workshops at Good Hotel London. Every workshop provides a different kind of outcome depending on the participants, the energy in the room, and also what is happening in my personal life reminding myself that I am simply a human being first, and as an artist second. I always write a draft workshop plan, just to have some sort of structure and see what I can introduce to the participants. However, reading the room, I can always slightly shift my decisions, depending on the participants's needs. 

What I value from these workshops, is that it invites everyone to explore movement differently. What do I mean by that? Imagine dancing whilst no one is watching. This is the atmosphere I want to create when I propose a creative task and every participant they have material to work with on their own.  I also have group creative tasks, where it allow everyone to get to know each other and simply enjoy movement together. 

Today I have offered to explore closely what 'A W A R E N E S S' means to us. First of all, we have tried to connect with our bodies with the curtains closed (you would think does this make any difference, try it yourself to meditate for a few minutes in the daylight, but with the curtains closed and after a few minutes of exploration try with opened curtains). It does feel that certain sensations start to appear. And this is the goal of these sessions is to offer various ways of looking at things, even though we might do them ourselves. Could you pause and listen? After this, we explored in pairs a little bit about trust and awareness of each other. One person walking towards you and walking away and vice versa. Then we used touch in pairs again. This time the task was 'what quality of touch would like to offer: slow, fast, heavy, light, moving, non-moving, and so on. How does the one feel receiving it and how does the one feel giving it?

Then we tried our third awareness exercise about how much we trust our partner. Facing each other back to back and one by one leaning toward each other. The one who receives the weight offers stability and strength. The one who kind of lets the body go explores how far they can trust their partners. Note, we have tried different variations for this, to express your weight on your partner facing forward whilst your partner still receives with their back. Some felt more comfortable.

A very fun activity is to create your choreography of saying hello with 7 movements each and the same saying goodbye with 7 movements each. It felt so light and playful to witness the ladies come up with such different levels of movements, and the mood was so happy. Happy place.

In the end, it was time to have a little bit of dance improvisation, I always have a feeling that playing a few songs to close the session fits perfectly, finding a way to come back to yourself and to reflect on the session.

My friends, my ladies, thank you for being here today.

Yours,

Agne

14th of October

Feedback: ' I feel like coming home.'