WHY WORK WITH THE BODY-MIND?

Understanding how the past has shaped you can be very liberating. When you engage with your unconscious
early conditioning - especially at an embodied level - powerful change becomes possible and you start to have more choice about how you are living your life. Dance of Awareness   is an embodied movement practice that invites you to consciously connect with your body and explore developmental themes from early childhood. The Dance of Awareness cycle takes you through a dynamic movement journey which consists of six sequential phases: Sensing; Grounding; Expressing; Releasing; Connecting and Completing. Informed by psychodynamic theory and developmental psychology, the cycle follows childhood stages of development from pre-birth to around five years.
 

By listening to the imprints and stories from these formative years still held in the body-mind, you will be
invited to explore: How did I become the way I am? Through movement and dance, somatic awareness and
embodied exercises, we will look at how early experiences of key developmental issues such as safety, trust,
support, validation, autonomy and contact shaped your ‘becoming’ and show up in your embodied and
relational patterns as an adult. Within the safety of a supportive group environment and the permission of the dance floor, you will have the opportunity to practice letting go of self-limiting patterns from the past and move beyond the early conditioning that no longer serves you. You can experiment with new, more authentic and creative ways of relating to yourself and others and enquire: Who do I want to become now?

 

What Is Dance of Awareness?
Dance of Awareness  is an embodied movement practice that explores early developmental patterns through a dynamic movement journey. It invites a rich and joyful exploration of what it is to be a body in the world, moving in response to inner awareness and outer connectedness. It draws on several influences: Post-Reichian body psychotherapy; Five Rhythms; Authentic Movement and Mindfulness Practice. Set to music, the Dance of Awareness cycle takes you through six sequential phases: Sensing; Grounding; Expressing; Releasing; Connecting and Completing. Informed by ideas from psychodynamic theory and developmental psychology, the cycle is designed to evoke childhood stages of development from pre-birth to around 5 years. Throughout the process there is a strong emphasis on body awareness which provides the ground for our experience. By revisiting imprints from our formative years, we can celebrate strengths and resources that have evolved, let go of self-limiting patterns from the past and discover more authentic ways of relating to others. 

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An Overview of What the Day Involves:
We will start with warming up the body to music and arriving in the space. There will be an opening circle and
brief introduction to Dance of Awareness.  Over the course of the day, we will dance our way through the 6
phases of the Dance of Awareness cycle (Sensing, Grounding, Expressing, Releasing, Connecting and
Completing). There will be guidance from myself, some structured exercises and plenty of time for free
movement and dancing to find your own flow. We will have a lunch break of 1 hour at around 1p.m. and a tea
break in the afternoon. For most of the day we will let our bodies do the talking but there will be some
opportunities for verbal sharing in the whole circle at the beginning and the end of the day, as well as time for
reflection and integration in pairs and small groups after exercises. The group will have a maximum of 14
participants to allow for in depth exploration and a safe, well-held, therapeutic environment.

 

About Lucy
I am a relational body psychotherapist and have been working with individuals and groups for over 25 years. I have an MA in Humanistic and Integrative Psychotherapy and have done extensive further training in Somatic Trauma Therapy and Embodied Relational Therapy which emerged from Reichian body work and body-centred psychotherapy. I am a full member of the European Association of BodyPsychotherapy (EABP). When I discovered Dance of Awareness,  I immediately knew I’d found a home for myself: it brings together two things I feel passionately about, conscious dance and body psychotherapy, and in 2017 I qualified as a licensed facilitator. Most recently, I became a certified breathwork practitioner and run regular groups in Conscious Connected Breathwork in Findhorn.