Creative cycles

[Susan Hosken]

Dear friend,
I have pronounced cycles of super creative time and then quiet time on a 10 to 21 day cycle. I was interested to know how other peoples cycles are. Do you have creative and quiet times or are you creative all the time. How do you deal with the cycles? How do you cope when you aren't being creative? I find the time when I am quiet and uncreative except for my writing the most challenging. I love being creative. i'd love to read your reactions to this post.
lots of love from susan in australia
PS The photo is one of my first bracelets. I just learnt the other day how to do them

[WildCherry]

The big main meal is still alive and well here in spain, the land of the Siesta ;-)

[Barbara Ann Storrier]

Ah ... what could be more comforting that a Siesta with a full belly :)
I'm a nappy fan, especially in winter and when it's extremely hot in the summer ...

[Dan Goodwin]

I loved reading this Fiona, thanks for being so open. I'm going to come back and read again. What strikes me and makes me smile is how you've listened to your creativity, you haven't tried to cram it in a tiny corner and make it do things it doesn't want to. Very very freeing, as you've obviously found.

Thanks for sharing your cycles!

Dan

[Susan Hosken]

Fiona, thanks for sharing your creative cycles. Wow yours are so detailed.
lots of love from susan in australia

[WildCherry]

I started belly dancing class at my local adult ed in Oct and its fabulous! Really brilliant exercise as it teaches you to isolate different parts of your body and it really works muscles that often lie dormant in our modern western lifestyle - particularly shoulder and chest muscles! The music really gets into my psyche and I find that as soon as I listen to some outside the class, my body starts trying to do the moves...Its great fun and really cathartic so go for it!

[Dan Goodwin]

That sounds brilliant Cherry : )

Dancing of any kind is so good for us, creatively and for our general health and happiness.

[WildCherry]

So true...I'm sure its a natural state for us as all cultures have dancing but we don't always make a place for it in our modern lives...Dancing is something I feel I have had an overdue appointment with for some time! I felt very self-conscious when I began, and whilst I'm not over that entirely, I am beginning to feel more relaxed about my body in movement...

[Jules]

I think you are right WildCherry- it is a neglected natural state. I have always been self-conscious like you are- I do not really understand that. At one of my spiritual retreats a gal had a workshop on dance as a way to meditate/ a spiritual practice. When she led the group, in a free form type dance, just encuoraging movement of the entire body- for the first time in my life I was dancing without any of the discouraging thoughts that usually run through my brain.
It is strange- but I felt a connection to Mother Earth- to myself and to the other people at this retreat dancing with me around a circle...I was pumped up and excitd- really felt alive.
I do think if I could do that more I would be more in tune with nature's cycles, therefore more in tune with my own cycles. I just put road blocks up for myself when it comes to dance- even after that wonderful experience.

[Dan Goodwin]

Yes, definitely a natural state, a primal urge. I honestly don't think I've ever felt more in the flow with something than when dancing to a great track with a great partner. No other creative experiences (I have had) are quite like that as they tend to be cerebral, like writing, whereas with dancing it's far more physical. Obviously!

My fellow salsa teaching friend Dawn always says that dancing freely begins in the mind. We have so many English people come to salsa who are incredibly stiff and wooden, not through any biological or physical reason, but simply because it's not been acceptable in our culture to move in the loose and sinuous ways that Latin American dances like salsa require. It's self consciousness and cultural programming that holds them back, not any physical disability... Very interesting seeing how some loosen up very quickly, taken on a dancing alter ego almost, whereas others never do and remain as stiff as they day they started...

[Barbara Ann Storrier]

Do people ever do drum circles where you live? It's so neat to just feel the beat and allow yourself to move to it ... and there are not too many who can resist it, so the self consciousness thing just takes a back seat ...

"It's the heart afraid of breaking
That never learns to dance"

Bette Midler - "The Rose"

[Dan Goodwin]

I used to go to djembe drumming, very hard on the hands, but brilliant when the whole room was filled with layers of overlapping rhythms. Very powerful...

[Jules]

The gal got the workshop from Soul Motion Vin Marti is the creator- he had a studio in Portland Or at the time I got this info.
It starts with a drum circle type thing- then gradually becomes more individual within the group.

Soul Motion is Vin Marti's design for improvisational movement as meditation. It is transformative dance that redefines the relationship between mind and body through movement. Vin Martin serves as a dancer, a teacher and a spiritual guide of Soul Motion which embraces the directive that Martha Graham has for her dancers : "There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening, that is translated through you into action...this expression is unique. If you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and will be lost";

At the core of Soul Motion is Marti's instructions to :"Open your intuition. Rearrange the familiar, notice what emerges. Expect nothing but allow for all things.
Soul Motion has little to do with percision, technicalities or compititon, instead this dance form is a personal journey using the dancers own individual rhythm and dance style to bridge body and soul and to connect with one's self, one another and the dance community.

I have not looked yet, but I bet he has info on line