I appreciate how Life provides endless opportunities to see how we cause ourselves to suffer, so that we can drop that and end suffering. Recently, I recognized a familiar pattern of suffering showing up in a new context -- on the dance floor.
First, there was a call from the heart to do something I love, dance, but in a new form: partner dancing. Attending to the body in motion, while listening and responding to another person, would combine two things I love: movement and Awareness Practice. However, what began as a joyful impulse from Life quickly turned into an ego takeover. Starting something new that I thought might be light, fun and interesting was enough to set the wheels of conditioned mind in motion. Soon after starting classes, I saw there was an expectation that I should already know how to do this and should be better at it. Driving home from the dance studio, I got beatings from self-hate, critical voices amplified by comparing me with other dancers.
A helpful insight in this learning process came as I saw the tension build in my body as I anticipated what my partner was going to do. In the dancing, where I was learning to respond and follow a partner’s lead, anticipation kept me from being guided. The tension kept my body from moving freely. Often, I would default to a pattern I knew and do those steps, whether or not that was what my partner intended. Trying to be prepared and know what to do in advance negated the very in-the-moment experience I was looking for. I’ve seen this pattern so often before, I’ve named it, “predict and control.”
In the past, I would have dropped out. There are plenty of things that I didn’t pursue in life because I was in this process. This time, I’m choosing to stay and watch, to use this as an opportunity to practice, to return my attention to the initial impulse from Life, and remember that being in the moment, moving with presence, and being responsive to a dance partner were the things that most inspired me to try this dance practice. And because how we do anything is how we do everything, I trust this will support this person both on and off the dance floor.
In gasshō,
barbara