Be the change you want to see.

wow.
this weekend I went with my friend Chelsea to a 3-day workshop for the dance form we both study in, called Open Floor, or Five Rhythms...
it was such an amazing experience, that I still can't, partly don't want to, wrap words around it.
the kind of time that feels like you'll break the spell if you try too hard to describe it, too precious to try to explain.

Here's the KIND of weekend it was though: flirty fun floaty flowy.

I danced and moved and explored and stretched and didn't take long breaks for the entirety of the session. Fri 7-10 pm, Sat 11-2 and 3-6, Sunday 2-7 with a break at 4:30-5.

So call it thirteen hours of being carried along by the dance and the moving and the community and the exploration of what my physical self is capable of. Beautiful, ugly, silly, boring, all of it, range of motion, all the different moods and impulses that the music and our teachers encouraged to come out.

Aside from emotional and self esteem shift-change-improvements, the physical improvements are tremendous.
my shoulders feel totally liberated, I can move them n all kinds of directions, watch my collarbones be mobile (what??)
and late on Saturday I had THE most painful kind of muscle cramp, in my low right abdominals, at first I was like, shit I overworked them but I dug my fingers into the muscle to try to support them (through the deep belly fat) while they cramped, breathed and hollered a little (I was actually sat down in the loo when this triggered, heh)

but when the cramp finally released me and I was able to stand up again, there was this... only way to describe it, freedom, open space, liberation? in my belly and my hip and leg and belly and back were straighter, looser, more limber... I had a new rotation in that hip, as I discovered when we returned to the dance floor, a new violence was possible in my movements, explosive and HUGE.

I need to move this some more, because it's immense and gorgeous, after seventeen years after the initial injury, this precious body has found strength and release and liberation.

I wasn't larger than this body, or smaller than this body, but exactly body-sized; and everything was full of flow and amazement.

I have a completely different belief about what I'm physically capable of now, and the crunchy painful fear and worry has softened and melted and released and ALLOWED.

...Right now, if you're reading this: for just a moment, roll your neck gently, move your shoulders around in circles, twist your torso, wiggle your hips, flex your feet. If like me, you tend to sit a lot, take a moment to check in with your body and love it with some movement.

and that's what I have for now. Got a busy day today, looking forward to it.

I forgot/ran out of time to blog Wednesday's workout, and yesterday's workout, well, I got slammed by busyness afterwards.

1) had to go over to the framer's to sign my collage-paintings for the county fair because I had forgotten to do that
2) had to grab some kind of quick lunch that turned out to be just fruit and tea, because I...
3) had promised to come volunteer with Anastasia, the Waldorf school gardening teacher, and help the third grade plant All The Grains.
(oh that was fun... and I got to plant and water in a row of amaranth, which are just gorgeous tiny purple seeds, squee!)

So.

Results of workouts are:
1) the hamstring I pulled/strained on Monday during dance class is a bit more flexible/capable now, and hurts less
2) my ANKLE muscles are hella sore. Like all the way around my ankle is sore. I keep waking up and rotating my foot/feet and they're still sore.
3) I'm starting to see muscle definition in my forearms again, even underneath the fat I still have. I have pleasing curves going from wrist to elbow, and the hollow place at the inside of my wrist is longer and more defined than it was.
4) I'm learning that when a muscle is sore from the workout, I need to do more with it later that same day, intentionally, to keep it from going all stiff and inflexible. Stretch AND work it. Oy, my pectoral muscles. I had to stretch and work them last night before I was able to sleep
5) I can do more than I think I can. Speed and bounciness of legs/ankles/calves varies by day and by how much those muscles have already been worked.
6) Tal does a good job of helping me feel like we are doing choreography drills at least some of the time. She also does a good job of finely judging how far to push me, and we have been finishing JUST before I fail, i.e. muscles haven't yet given out in the middle of a set.
7) I have discovered I like free weights MUCH better than machines. And Tal confirms my belief that free weights are better for more all-round muscle strength, since you have to use more of the little muscles surrounding the major muscles to control free weights properly. Dynamic stability!
8) the sides of the long leg muscles (calf and thigh) need some more concentrated work. I think hiking in uneven terrain would be a good job for them. Again, Dynamic stability... and working the overall system rather than the specific large muscles.
9) Tal helped me specifically stretch shoulders and pecs in a way which I can't do. She groks partnered stretching. I may yet be able to consistently have open shoulders and reach my arms directly vertical over my shoulders, and I may yet be able to open my hips enough to have my knees flat on the floor when I sit pretzel-style (and maybe even someday in half-lotus or proper lotus position for yoga class!)
10) I told Tal that I have a personal goal I expected her to say was ridiculous, which is to do unsupported headstands and maybe someday handstands, and a) she was impressed when I told her I'd sorted out how to do yoga style shoulderstands, and she said your body can do anything you set your mind to do.

Tal gives me hope.
I shared with her that I used to have "a relative" who was so sarcastic in how he spoke to me that I had internalized his voice and used to speak very unkindly to myself. And I also said how I had to learn how to stop that voice from being how I spoke to myself, and had to learn to speak kindly and encouraging to myself.
I was to embarrassed to say that the relative was my dad. =(

But she's been great about listening to the little snippets of personal stuff that come out when we are working out together. She's great at correcting my form so I do the work correctly, and at encouraging me gently.

I have hope of gently reshaping this body and coming into pride in self that I haven't had in nearly 20 years.
For the right reasons, this time, not for fitting into a wedding dress.

I'm doing it for ME this time.

This is what I posted to FB last night just before falling asleep...

"Seems I have 3 rules for dancing at 5Rhythms:

1) dance in 3 dimensions
2) take up space
3) try to detach from thinking, just move!

Oh, and HAVE FUN & SMILE A LOT"

a FB friend said, well yeah, I agree, except those are my RULES FOR LIFE!

=D

Last night went AWESOMELY. Excellent flow, mostly I was out of my own head and just moving, doing some things I believe I have only seen other people do... (but I wasn't planning them or observing myself doing them, so I'm actually not really very clear as to what precisely I was *doing*, which is a very interesting state to be in...)

I did notice that I had more people "asking to dance" with me last night, in a way... that was also very interesting (people ask to dance nonverbally there, usually by eye contact and then joining you in the space on the floor)

At one point, after the lesson, Claire asked us to join other dancers in groups of 5... < anxiety levels rising, who will want to group with me? >

We had a group of 6 for a bit, then it shifted and the 3 that joined my/our initial group of 3 melted away and we were joined by 2 others... David is HELLA tall, and looks like a friendly, meditative Lurch from the Addams family, a shorter more choleric-moving guy whose name I didn't catch though I danced twice with him later, an ectomorphic blond girl, and a (relatively) shy-moving Asian girl. I was *definitely* the fattest in our group, and also the most uninhibited in some ways. I think I blew the petite blond's mind... we were taking turns dancing at the center of our group, and holding space at the edges when we weren't dancing (and also dancing, sometimes echoing whoever was at the center, interpreting the idea or quotation we'd selected to think about)... I've no idea what I was doing that made her face and eyes look all surprised and amazed while she was watching me, but I was grinning, and moving, and loving it.

My turn in the center turned out to be brief. I didn't talk about my quotation, I just moved it. I love that I studied eurythmy with the Waldorf program... it makes it so much easier to EXPRESS some things...

The quote paraphrased: Intuition is about Knowing, not about Thinking, and something about a battle with the Ego. Maybe that last part is something I will have to live my way into the Answers, later (thank you, Rilke) because I don't really understand what was meant by it, but the first part of the passage I can live now, in Dance, and in other Expression.

Moving While Fat is still just MOVING. I dunno why, but nobody gives me flack for being fat while dancing... and 5Rhythms is the BEST about being welcoming and fun.

Just DANCE, my babies!!

Jeff and I BOTH made it to the gym tonight.
WOO
(and he made noises like he was amenable to doing this every Sunday, DOUBLE WOO)

NOTES:
I stretched before getting on the exerbicycle, I think I'll be trying to do that consistently in future.
My foot hurt less (plantar fasciitis AGAIN), and I believe it's because I pre-stretched. 22 minutes on the bicycle.

Nearly 2 months since I lifted with any regularity. *sigh* I've been getting 2 days of loving movement pretty reliably, with dance on Mondays and Yoga on Tuesdays, so I'm not in horrible shape, but I have specific muscles that are very very crunchy. I tried to work those specifically (various around the shoulder capsule, and pectorals, plus hip flexors and all these needed to open the hips). Still feel crunchy.

We'll see how I feel after dance tomorrow night and yoga on Tuesday.

I'm going to try to add Sundays reliably to the schedule, and after that, hopefully Thursdays. That would mean 4 days a week with significant exercise, if I can do this on a consistent basis.

Two days a week is not quite enough to make steady progress in strength and flexibility, HOWEVER...

... I did manage to put my foot WITH EASE onto the top bar of the stretching fence. Yup, my foot at shoulder height, easily, and stretching there felt strong, stable, and good.

that was friggin' COOL.

Went to the gym yesterday on the way home from lunch with my friend Julia. Got to eat at Oliveto Restaurant in Rockridge aka the Oakland Hills, I love that joint.

Was driving past the gym on my way home after a side trip to Pendragon Books (OMG that place pulls cash straight out of my wallet and transforms it into a huge pile of books every time I cross the threshold!).

I do like my gym. That's good, if my intention is to spend time there two to three days a week.
Yesterday I started, not with bicycle time, but with some slow yoga. Result: spine and hips more flexible than they've been in ages, with less crunchy noises afterward, however knees (both knees) and my left achilles tendon are sore and tender the next day.

Verdict: Next time, try bicycling first, then yoga, then weights, and don't neglect a last little bit of steady cardio, either bicycling again or walking, as a kind of cooling-down or settling-down routine.

Note to self: remember to ice the left tendon and sole when you work out again, or anytime it's sore. And since this has persisted for some time, what with waking in the morning to limp into the bathroom from the bed, perhaps it's time to check in with a medical professional. Keep note of how often this pain happens during the next week, and how often you take Vitamin I for it.

Still want to try the formal yoga class and one of the Zumba fitness classes, largely because apocalypticbob has expressed such joy in Zumba. I've never tried pilates, and want to, and it's offered. Still want to try some swimming for cardio, strength, and flexibility.

Surprised myself yesterday in the shower when I noticed a thigh muscle I haven't seen for years. That was a nice kind of surprise, but I actually exclaimed aloud and surprised Jeff. =) Hoping to have him come accompany me to the gym, perhaps as much as once a week.

And, I've trotted across the street ahead of the light, perhaps three times in the last week? No knee pain or strain. I think this strength training is paying off in multiple ways.