I still remember the editions of ‘’Il Corpo Umano’’ (the Human Body) back in the 80’s.
I used to collect each piece of the body that came with the weekly
magazine and VHS cartoons illustrating the workings of this fascinating machine
that is the human body. I was looking forward to completing this big puzzle,
and being able to complete this little plastic statue.
I soon developed a passion towards dance, music and singing.
It was not until a very long break that my conception around the body started
to mold around various professional experiences and movers I have met along the
path.
I got fascinated at the idea we could experience movement rather than interpret movement through our body. For the first time in 2015, I started to contemplate the idea of movement rather than dance, of agency rather than executor, of attending rather than controlling, of stillness as an action rather than an absence.
I gradually landed in the fields of somatics, which although
still considered contradictory in its semantics, gave a wider space to breath
and connect to my unique way of living.
Back in 2018, a change in my practices led me to walk in
therapeutic settings. Contrarily to my previous decade during which my main
focus was my-self, I started to look after the other. Me in relation with
an-other. Needless to mention, how scary it was to feel the burden of this
responsibility. The difference was that, compared to when I was responsible for
dance students and play creatively together to an extent, this time I had to care
together and establish another level of dialogue where intimate sharing
takes place.
My inquisitive and relentless spirit brought me to take a
Master in Professional Practice, Somatic Studies in 2021. I had probably looked
for an opportunity like this to open my own pathway of research and create my
own perception and ideas of body and movement.
Having experienced such a pleasant opening in getting
familiar with ideas such as ‘embodiment’, ‘inhabiting’, ‘body agency’, at the
question of where my stance is in terms of positivist or non-positivist
approaches to the body, I was sure the answer would be the latter.
In answering I have probably detached myself from the choice
and opted for the emotionally most convenient one.
They talked about process-oriented and not product-oriented.
Yet, it is so easy to carve out a fictitious robe to start a journey and make
the assumption that the lived experience will go in a certain way, when in
reality it is not. More importantly, we sometimes exclude other very important elements
from our academic journey, which are our affects, unexpected life
circumstances, rewards and defeats.
During my bereavement for the loss of a family member,
someone recommended to read the book ‘How to Land-Finding Ground in an Unstable
World’ by Ann Cooper Albright. I could not find any other words so relevant to
that moment but ‘Instead of being nervous about keeping our balance in a world
in which so many aspects of our lives are in danger of falling apart, we need
to accept our falls with grace and learn how to land with intention’
It is about surrendering. And it’s just when you feel the
ground has been taken off from under your feet, that you are confronted with
the fear of being, while you need to let go of the pride of doing.
Going back to the plastic statue and the misconceptions
about body as a static entity of life, which most of us have been exposed to in
common dualistic school curricula, precludes us from enjoying the natural act
of falling and staying in the fall. That act is the process. That act is the
un-learning I could not grasp in the beginning. That act is likely to be the
way out or through my deadlocks.
Today marks the beginning of my new journey. Every day,
every moment is a beginning. Today’s stone is I will approach different readings
on phenomenology and the lived experience of one's body towards my research inquiry.
With this recipe in mind of being in the moment, I will do
my best to refrain from scaffolding my next page of my discovery journey with the assumptions of what I already knew. It may sound intimidating perhaps, but it’s the same
feeling you have when you jump off a rock to splash into the crystalline waters
of the sea. You need to let it go.
References
Cooper Albright, A., 2019. How
to Land-Finding Ground in an Unstable World. 1st ed. New York: Oxford
University Press.
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Thank you so much for this Paola. I will be having a look at the book you have recommended. The metaphor of having to let go the shore line of the island you were on to discover the next island comes to my mind in this situation as well. As someone who finds change incredibly hard, the concept of letting go is something I definitely need to work on going forwards. Thank you so much.
ReplyDeleteDear Paola, I enjoyed very much reading your last blog and I fall immediately for falling...:)
ReplyDeleteFear of falling affect us all. Very few people are immune to the sense of instability these days. It is important to look for deeper understanding, reflection to the temporal stresses. I am amazed that some people quickly can feel emotionally wrecked when unexpectedly lose their balance and immediately enter into new phase, how to respond to the stress. Some people challenging trauma to bounce back from stress and some go on the thrive. It is a mystery and very unpredictable thing. I have been thinking lately about those things, about falling, being in dead end or being creating, I was asking myself, what to do? There are varying degrees of openness, different stages of life, learning to live and respond to the daily stress. Falling apart and feel afterwards like nothing happen it's an art of surviving. It's important, the outcome. What falling teach us about how to survive personal, social, economic crisis? To accept the situation. Envision, embrace falling, but to learn how to live with that. That is not easy. It is the process. Balancing life becomes my new skill and this skill always needs improvement, its ongoing thing, floating process. This is also the theme I took under my research. Learning how to work out that moment requires first three Buddhist wisdom: waiting, listening, reflecting and then bring awareness to that sensation of interrupted flow while life is falling apart. It is so hard to let go and find the ground, find the confidence everyday and make friendship with the gravity and fear. There is a nice quote about that: "Balance would be better described as an exquisitely delicate act of continually recovering our uprightness (Cooper, 22 2018). This thoughts led me again to my master research EMBODIED FLOW IN MOTION and famous Heraclitus thought how nothing endures but change.
Thank you for your insight and advice on the reading which I found extremely inspiring and relieving somehow! Although I am familiar with Heraclitus' thought I still encounter situations where I have to questions what I have just learnt and reframe it. Yes, you are right, it's probably more about observing, rather than having to come to conclusions..
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