The Sensing Self, An Intention-full Life

Week 2: The Sensing Self

Major Questions

  • -How much to I absorb every day that I do not notice?!
  • -What does it mean to live life in an “experiential” manner?

Part 1: The Mezzanine Nicholson Baker or The Bee Dance –Thomas Hanna

  • -Exactly how much attention are we CAPABLE of paying? THAT is the level of attention I want you to give during the next exercise.
  •   -We have the capacity to take in SO MUCH… and we DO, but we filter out the “less important” things. What if everything was important?
  •  -What happens to us mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically when we loosen that filter.

Part II: External Attention: Condensed 5 Walks Exercise

**CHANGE ENVIRONMENTS: Possibly OUTSIDE? Throughout Dittmann? In the student art gallery?

  •  -As you walk notice what new things you’ve never noticed before or don’t usually pay attention to.
  •  Discussion: CONSTANT sense of curiosity yields greater sense of appreciation, –   —-Did you feel a sense of broadening physically, mentally, or emotionally?
  •  -(As dancers) the potential of constant newness might help keep movement material ‘fresh’ for performance.

Part III: Internal Attention:

                  **Take sight out of the equation

  • -Stand & Drift over the feet.
  • -Humming into kidneys à Feel the resonant sensation of that
  • -Pressure, Release: Aligning femur into the hip socket, applying pressure around the skull and releasing to feel the head ‘float’ off the spine
  • -3 Dimensional Breathing?
  • -Teach a very simple pattern including inverted moments, aligning moments, changes in tempo. Practice with eyes closed.

Resources

  • -Experiential anatomy books
  •  –The Mezzanine
  •  –Becoming Animal
  •  –The Bee Dance- Thomas Hanna

Week 3: An Intention-full Life

Major Questions

  •  Where do I find intention? Owning choices, energetic motivation, breath propulsion…?
  •  -How many of your choices are deliberate or unconscious? What is the value of unconscious decisions?

Part I: Examples:

  • -Watch Baby Video & Look at Animal Images
  • Discuss desire, integration of movement, intention, and emotion
  • -Possibly address evolutionary sense of self, self as animal body with animal behaviors driven by animal desires & needs
  •  -For animals choices are often the difference between survival and death. Do we take any of our choices so seriously today?

Part II:  Energetic Anatomy

  • -Brief overview of the Chakra system
  • -Explore intention from an energetic/bodily point of view
  • -What is the energetic intention of the lower pelvis?
  • Teach a short movement phrase
  • —-Where are the moments that different energetic intentions show up?
  • —-What is the difference between “intention” and movement “quality”?

Part III: Authentic Movement

  • – Where does the choice to move originate?
  •  -Making choices in performance
  • -Discuss the instantaneous vs thoughtful natures of intention: where/when do intention and actions become more integrated vs more separate.     

Resources

  • -Chakra Images
  • -Animal Images
  • -Baby Video