PERMISSION TO LOVE
5Rhythms workshop, Heartbeat level*led by Lucija
In the Waves map we dance to explore and heal the patterns of our movement and ways of being that we’re stuck in, moving through the shadows of resistance, rigidity, destruction, being spaced out and numb into the light of acceptance, clarity, creativity, ease and connection. In the same way dancing the maps of Heartbeat we move our emotions and patterns of the heart we’re tangled in, thus healing the wounded places and giving a permission to vibrations of Love to release the stories of the past, and once again begin performing their sacred tasks. Letting the fear awaken us and bring awareness of danger, the anger to energize us for the necessary action and defend us from attacks, the sadness to soften us, cleanse the wounds and relieve the pain, the joy to uplift us and show us the colours and houmor of life, and finally the compassion to empty us and connect us with everything and everyone.
“Permission to Love” workshop is an opportunity to feel our heart and put it in motion just as it is – constricted, overwhelmed, closed, wounded, strong, vulnerable, loving, cold, open, powerful, shy, hungry, fierce… – and give it a chance to drum in its own beat and dance to that rhythm. And then in movement, with breath and attention invite and allow Love, the pure and free vibration of the heart, to melt the frozen places, soften the chains we locked ourselves in, let go of the residue we keep carrying and show us the purpose, power and beauty in its different shapes. Or maybe this time just opening the doors to the potential of some of those things or all of them being possible 
*Previous experience with 5Rhythms or related consious dance practices required. Minimum of 10 hours.
On healing – when and how and why
Many of us are striving towards self-healing, knowing that ultimately the only thing we can change is ourselves, and afterwards from that inner change bring healing into the bigger field and inspire others to embark on a healing journey themselves. But what do we need for that – what ability, what technique, what kind of support?
What does it mean to heal? In my native tongue the word healing – “iscjeljivanje” – literally means making whole, so for me healing is just that bringing the system into wholeness. Connecting where I feel divided, cleansing the blocked and impervious inner pathways, building healthy relationships and leaving those that are beyond repair, accepting my own imperfections and those of others – including what I reject or judge…
And first step is always asking what healing is needed at this time, and how can we begin to bring it into our lives. Not which healing technique sounds fun or new and shiny, nor which is at a discount at this moment, but deep inside what is in the way for me to become healthy wholesome human being and what is the first step on that path.
Sometimes healing requires us to step into our shadows to find the source of the pain, sometimes it is enough to let go of something unhealthy (like a relationship, a belief, a habit), sometimes we need to bring into a place of emptiness a seed of light, a new, healthier way of being.
As we are complex beings, we need to heal on different levels and in different ways. Sometimes the process starts on a physical level, sometimes emotional or cognitive, sometimes even subtler ones. But for a deep and lasting healing we need to allow that process to resonate on all levels. Regardless of where the shift towards the healing begins, we need to allow it to weave its way through our whole system. For the healing isn’t simply curing a wound in only one sense, on one level, but aligning all of our dimensions and reconnecting into wholeness all of our layers.
I firmly believe there is no one ultimate technique, nor one universal solution, nor one ideal approach. I myself practice different techniques, apply multiple perspectives and diverse approaches equally on my personal growth path and continuous deepening of healing as when working with others, supporting them to find their way towards wholesome health.
From my experience over last 20 years or so, one of the most important things I learned is that there are many factors we need to take into account, many of them more important than whether the technique is adequate, and maybe the most important factor is our wish and willingness to change, to heal, in other words our readiness to take the responsibility for our growth and health.
Taking on the responsibility for our condition, growth and change does not mean taking the responsibility for adversities, hardships, wounds and other obstacles that have brought us to the place we are currently in. It simply means stepping into our own power and admitting that now that we are here we have a CHOICE to stay in the same place or take a step towards healing.
So I find it more important from asking how to heal to ask the question WHY do I want to heal. Even though many techniques offer fast and deep shifts, integration of the healing takes time and motivation, courage and strength. Sometimes the healing journey is long and requires changes in areas of life we never thought were related to our issue. So knowing the purpose of healing helps us in those moments when it seems easier to continue along the old well known road, to remind us what are our values and deep needs. Without purpose, it will be difficult for our healing to be wholesome, long-lasting or even successful.
Once we have the purpose and we take the responsibility it is easier to begin the exploration of techniques and ways to support ourselves. Because, even though we are responsible for our next step, we don’t need to have all the knowledge or skills needed to take it. Here, at this moment, in this pace of responsibility and willingness we can open the place for a healer, therapist, teacher, coach or a any sort of practitioner to support us in what we can’t do alone.
As I am danced
I dance for as the beat hits my bones
As I pour into movement the lightness and the weight
I discover the medicine for every ail
When I am worried about tomorrow
I offer these worries at the altar of my feet
To carry them and unravel and return them to dust
And when today is wonderful
I offer that beauty to my hands to celebrate
embracing the wind, spreading into the emptiness
And when the Now tightens and clenches me
I rock those claws with my hips
For juices of life to soak and dissolve them
and when I am thrown around and breaking apart
I surrender to my spine and pray
to be held and let go, received and open
And when I am alone, and I don’t know, and I yearn
I hand that yearning over to my breath
to weave the bridge towards the Divine
For as I am danced
In the depths of my being, from the very core
Springs strength
and love
and beauty.
Very important announcement
Due to the restrictions for gatherings we have shifted most of the programs ONLINE, with intention to return to in-person setting as soon as it is possible.
Some of the programs are still described as in-person, but that is susceptible to change in case of prolonged measures.
Coming soon
AWAKEN your heart
befriending the power of fear
ZAGREB 11-13.6.2021
weekend workshop, Heartbeat level*
Spaces for this workshop are strictly limited due to epidemiological situation
*previous experience required
PRACTICE – Sexuality on the dance floor
To begin with let me explain what I mean by some of the terms so the difference is clear when I use then further down in the text. Sexuality, sexual energy, sexualizing, sex… Even though we say that everything is welcome on the dance floor, some of those things actually are not. Our every state or need, every feeling or thought are most definitely welcome, even every dance of ours. The boundary that does exist refers to situations where our dance begins to include others, be it by projecting our energy, needs or processes onto another person, or by direct interaction.
Sexual energy is the life force, creative and juicy. One that awakens and feeds the passion. One that penetrates into our depths where it stirs the cauldron of our creativity and reaches towards heights where it dissolves us in rapture. One that whirls up our spine like a snake and connects the base with the crown. One the calls and lures us to confront and unite the polarities, masculine with feminine, physical with spiritual, personal with universal.
Sexuality is our capacity and manner with which we manage, act and behave with sexual energy. All of our different behaviors regardless of how appropriate, polite or acceptable or not ourselves or other people deem them.
Sex, strictly for the need of this text, I would define as the act of uniting, basically on a physical level, which preferably, besides the exchange of energy and physical stimuli, leads to some sort of ecstasy. Though in reality sex is at the same time so much more, or less, than that.
Sexualizing is the most difficult term to define, and from my point of view it usually has a negative connotation. In the context of the dance floor I would frame it as a unwanted, unnecessary or exaggerated emphasis on sexuality or directing the attention to superficial manifestation of sexuality, often thus distracting ourselves and/or others from more subtle layers of process or using sexuality as a distraction from other uncomfortable, unaccepted or simply unfamiliar pars of ourselves and our dance.
One of the biggest benefits and gifts I got from the dance floor is the freedom. Permission and tools to find my freedom in different shapes and forms. Freedom to be and move, to be seen and to meet others without censorship. Freedom to express emotions that otherwise might be suppressed or uninvited, to explore, move and reclaim my juiciness, aliveness, fullness in many coulours. Freedom to move and make sounds and be natural, unpolished, un-adjusted, my self. Freedom to retreat, fall silent and pause. Freedom to feel the attraction and dance with it. In that exploration of my own freedom, and later on as I started to teach also supporting and encouraging others to do that as well, I discovered – well, reinvented the wheel 🙂 – that responsibility that comes with the freedom. Profound understanding of boundaries and the need for them. Another paradox that is actually quite natural and non-contradictory.
In the dance we explore and expand our capacity to embody something and stay present, to meet an energy in another being and stay present, to find a way to connect and stay present, to not get lost in the torrent of energy or emotions or intesity of the meeting, but to hold our place, keep our dance and our integrity. Whether we’re talking about exploring the rhythms, the elements, our emotions… Or sexual energy. The other dancers are our mirrors and teachers, inspiration and challenges. And as long as we respect the postulate that each of us is on the dance floor to do our own work, we are staying within the limits of acceptable.
We live in a culture where sexuality is wounded, twisted and removed from its inherent beauty and power, and reduced to a cheep version of itself, superficial and manipulative. As a dance floor is a reflection of our lives, so we can very easily slip into inherited patterns. That is the very reason why we need to pay attention and set clear boundaries within which we can in a safer way and with more freedom explore healthier and higher quality relationship with sexuality, our own and of the others. Just like we don’t practice “just watching” on our classes, so that each dancer can dive into their dance with less reservations or holding back, in the same way we set the boundaries to interaction and “allowed” level of sexuality to additionally empower the safty of the container within which we can inquire into such sensitive areas.
The basic principle is that we are not taking other people’s dance personally. Not even when it’s a seductive, sensual, sexually charged dance of a person we are currently dancing with. We stay in the field of our own energy. That doesn’t mean we need to ignore what is happening around us (or inside us), but to look for our own dance with what is real in that moment. As soon as the base of our exploration stops being our sexual energy and moves towards expressing our sexuality, or even expressing and feeding our sexual needs, especially by projecting our attention or directly acting towards another dancer, I would say we enter a very slippery terrain. Maybe one of the best guidelines about staying within the acceptable limits, which I heard from a dear colleague of mine, is “no penetration”. No penetration of any kind, which includes french kissing. No penetration migh sound vulgar or rough, but that is the whole point. No vulgarity, not roughness, no entering other people’s bodies, or even personal space, or even dance. I would say that even the energy exchange is acceptable only if both parties agree. Which should be natural and granted, but we live in a world where it’s not. That is why it is good to underline, remind ourselves and practice the sensitivity to our and other people’s boundaries.
Here is where the responsibility comes in. Responsibility to when we “unleash” our sexual energy hold our boundary and be clear as to how much are we allowing other so interact with it. Responsibility to take all the processes, awakened or unfulfilled needs as fuel for our dance, not as an invitation to feed on another’s energy. Responsibility to communicate, to ask and listen and respect the response, to be clear when we respond. Responsibility to respecet the rules that make the dance floor a safer place for exploration. And maybe to follow another guideline “don’t do anything you couldn’t talk about with your partner who wasn’t present when it happened”.
Most often the ones who cross this boundary of acceptable are people who come to the dance floor with their partners, because this last guideline that is rooted in an internal moral restriction that would keep them from sexualizing doesn’t apply to them. Their partner is there. From my personal experience, and I have spent more than 10 years on dance floors with my partner, and from deep conversations with other people who have crossed this limit I can say that dropping into that familiar place of intimacy is a pattern that distracts from other internal processes like fear, boredom, discomfort, or simply taking a step into unknown.
In those cases I like to quote my teacher Andrea Juhan with whom I spent a few years investigation the theme of Libido through the practice of 5Rhyhtms, with a quote that beautifully explains how to connect sexuality and the dance floor – “Bring the dance floor to your bedroom, not the other way around”
PRACTICE – Dance as a medium for personal growth
Often when people ask me what I do it is hard to distill into one sentence what dance is and can be for me and people I work with.
There are many layers of gifts of the dance. On one hand every physical activity, especially if we pay it due attention and do it in a certain pleasurable context, brings enhances our well-being not only on a physical level but also on a psychological. Often we can hear people saying they go to the gym to work out the stress, or they go running to reset, or they do yoga to relax their mind…
Our being likes to move. Our body needs movement to stay healthy. But not just our body. Our heart needs expression and connection to be strong and nourished. Our mind needs emptying, deconstruction and intertwining to stay open for learning and creative and to keep the healthy dynamics of focusing and resolving. Our soul needs reflection and recognition, art and sharing to maintain the healthy glow and have space to spread its wings. Our spirit, in which we are all one, needs the moments in which we dissolve from our uniqueness into the unity and remind ourselves of the Source.
What makes dance special for me is that it covers a big spectrum of diverse needs. Physical activity with possibility of expressing something that might not fit into words, releasing the accumulated stress along with an opportunity to meet others, the artistic aspect, the inner and outer beauty, and much more than that if we allow ourselves to dive deep.
The dancing itself is already enough to bring well-being in many ways. That’s why many of us when we ere younger danced out in the clubs or at parties our broken hearts, destroyed hopes, big successes, beginnings and ends of relationships, birthdays and new years. Some of us needed support of substances to get ourselves moving, for some the music was enough, and some didn’t even need that 😉
What distinguishes a conscious dance floor from the club one, and what deepens the level of relief and healing a dance can bring is the component of consciousness. Already by becoming aware of our body, emotions and thoughts, and weaving those three aspects of our being into one dance brings deep cleansing, release and even healing. For some of us just allowing ourselves the freedom of uncensored dance can be profoundly healing. When we bring our attention closer to ourselves we stop being puppets thrashed around by the forces of the outside field. When we begin to peal off the masks we carry, beacause the dance stops being a way to attract other people’s attention and starts being a way to deepen our own, the door to inner landscape open and we can allow and activate the intrinsic wisdom of body to move and energize the empty places and release the accumulated and stuck energies from tense ones.
Even though this releasing and redistribution of energy is desperately necessary work, it is only a surface layer. Those empty and tense places appear because of knots in our inner structure as a result of our experiences, beliefs and capacities. So once we come off the dance floor back into our everyday routine stress tends to accumulate in the same old spots, just like our energy is drained from the other familiar places. So the next layer of our work is unraveling those knots so that our inner structure can be more smooth and stable. And we need more than dancing stuff our of our system to get there. That is what is called personal growth.
Dance can be one of the tools as we step further down the path, but we need others as well. This is the value of a practice and maps, or gateways it offers into our inner landscape. When we add the structure of a practice on top of the freedom of movement, it can lead us down the unknown paths into the places that can be unfamiliar and sometimes at first even unpleasant, but where we can unearth our patterns of being, doing and relating that aren’t necessarily healthy or useful for our current life or our surroundings. Here is where the inner work can begin..
Often people ask me if the 5RhyhtmsTM practice is a sort of therapy. The official answer to that is – no. Yet even though 5Rhyhtms aren’t a psychothearapeutic form, they most definitely have therapeutic effect. That stems from the fact that our body reflects our whole being, and that is stores all our experiences and charges we have related to them. So the way we move through life is the way we move on the dance floor. On the dance floor we can relax the layer of functionality and just be as we are. And just as life constitutes of doing and being, leading and following, of turning in and reaching out, of relationships and roles in different communities we’re part of, of listening to our needs and attending to needs of others and responding to outside stimuli… So is the dance made of all those bits. We dance alone, with others and in a group We dance to music we like, and to music that we don’t. We dance in tune with the bigger field or totally out of sync with others. We dance through and with all 5 of the rhythms. We dance with our heart and our stories. We dance with the roles we play on the dance floor and beyond it. We dance in relationship to Divine.
In the dance we discover places of comfort and discomfort. Through sharing and teachings that practice brings, and again through dance we seek and find medicine, solutions, answers…. In the 5Rhythms practice each of the rhythms is a teacher and a medicine as much as a challenge and refuge. Sometimes just practicing the rhythms long enough without addressing a specific “issue” we notice changes in our life. For by practicing movements that are missing from our life our whole system is learning new tools and ways of being. Nevertheless we can, if we wish to, bring a certain question, theme or challenge to the dance floor and both actively seek answers, shifts and healing and integrate them through dance and meeting the others, through conversations and reflections. That is how the dance becomes a way of conscious personal growth.
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