One of my favorite books which I have my dance movement therapy students and supervisees read is Caldwell, C., (1996). Getting our bodies back: Recovery, healing and transformation through body-centered psychotherapy. Boston: Shambhala. If you go first to the ADTA website and click on Shop Amazon & Support ADTA, you'll also be giving a percentage of the sale to the ADTA, a very worthwhile cause in furthering the field of mind body medicine.
Here are a couple of quotations using the metaphor of dance:
“The art of life then lies in going with this flow rather than trying to control it. Happiness arises not out of pushing away pain and pushing the pleasure button. That makes us into addicts, and causes untold suffering. Happiness comes when we dance with the flow, when we participate with whatever arises. So we come upon the radical idea that happiness is not about how many good times we’ve had and bummers we haven’t had, but from being willing to greet life as it occurs, to meet it and respond in its gush and flow. We don’t attach ourselves to the contents of life, but we celebrate the very process of being alive.” (p. 57)
“We are born onto a dance floor called experience. Life is our partner. If we try to take control and lead, life will step on our toes. If we remain still and limp, life will give up and go find a new partner. Either way, we suffer in the absence of the greatest relationship we can ever know.” (p. 58)
I find so much wisdom in this book ~ it's the book that I wish I'd written. Thanks to Christine Caldwell for writing it.
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