Musings of a Dance/Movement Therapist

Authentic Movement Retreat for Experienced Practitioners ~ Aug. 27 - Sept. 1, Tuscany, Italy

Authentic Movement Retreat for Experienced Practitioners
August 27 - September 1
Tuscany, Italy
Led by Marcia Plevin

An  experienced international group of movers/witnesses will meet at The Center. Le Capannacce is immersed in nature in the Tuscan hills among
 olive groves and cypress trees. The ample size working studio is bathed in beautiful light throughout the
 day, the food ( Italian of course)  and hospitality is optimal.
 Vegan or vegetarian diets that will be taken into
 consideration.
   

The Retreat, taught in English is 4.5 days and will explore the
 individual and collective unconscious, the relationship of moving and 
being moved with integrative meditative practices based on vipassana meditation.
 Time in the afternoons will be dedicated to practice and also to 
explore in seminar form theoretical implications of the discipline. For those leading AM groups there will be time for personal supervision.

Might Stress Contribute to Dementia?

According to the Scientific American March 26, 2012 Blog article in The Scicurious Brain, "Chronic Stress and Phosphorylated Tau: suggestions for Alzheimer’s",  this latest study by Robert A. Rissmann, Michael A. Staup, Allyson Roe Lee, Nicholas J. Justice, Kenner C. Rice, Wylie Vale, and Paul E. Sawchenko (2012) shows that stress may play a role, although they're still still not sure exactly how.

 "[Chronic] stress can increase levels of phosphorylated tau, which is the first step to causing tau to aggregate, and which could play a role in creating the neurofibrillary tangles present in Alzheimer’s disease." ....

"Of course, there are many caveats to this study. While it may have important implications for the development of Alzheimer’s, there is not yet evidence that neurofibrillary tangles themselves CAUSE Alzheimer’s disease."

Another good reason to minimize our stress. What's a great way to offset the effects of acute stress and keeping it from becoming chronic stress? A life that is balanced, where work and the very real stresses of everyday life, especially as we age - dance. That's why Heidi Ehrenreich's Come Boogie with the Boomers, classes like Joan Green's Dancing Outside the Lines, and Andrea Taylor-Blenis' for Dancers 55+ at the Dance Exchange in Cambridge, MA are wonderful for body and mind. Also Dance Movement Therapist and zumba instructor Lora Wilson Mau's  classes in California.

That's why I'm going out dancing tonight at The Actors Studio of Newburyport to dance to Girls Night Out Quartet in celebration of Women's History Month. If you're in eastern Massachusetts, southeastern NH, I hope to see you there.

Fun Fitness for Baby Boomers

Board-Certified Dance Movement Therapist Heidi Ehrenreich shows how baby boomers can have fun and get fit in this clip from TV News 22 in Springfield, Massachusetts. She is creating a space for older adults to have fun dancing to the music of their era, which is therapeutic, but isn't actually therapy. You can see Heidi encouraging the host Seth Stutman to use what he's good at.

Heidi also works as a bona fide dance movement therapist working with children with autism; she began working with children with autism in the late 1960's or early 70's. You can find out more about DMT with Autism. Heidi also leads Authentic Movement with adults.

"SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (Mass Appeal) - Boogie for Boomers allows it's participants to get down and dance to music of their generation - and they can get fit while doing it. 

Heidi Ehrenreich is a dance therapist and she'll show us how to dance our way into the best shape of our lives."

 

Global Water Dances ~ 2011 / 2013

The next Global Water Dance performances across the globe with be June 15, 2013.

Here is a video of some of the 2011 performances from around the world.

Jody Wager Co-Leads Opening at Psychotherapy Networker Symposium

Dance/movement therapist and ADTA Vice-President pictured above. I can't wait to hear about the opening and see more images.

A Dance Movement Therapy Filled Week

So much happening in the world of dance / movement therapy this week. I thought this article about dance movement therapist Deborah Welsh and dance movement therapist-in-training, Megan Lortie was one of the more accurate portrayals that I've seen written by a non dmt.The article is entitled The Right Step, published by Jerk Magazine of Syracuse University.

"Dance therapists today lead clients of all ages, individual, couples, family, and group therapy sessions. They help with everything from mood disorders like depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorder, to children with trauma issues and patients with eating disorders."

Board Certified dance movement therapist Lora Wilson Mau posted this blog article today, An Invitation to Those Making the World a Better Place Through Dance. Mau highlights the expertise that dance/movement therapists deliver in the practice of DMT:

The practice of true clinical dance/movement therapy (DMT), however, is a complex and nuanced one, involving graduate level understanding of all of the following:

• psychological theory
• human development
• multicultural perspectives
• group process
• behavioral research
• psychopathology, psychodiagnosis and assessment skills
• dance/movement therapy theory
• expressive & communicative aspects of verbal & non-verbal behavior
• movement observation and analysis
• human anatomy, kinesiology, and basic neuroscience
  and clinical applications of DMT with individuals, families & groups

Lacking this education and training, I believe it is unethical to call the use of dance for healing, "dance therapy".

I am just back from a wonderful experience at the NJCATA conference in Morristown, NJ. I had the opportunity to learn from dance movement therapists Susan Cohen, presenting "Witnessing, Action and Stillness When Children Die" and Tricia Capello on "Dare to Dance: Dance/Movement Therapy with the Adult Psychiatric Client". My presentation on "Enlivening Older Adults through Dance/Movement Therapy" was very well received as well. If you are interested in learning more about the field of DMT, the next national ADTA conference in Albuquerque, NM is not to be missed.

And, finally, I just received a call from a friend telling me that she saw me quoted in Daniel Amen's book, Use Your Brain to Change Your Age. The quotation was one that was taken directly from Lane Anderson's July 1, 2010 article in Psychology Today, "Mind Your Body: Dance Yourself Happy, Why swinging your body lifts your spirit":

"The physically expressive nature of dance also helps people release and thereby recognize pent-up feelings, the first step to dealing with them. 'Depressed patients tend to have a curved back, which brings the head down so it's facing the ground,' says Donna Newman-Bluestein, a dance therapist with the American Dance Therapy Association. 'Dancing lifts the body to an open, optimistic posture.'"

All in all, it was an inspiring way to spend Creative Arts Therapy week in 2012.

Dance as Healing

Here are my favorite quotations today about dance from this list of 65 in Psychology Today February 17, 2012. Tomorrow's list may be different:

Stifling an urge to dance is bad for your health - it rusts your spirit and your hips. - Terri Guillemets

Dance is the hidden language of the soul. - Martha Graham

We ought to dance with rapture that we might be alive... and part of the living, incarnate cosmos. - D.H. Lawrence. This is especially relevant for people at the end of life.

There are short-cuts to happiness, and dancing is one of them. - Vicki Baum. I have to add skipping is another one.

"I think Balanchine and Robbins talk to God and when I call, he's out to lunch."  NOT!!! This one by Bob Fosse says so much. That Bob Fosse could not know that God was speaking through him is truly unbelievable. I remind myself of this when I'm lacking in self confidence.

And this one, "Almost nobody dances sober, unless they are insane" by H.P. Lovecraft ~ this is the sort of thing many of my clients say. It's what I point to when I talk about the mind/body split in the U.S. and western cultures.

Kids: they dance before they learn there is anything that isn't music.-  William Stafford

There is a bit of insanity in dancing that does everybody a great deal of good. - Edwin Denby

We're fools whether we dance or not, so we might as well dance. - Japanese Proverb

Dancing is the loftiest, the most moving, the most beautiful of the arts, because it is not mere translation or abstraction from life; it is life itself. - Havelock Ellis

And here's one for whom the writer is anonymous, not listed, but one of my favorites, "Life may not be the party we'd hoped for, but as long as we're here, we may as well dance."

National Dance Week is coming up, April 20 - 29. Anna Halprin stated in class the other night that she's been invited to create a dance which will happen in Union Square, on April 29 for National Dance Day. I think it's also International Dance Day. I believe that it's called for 2 pm and members of her classes will be dancing in it. I highly recommend Anna's class for anyone in the Bay Area who likes to dance. She is a cultural icon and still a wonderful teacher at 92.

Also, dance movement therapist and dance healer Norma Canner's obituary was published in the March 15 Boston Globe. “Norma’s effect on people was magical." according to Alan Shapiro of Newton, program director at the Community Therapeutic Day School in Lexington (also according to me).

“She would take very disturbed children with special needs and transform them like magic,’’ Shapiro said. “Her ability was not that she performed. It was how she made other people express themselves by dancing. Norma could bring people out. She could transform somebody from being in their own world to joining the shared reality of everyone else in the room. If she didn’t have a musical instructor with her, she would pound on the floor to provide the rhythm."

Read the article for more about Norma Canner.

Matilda 94 y.o. Dances ~ Inspirational

 

Norma Canner Helped Popularize Dance Therapy Worldwide

This obituary appeared in today's (March 15, 2012) Boston Globe. There's a dynamic photo of Norma, looks like the 1960's, leading a group with joyous children.

 

Anna Halprin and CIIS - It's Great Being in San Francisco

Well the weather hasn't been great in S.F. Today is cold and rainy, but the weather isn't everything. Yesterday I had a wonderful time leading a dance movement therapy group for elders at an adult day health center. About 30 participants from many different countries of origin, mostly non-English speaking, and with different abilities were fully engaged in the group. With ribbon wands, scarves and the Octaband we moved to the tempos and music of many cultures, communicated with each other nonverbally, and connected with one another, contributing synergistically to a whole that was greater than the sum of its parts.  

From there, I had the opportunity to guest lecture for Sherry Raley's first year expressive arts therapy class at CIIS. That, too, was a great time. I spoke about the breadth of roles an expressive arts therapist can play:

As expressive arts therapists, we use the arts as the medium for therapy individually and in groups. In addition to the direct therapy, we may provide inservices and consultation to staff, we may help improve the communications, teach relaxation and team building skills to help the staff work better together and to provide a more supportive environment for the clients. We may also engage in social action. Just as in the treatment of an individual, we may want to provide family therapy so that the family supports the growth and change of the individual, we may engage in social action so that the culture-at-large supports the growth of our clients. The mainstream culture in the U.S. suffers from mind/body split.

I loved what one of the students said. I wish I knew her name so that I could give her credit. She said that healing oneself is in itself social action. To that I say, Amen.

Tonight I had the opportunity to attend a class with Anna Halprin with my friend Meg Chang. I feel so centered and sated after the class. There were bits from many of the disciplines I've been studying lately, from parts that felt like Bartenieff Fundamentals, Authentic Movement, Feldenkreis, and some of her walking, swinging and skipping directives which were reminiscent of Barbara Mettler's Creative Dance. I look forward to bringing back some of what I learned to Dancing Outside the Lines, the improvisation class I take with Joan Green next week.

Anna quoted Fritz Perls at one point, and I wish I remembered the quotation. It had something to do with releasing the head. If anyone knows this quotation, please let me know.

Another thing that Anna talked about was momentum, gravity and rebound. This last also got me thinking about resilience. As much as has been written about psychological resilience, I have yet to see anything written about resilience as a body concept. I believe that the rebound that Anna was talking about is just such an example. Barbara Mettler would have us do a "bouncy" walk, feeling the bounce in the knees. It is in the knees that we can feel the down/up, the spring. When we were skipping tonight, I turned to my skipping partner and said, I don't think it's possible to feel depressed when one skips. I've often thought that skipping would be great therapy for someone who is depressed for that reason.

I look forward to continuing inspiration from my friends, family and colleague in this beautiful part of the world.