My Journey: Evolution in Creative Expression and Sense of Self Part 3

   So, I had this discussion with myself and my husband while I advertised for an ATS workshop. As I set to it I realized how much had changed even since I had last really advertised myself as a teacher. Facebook pages and group worked differently and there were a multitude of ways to advertise yourself on-line and not just by Facebook, Kijiji or Twitter. I worked on making handouts and the music playlists, and posters. I did not have a good camera or the ability to get a new one with a good camera yet. My older pictures of me as a dancer were old. I did not at the time have a photographer in the area and wasn't sure how much I was willing to spend on a session plus travelling. So I had a picture taken by my husband with my crappy old phone camera(not that old but was never good camera tech and phones age fast these days). The only way to make it look more professional was by muting it and zooming into the picture up close to my hips because i also had not had a complete costume for years. This is the pic that you see as my profile pic on my Facebook dance page. I had this as my main profile pic also on my regular Facebook but received a bad reaction from a dancer I had on a previous Facebook who thought I was either a fake account or a creepy male who was stalking her. I had taken the time to message some people who I had added to my new facebook after I had been off for about a year but had not messaged her. I had no idea that my picture and state of my facebook account being new would be received in such away and that when I asked why I was unfriended that I was told I had no right to ask.

   It's something I tried to not let bother me, but it did. I felt alienated and paranoid about how possible future interactions might go because not only is the greater belly dance community small, the dance community in the Maritimes is doubly small. If I go to a workshop that this dancer may be at I don't know if they would even know me or if they would assume I am "stalking" them simply because I "liked" a few of their pictures and go to workshops in the dance community. There is a lot to why I felt it hit below the belt. For starters I was very new to being back in the Maritime Dance scene and felt it was a horrible start. I was busy enough with the workshop coming up within a week that I was too busy to take as much notice of how it hit at my confidence and my already underlying fears that whenever I try to teach I for some reason attract a very odd "wtf??" moment. Something that had happened to only to me and where I saw a side of someone that possibly no one else had.

   The workshop went on with success but within a week I caught the flu that was going around. I had symptoms then on the day or two of that week I felt more normal would practice and do stuff as usual planning on starting classes the following week. Then it kept coming back and going away seemingly and coming back. I tried not to superstitiously equate it with, "When I teach bad things happen to me to make it impossible for me to teach!" It crept in there and I still have this fear and it's PTSD and no I can't just get over it. Unfortunately I am more easily discouraged in this area from fear. I haven't quite cracked the code to have it gone once and for all. I was going to face it every week for teaching but nope it had to be January during the thick of winter while all the worst plagues are going around! After a three or so weeks I had to wonder, "Is it flu or something worse? When will this go away?" So when I contacted the owner of Perpetual Motion dance Studio that I didn't know when I was going to be better she mentioned that the Tap group would like to make use of the time slot on the day I had reserved and rented for. It was more fair to the Tap group and to the owner so that she could make use of the time slot and receive some rent rather than each week for who knows how long my having to cancel and have no rent to give her.

   I felt it was really not fair to the people who had come to the workshop and had wanted to continue as well as to all of the unknowns in Sackville who I would only know were interested when they showed up on the first day. I felt guilty and sorry also to the previous dancer of the space. But did what I thought was right and am keeping the door open to teach in the future somewhere, someday. I had been afraid that the arrhythmia I get which developed over the past year and a half or so would get in the way of my teaching and practicing. But I didn't want to let it. In truth it did get worse the more I was taking on for advertising, organizing and doing all of that with real practice. And when I got the flu it got worse. When I say real practice I mean 2-4 hours almost each day of the week.

   But, not long after I gave the time slot to Tap and broke the news that classes were cancelled indefinitely of course I recovered and made my way towards practicing seriously without knowing when or where I'll teach again.

   So, here I am today. My choice is to teach workshops in the future. I'm hesitant to teach ongoing classes because my immune system has always been bad. Believe it or not, I get sick less than I used to and to not as bad of a degree. I don't get pneumonia or the kind of flu/cold where I am sneezing absolutely constantly. I do everything I can to strengthen my immune system and to avoid lung infections for having asthma. Maybe to some it means I am whining for talking about things that aren't "amazing". I just tell it like it is. This is my process and my truth. That's it. No facade.

   I'm also hesitant to teach ongoing classes right now because the arrhythmia I get makes me nervous. It's not something that you can just control and like a lot of health issues that no one can see it's hard to understand so that you can avoid it from happening. I don't know when or why sometimes it happens. Sometimes I notice a trigger but then notice that it doesn't trigger it at another time. I assume it's my bodies way of telling me that my cup is overflowing. That everything I've been through has done damage not just to my spirit heart but my physical one. So, I have to do my best to strengthen, heal and protect it in many ways. I will only someday start teaching regular classes after enough time has gone by with absolutely no arrhythmia in normal activity.

   My doctor who I saw in Fredericton when it started believed it's just something that I developed which some people are more apt to do. She said it wasn't dangerous to my health and to try and relax when it's happening and to notice when and why it happens. I've thought it was from prolonged abnormal stress or from taking asthma medication including the rescue inhaler. I still don't know anything for sure so I go on rather blindly but doing my best to handle it and my best to know what I can handle. I see it as one of the ways my body talks to me that it has over the years. At this time in my life it's my heart. At other times in my 20s and early 30s it was most definitely my gut. I discovered my pain was from IBS. No doctor told me but I fit all of the symptoms. Now I know how to control it I don't get the symptoms so much anymore which makes me lucky. Some people have more triggers than I. Specific foods or drinks would trigger it or not eating soon enough but it also happened when  someone had hurt me and when it had really cut at my esteem. This was so for me, I don't know about anyone else. But I couldn't help but notice the pattern that was going on. IBS also got in my way and I'm thankful it doesn't anymore!

   I found it odd that someone with arrhythmia could have perfect blood pressure but there it was when I got tested. There have been times where absolutely nothing would trigger it. Or it would be a really strong arrhythmia after only half an hour of simple belly dance practice. But now that I am "controlling" it I can manage to be active most days of the week for hours doing intense practice without arrhythmia. It happens sometimes but again I don't know why. Oddly enough it doesn't mean I am unhealthy or unfit. Just like having asthma doesn't mean I am "weak" simply by having it even if it's medicated. I met someone who was dumbfounded to find out I had asthma because I wasn't a spindly skinny, weak little thing. Was rather insulting but occurrences like that happen to people who have an illness that nobody understands unless they have it themselves. It seems to be a common belief that a person can''t have symptoms of unhealth but also be healthy. Odd? Yes but it's true.

   Health affects creativity, state of mind, ability to take on new ventures and goals. It's hard sometimes when you have symptoms of something that makes you feel unwell and unable to handle what you normally do. People blame and think if the person did better or did some kind of technique it would just go away. That it's simpler than it really is even though millions of people have Asthma or have Migraines or IBS or Chronic Pain. The culture expects people to just get over it eventually and if they have not then they have failed even if they are doing the best they can. All of this really does not help anyone's sense of self. As it is to those who are afflicted work hard to not define themselves by their symptoms while others around them are either pitying them or judging them and even hating them for reminding them of their own vulnerability as a human being.

   It is partially because of the things that afflict me physically and Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia that physical expression dominates so much of my time. For those of you that don't know what HSP is and haven't read my previous post this is a genetic illness that runs in my family. Everyday when I practice and can practice for hours I am grateful that I can walk and more. At the back of my mind I hope that by doing intense practice that I am warding it off. And because of all of the kinds of pain including everything I've mentioned in this post and the kind I experienced that I mentioned in previous ones I'm grateful to do anything. It's amazing to not have the chronic pain in my shoulder stopping me from doing something before I want. At times my only creative expression was trying to find ways to relieve pain and that was it.

   I say all this because human beings have a natural need to tell their story. The internet is a giant talking stick and if you have wondered into my circle welcome. I want to hear your story. I share all of the texture, the nuts and bolts of my story so that people will feel that they can. So that I can try to budge the belief just a little about having a defined set of emotions in a pretty box narrowed down to strength and power. We are more than that. Some people don't want to be reminded of their humanity. Some do and this is for whom I speak. All of what I express is who I am as an artist, a dancer, a teacher, anything I do. If I don't communicate about these things then I would be pretending to you that I am a different kind of artist/dancer. Anything I do should not be about forwarding my name or gaining attention or pity or making myself appear impossibly perfect.

   Because anything that is of real and true worth in this world has the power to cut past the falsity. To cut past the grain to what is real. Lies never did anyone any good. And a life built around lies or trying to get better at lying to others is more than sad. It's an act of war on oneself and anything in this world that refuses to or can't lie. I know what people are up against. I face it everyday. It tugs at the back of my mind even if I'm not thinking about it. But the more people that begin the more that people will begin.

   I challenge you to be your truth in your everyday life including in the arts. I challenge you to look at yourself real closely to know your intentions. To know how much your lying to yourself and others and trying to get better and better at it as a way to success in this world I challenge you to stop and feel how that feels and how much you numb yourself to how much you actually do in fact hate it and want to give it up. In order to give anything up that is horrible for us we have to allow ourselves to feel just how horrible it really is. That it isn't that great to keep telling ourselves " I'll feel better when I'm thin, perfect, rich, a genius and successful. It's ok if I feel like shit now."

   Anything worth anything takes time and work and even some unhappy and imperfect emotions but not to the extent where we have to constantly tell ourselves "I'll be happy when."

   We need artists that express the grand magnitude of being human and therefore of what it is to be alive, the good and the bad, the imperfect, the dark and the light. And we need artists that share their stories, not just their techniques. Artists trying to not be rebellious, not not face people with themselves, not stir energy within is a contradiction in terms. Artists have been seen as many things over the years. Only recently have artists been seen as rebellious and questioning culture and getting others to. How could a Belly Dancer be any of these things or have this affect just by dancing with a variety of emotions instead of just one or two in each dance she dances? Because it's a radical act to feel and to express in our culture.

   I challenge all dancers to find this depth of emotion in any dance form they practice whether it is ATS, Tribal Fusion or Am Cab. Don't get lost in technique or goals of unreachable perfection. You'll find that when you do that you become the amazing dancer that you were always struggling to be.

   I'll talk more about how and why this happens in a future post that will also praise Princess Farhana's deck of dance practice cards!

   Stay tuned!

My Journey: Evolution in Creative Expression and Sense of Self Part 2

   A lot of people dance with creativity everyday and dance the edge of deep innermost expression all the while keeping it at a distance and therefore not really committing to the message that is there to come out. The hardest part of any creative endeavor is not the technique or the time/energy management. It's the daring to be completely and whole heartedly honest with no codes to veil and distort the expression. We want to water it down and make it more palatable to the masses even though the artists job is to challenge people to reflect on their own experiences and relation to themselves, to others and to things. The artist no matter what style of expression has been turned into a robot. Merely an entertainer. Entertainment is all good and well. It is very much needed in a world where people work very hard and suffer everyday. Sometimes entertainment is the only thing that can make us feel like we aren't the only one, or to take us beyond a difficult experience to experience happiness again. But people are very afraid of facing themselves, hearing themselves speak. Because they know deep down what I know by experience. That when you hear yourself and see yourself you see everything around you differently. You feel everything differently. And all of this means that you'll attract trouble in some way or another. It means having who you are on the table and therefore not ultra protected by a massive wall of illusion.

   I have danced for years with how to have a wall that is good for me rather than one that is created in the way that most people in my culture create. The kind that is based off of fear, anger, victim hood. We've all been victims of something and most of us know how hard it is to keep ourselves from losing a part of ourselves deep within that is fresh. The only part of us that has the guts to be so honest that it changes and breaks institutions and blows everyone's minds! To keep that inner child alive and healthy as well as safe and protected is the trick of it. If your like me you did not have a mother in life that was able to provide this for you while you are growing up. I like to believe in things I cannot see and things that I have never known but I know must exist and that I can create for myself. And because I believe that for myself and know this by experience I believe that every one else can too if they could only open their minds to the idea.

   I really believe that all of the trouble in the world no matter what it is is rooted in how people are conditioned to believe that their human nature and therefore animal nature is bad. And that we all must rise above it and to rise above anything from the natural animal kingdom. The more people have continued this line of thought, the more we have seen damage done to the earth and all of it's inhabitants. The massive breakdown of communities, families and therefore the massive breakdown of connection to our natural selves. We see dogmatic beliefs about beauty, success and self worth. Everything has a price tag including our abs, hair or lack thereof!

   All of this thought came about from experiencing not just knowing which I have known some time now that I had lost a connection to dance which I had early on in the early to mind 2000s when I began. Back then I had the heart of Am Cab in my heart and my hands and I danced with it. Over the years I explored other dance forms such as ATS and Tribal Fusion which I am very addicted to and I love them because my body loves expressing what these dance forms express. My body needs it and my mind needs it. But through exploring and focusing on these dance forms in depth I wasn't dancing with the heart of dance like I used to. As a result I had less and less confidence in myself as a dancer and as a person no matter that I was learning new dance forms, refining my techniques and learning more complicated things. All of this lead to feeling dis spirited by the dance form so over the years I danced back to it for missing it and wanting to have what I had before but then dancing away to other forms of expression and arts. I also was not in a good financial place to continue or to be in a community that I could be supported by. I could not explore all of the dance forms I had come to know and need. There were times where I wanted to join daturaonline.com but even then $25 per month was too much to commit to. And it isn't just videos. It's an on-line community that supports each other. So I didn't even have that!

   I also was very dis spirited by all of the politics surrounding Belly Dance which did not exist or not that I knew of when I began. I struggled with it enough that I was overwhelmed, burnt out and it drove away any of the heart I had tried to spirit up into my life again. But my wishes and my dreams never went away. I tried to make them go away to make my life easier. To save money, pay down debt easier and not be put in more debt by dancing. I was burned out in other areas of my life so much I craved simplicity, space, quiet and peace. I gave it to myself and though I needed it and got what I needed from it, I needed richness, color, texture, culture and energy that fluctuated to out and in to my center. I needed community and dreamed of finding a dance community that I could be part of again that allowed my spirit and expression to dance free. So, though I held dance at a distance I held the dream out there for it to be a possibility.

   I was not happy living in Fredericton NB. I was happy to go back there after living in Halifax NS but it did not have what I needed. I felt wrong there as I did in Halifax. I had no idea what I was going to do. All I could see ahead of me was nothing and I hated it. No matter how hard I looked I couldn't see myself having anything there and this went on for almost the entire time I was back. One day last fall at the beginning of October I was having one of those days which were many which felt dead, dis spirited, flat, unhappy, bleak, depressing. I was in the shower and suddenly a thought came to me straight out of nowhere. It was " Have I ever thought of moving to Sackville?" And I thought, that yes I had. Years ago during my first year at NBCCD while I was completing my FVA I applied too Mount Allison University to the Fine Arts program. The idea of moving to a small town at the time was scary. I used to live in a small town and was afraid of it. But I wanted to explore the Fine Arts so I applied. I did get accepted to the school to take any other program however but didn't follow through with it because though I was interested in many things they had to offer, I wanted the Fine Arts. After that I sporadically thought of moving to Sackville NB. I craved a small community that wasn't angry by the population, the horrible transit, etc. After going to see Alice Cooper in Moncton NB of 2016 my husband and I went on a trip with some friends who had also gone to the concert  to explore Sackville. I played with the idea a little then of what it would be like to move to the small town. Finally, I'm here! Last fall when I thought of it I also thought, " I could travel to Moncton nearby to take classes with Barbara Aubie at Studio Sephira! " I also thought, " I could travel to Halifax which would be much closer to take classes at Serpentine Dance Studio."

   Another part of my evolution of coming back into my dance self happened soon after I moved here much to my surprise! I knew it was meant to be because I had held an idea in my mind that I was looking for a healthy dance community. One day I was walking down the street and there was a dance studio. I thought " I wonder if they have any belly dance classes there...." Then thought "Probably not. It looks like it's Ballet and Modern Dance." I saw when I checked Perpetual Motion Dance Studio's site that it was indeed a lot of that. But I spied Tribal Fusion. Tribal Fusion! I was like "Wow! In this small town?!" I have come to find that Sackville NB holds many such hidden extraordinary jewels related to art and culture and it has made me feel more and more like it was the right choice to move there!

   So when I made my discovery I wrote the owner of the studio about more information regarding the classes to which she forwarded me on to the teacher. I wrote to her expressing my interest in taking classes, my experience and how I would like to be part of a dance community again and maybe to someday perform again. She wrote me back and was amazed to find someone approach her who already knew what Tribal Fusion and ATS was! We got together to chat at a local cafe and it was the first heart to heart chat that I had had about Belly Dance in years! We both talked about the difficulties within the greater dance community, the frustrations and our passions. We also talked about how image was a major barrier to women beginning and continuing the dance form. During the conversation she also revealed to me that she was going to be taking time off of teaching soon because she needed maternity leave. She apologized for my timing on coming to the classes just when they were ending but when she found out my experience as a dancer, teacher and yogi she wanted me to teach at the studio. For years I had been afraid of teaching. I believed that if I taught bad things would happen to me because they did! Over and over! But over the years I had also wanted to break that fear and find my voice in teaching again. Because I knew it was one of my inherent strengths. I could always speak on front of people without fear and I could always teach well even before I had teacher training. So that was not what I was afraid of.

   So when this opportunity was laid at my feet I was amazed. I was energized and full of adrenaline. I had hope of teaching again and of finally letting the fear go. I had taught a few years before but in my own space and privately. But the fear never completely went away. Having a class at a studio felt bigger and more "real". Over the years I had learned to doubt myself more but I kept telling myself of how much I had grown and how much I could offer even with my practice having been sporadic and not as involved or as intense as my practice earlier on. I don't know everything and never pretend to. But it had gotten into me over time that I was supposed to know everything somehow. So, I had to ignore that and remember that I did know a few things and that the spirit, not just the technique of my teaching was good and needed. I felt I had to get people to find the spirit within rather than connecting to a technique or an image or a hope of losing weight by dancing. It has always felt like a huge responsibility because it is. It's not an easy task to not just teach technique but to help people to love themselves unflinchingly without shame through dance or yoga. It's a tall order. People want to be amazing at these things so that they can finally like themselves. Rather than dance as a process to learning how to "love" themselves and not just "like". People are very attached to it because being amazing or thin or projecting a powerful and refined image gives off an impression that if we can achieve this then it will automatically promise respect from others. That no one will treat us like complete shit again! A lot of us would rather be intimidating enough to put others in a position of submission. It's one of the ways that we adopt to protect ourselves in life and when it comes to exploring an art form. It becomes about this toxic relationship with ourselves and others rather than a real relationship and a real expression with ourselves and others.

   Stay tuned for Part 3 of My Journey: Evolution in Creative Expression and Sense of Self!

My Journey: Evolution in Creative Expression and Sense of Self Part 1

 

 
 
   In a post quite awhile ago I mentioned that I would make a post discussing why I don't/can't choose between styles of belly dance and forgive me for this post is belated! In this post you'll also get to know me more and my own progression and journey through exploring different forms of movement.

  This post will also lead into another one about how an experience at a dance class with Princess Farhana's cards triggered all of this writing and therefore how great and revolutionary I think they are!

   Over the years I have gotten into different styles of dance as well as styles of movements that I miss when I haven't done them. There are so many out there it's impossible to do them all! So it's only the limits of time, energy and other passions which choose for me. Before I ever did any style of Belly Dance I found a VHS on Latin Dancing. I loved it! And later when I took Belly Dance classes I found there was a parallel to some of the hip movements. It's practice also gave me well coordinated feet and the ability to layer simple hip movements over steps. This is why I believe that all disciplines no matter what they are serve to expand and inform your ability in other traditions. I also around the same time found a VHS for Kickboxing which I also loved. This style also taught me to move my hips in a twisting motion with the leg pivoting on the toe.

   When I started belly dancing it was different but it still helped me to understand better what was going on in the Egyptian Step( also called "Step and Point") in AmCab and the Egyptian Basic in ATS. I recently did Kickboxing last week for the first time in months and was happy to find that even after an hour of weights that my energy was good and I had no arrhythmia! So win/win! But every time I do kickboxing after a time where I hadn't in awhile I realize just how great it is for improving lightness and speed in your feet, leg strength, endurance, hip flexibility and releasing tension in the legs. You also get a great twisting action in the shoulders and spine which also relieves tension. It's also a very different exercise than belly dance and found that I wasn't used to that particular flavor of intensity anymore. But because belly dance is my thing and takes a lot of hours to practice and energy Kickboxing will only be an every now and then practice for me unless I can travel in time like Hermione from Harry Potter!

   When I found a VHS of Veena and Neena's Basic Belly Dance movements at Zellers in Fredericton NB in the winter of 2002 I was over-joyed! I had wanted to for a few years and never knew where I could learn! I still don't remember how I found out about what it was called. All I know is that when I was a teen-ager I saw a Janet Jackson video where they were doing amazing hip movements! I had never seen anything like that before and was like "That can't be possible! But they are!" They were dressed more in a style of Indian Dance Fusion so at the time I thought it's origins was India. Somehow I came across the name Belly Dance, years before I found the Veena and Neena in 1999 I was mentioning to a person from my home town how I wanted to learn "Belly Dance". I remember their reaction! lol At the time I was oblivious to how risque and baaaad it was perceived to be! The way I grew up, I was very separate from the way that everyone else lived and the ways that others thought. It was a very bad thing but in this way it was good. Because I was so isolated and spent a lot of time alone I had lots of time to think and to hear my own voice. Only years later did I find out how rare it is for others to have this and that if they did it was only after years of being very very busy with no time or space to think, to know themselves.

   For me it was different. I grew up with a mentally ill parent where her condition was not properly controlled by medication. And so I was isolated from other people a lot. When I should have been at school but wasn't because my mother didn't make sure I did, I was exploring ideas in psychology and spirituality, yoga, lifting weights, playing guitar, drawing, reading, and writing poetry. Art and being in my body was my own culture that I created. There was no fussy ideas surrounding it about one thing being better than the other or why. There was no judgement, only exploration, growth and setting my own goals. I created my own self discipline and made sure to keep learning and growing even if I wasn't in the school system. And this way of life also had me expressing my own voice in a safe place even if the only person to listen was me. That is why no matter how strongly and fiercely I have been silenced by my mother, this culture or any one else that I speak up. I am still surprised when I speak up because I think, shouldn't I keep silent? But even when I have been silent, just by me being who I am I ask for trouble. And anyone who thinks freely and feels freely will attract abuse from people who have cut themselves off from their heart in some way. I sometimes wish that I could create the kind of wall, veneer, image that others seem to do so easily. But whenever I have tried it has hurt me too much.

   Over the years I have felt like all of these creative forms that I loved and developed a relationship with was demanding of me to turn to stone. To create a false facade rather than to become more real. I even felt this when I was focused on developing my success as a yoga teacher years ago after I completed the teacher training. To those of you who have read my previous posts you know how I came to stop teaching yoga and how I became afraid of teaching for years. I have often thought that even though I hated what happened, and that all of it was so very wrong and still hurts me to this day, that it forced me to keep up with a facade that I felt I had to create as a yoga teacher. With everything that happened with being assaulted and people who I thought were my friends not understanding or caring it was too much for me to put on a front that none of these things hurt me while putting on the amazing yoga teacher facade that I felt was going on all through the yoga world at the time. I thought this was the only way for a teacher to get success all the while I thought it was bull. I grew up doing yoga so again it was a shock to learn that there were so many embedded projections, expectations, politics and ego involved in the simple practice of "stretching" and " breathing". This is why I don't adapt to the way that the rest of the world works. Though I was brought up in an extremely unhealthy and insane home I was not cultured and forged by the surrounding culture at all. So as I forcefully left the nest and explored the world desperately trying to outrun the fate of my ancestors I have found I can't adapt. And that I have to try very hard to hold on to myself while nearly, mostly everyone around me is trying very very hard to hate and reject themselves or to only love the show that they can put on for others.

  I don't love the show. I love the humanity that which most people are rejecting and holding at a distance. As a result I feel like I am always immersed in a new culture and experiencing culture shock. And I always feel like I am doing something wrong. Did I say too much? Was my communication or my dance or my writing, my singing too personal? Is the image I just drew or painted too close to the truth? And then I feel and worry that honest expression doesn't belong anywhere. That art is only accepted if it's in a very tidy box and only if it expresses strength, entertainment, absurdity to entertain, perfection. I have had many real things get in the way of all of my creativity but one of them has always been "Where does it belong? This culture seems to not want this." And so would progress to money being equated with acceptance and belonging by the greater culture and that therefore meaning "success" All of that rather than a human being defining for themselves what success really is and that it isn't really success if your warping your vision and creative expression to get more students, sell more paintings, get more followers, likes etc.

  Stay tuned for Part 2 of My Journey: Evolution in Creative Expression and Sense of Self !

What To Expect From My New ATS and Tribal Fusion Belly Dance Classes

Photo by Dave Gay 2004 Odell Park Fredericton NB

Even though the picture is of me doing yoga we will not be doing a lot of yoga in either the ATS or Tribal Fusion. We will be doing a simple and safe warm up at the beginning and a simple and safe cool down at the end for each class.

For both the Beginners ATS and Tribal Fusion classes expect a lot of emphasis on posture as well as feet, leg, arm and hand positioning. Expect the movements to be broken down, pieced together and practiced very slowly with speed slowly built up. Safety tips will also be discussed in both classes.

For the ATS expect your arms to be held up at shoulder height a lot of the time. You will get breaks to bring your arms down! Expect to get a little out of breath and expect to concentrate hard on doing moves that will most likely feel alien to you! Expect to not always be looking straight at me or any ATS teacher because some of the moves such as Egyptian Basic need for you to turn around facing away from the teacher. Expect a lot of discussion in the class about different aspects of ATS therefore don't expect that this class is made to burn calories to lose x amount of weight. It might burn some but it really is not the emphasis. The intention of this class is to learn new things, develop a new relationship with yourself and your body, develop bonds with community and to have fun! You'll most likely find a new inner strength of mind and body. As the class progresses and develops props will be explored in this dance form such as finger cymbals, sword and more!

For Tribal Fusion expect drills of isolated movements, a few traveling movements and time to consolidate all that you've learned as well as how to improvise. Expect the classes to progress to layering isolations over other isolations and over traveling steps. You'll find Tribal Fusion to be such a broad style of dance form for you to stretch your own unique style and creative muscles! Expect to express your unique self through this dance form and possibly discovering a new found inner power and playfulness! Again this class is not about burning calories. Tribal Fusion is about having fun, pure self expression, being one with your body, confidence, inner power, passion, mischief, humor and sensuality. And it's about exploring and creating this very new and amazing dance form which is making history! As the class progresses we will also explore the use of dance props with Tribal Fusion such as sword and more!

If you have been worried about your physical endurance in taking two classes back to back your concerns are warranted. But be assured that the Tribal Fusion will feel luxurious after the ATS! That is why I chose to schedule the ATS at 6:30pm before Tribal Fusion at 7:30pm. In my own practice I usually begin with ATS and follow it up with Tribal Fusion and feel like it's a very natural and healthy progression for the body. Tribal Fusion is after all the next step of Belly Dance evolution straight from American Tribal Style. After the specific styling of ATS I find that my body loves to follow it with the styling of Tribal Fusion. Like putting on a pair of comfortable jeans!

The Beginners Tribal Fusion will challenge you but rest assured that I will be purposefully making it gentle and easier for people who want to gently nudge their endurance levels up for people are just beginning fitness activity and for those who are exploring ATS and Tribal Fusion Belly Dance. 

Do you have to study in both styles? No

What do you get out of it if you choose to commit to studying both styles?

You get a broadened experience of not just a couple of styles of belly dance but of yourself. Both styles of belly dance introduce you to yourself in similar but different ways. Besides that, anything you study will serve to enhance your skill and awareness as a dancer and possibly a teacher if that becomes your goal in the future. I study a variety of traditions and find that they all serve to support my skills in other practices. Yoga and Pilates for example supports the skill of a belly dancer in any style infinitely!


Stay tuned for my next post about being a continuous learner, why I don't choose between any Belly Dance style and why I love them all!

Protecting Your Practice Strengthens You

 To begin with anything we are put up against all of the things that take our time and that want to get in our way. Integrating something new into your life takes a solid block of time that had been set aside for something else even if it was hanging on the couch and marathon watching tv shows. And yes, do that!

 But to begin, we also need to safe guard our ability to continue. All too often in the New Year people start something with high expectations of themselves all the while thinking of their failure to achieve it the year before. Perhaps for the last New Years  resolution. The high expectations and the remembrance of past failures does not set the stage for a solid foundation for our practice. Dancing is as much in the mind as it is in the body, In fact they are not separate at all.

 My advice is to not think of beginning a new practice as being a resolution. Instead a practice needs to be seen as a long term practice that is given chunks of time for however often you have chosen that you can handle physically, mentally and emotionally. It's hard to forget about falling off the horse in the past if you are coming back to belly dance practice after a time off. Just remember that this is supposed to be fun and to make you feel happy, energized and good in your body!

 Another issue with our practice is that we are faced with the excuses we make to do something else. A lot of the time it is easier to do what we have normally done and to avoid our reasons for doing so. We could be avoiding yoga or belly dance practice out of fear. Everyone's fear or doubt is very personal and we all need to take time to reflect on what our practice is facing us with about ourselves. We may even feel guilty about carving committed time into our schedule that is just for us. Dance may seem frivolous. Our idea of dance or yoga may not be in line with the face we are used to showing to the world. We may be trying to prove that we are a " hard worker " and perhaps dance we are afraid that people will see us as being frivolous and lazy if we take time to dance rather than work over time.

 All of these things are challenging and in order for our practice to be successful it takes time. Time to practice and time to reflect. What you have to deal with a year from now may be different but practice usually brings it up for us and right on front of our face! Do we judge ourselves for not being perfect dancers able to do and know everything? Are we still anxious about how we will be seen by others? Are we afraid of losing our job if we don't say yes to everything? Are any of our fears or doubts based on reality? Is it really true or are we believing in an old story that was handed down to us in some way?

 Protect your practice by being your own detective to discover what is operating in the background affecting your life and your practice. Protect your practice by realizing that you would be unhappy giving up on something that you wanted to do, on a dream no matter how small just because of what other people think.

 The most solid attitude that any of us could use more of to develop a strong and stable practice is by believing in ourselves no matter if others do or not because the quality of our lives is what is important. When someone questions us or expects something that is not in line with our goals or vision we need to depend on ourselves to not get caught up in another persons agenda for our dance or life.

 I am talking about clear, strong and healthy boundaries. Metaphorically committed dancers and happy people in general draw a line the sand and they under no uncertain terms ever allow people to cross that line. People tend to rattle all of us off of our center but it is up to us to get back to center as soon as possible so that we can get back on the horse. Getting back to practice is part of the process of coming back to our center after we have been shaken off course.

 No matter the day you've had do your best to step onto your yoga mat, put on your hip scarf and begin your practice with music, an instructional video or get yourself to a class. You know that you will regret it later if you let anyone shake you from the choices that feed into you rather than take away. Disengaging from the people who take away from us and instill fear and doubt are to be avoided as much as possible. Try as much as you can to find your supporters even if they are a country away and the only way you connect is on-line. We need supporters too also help us protect our practice. We really do!

 We may be used to being off center and used to not doing what we dream, used to listening to the naysayers. We need to learn to get used to another kind of experience. We need to allow ourselves to not feel used to being off center and thrown off balance by well meaning people who actually are not well meaning at all. A healthy person isn't used to having other people dictate their lives and as dancers we commonly build stronger boundaries as we progress which changes the dynamics of the relationships we are in. People won't be used to our change and we might not be used to it yet. It may still feel foreign and selfish to simply walk away from the crap that someone is slinging your way. You may find yourself surprised to not have the tolerance to have a discussion with another person about how good or badly you should feel about yourself. Over time that discussion with yourself will change. Over time it will be like " There should be no discussion on this. I deserve to be happy no matter what. I don't have to prove anything to anyone. This is for me."

 In our dance, through this transformation we are melted and hammered into a new shape just like with metal-smithing and we become something completely new and different. Through that process we have something that translates through our dance to the world. The hours and hours of practice and the hours of all that we do to protect it translates into a power and strength, a great inner beauty that is expressed through the dance to the culture that receives it. The audience doesn't quite understand at a logical level but they pick up on more than just movements and technique. The pick up on the dancer as a person and on the person as a whole. The dancer tells the story of triumph, freedom, liberation, endurance. The dancer tells a story of surpassing all difficulty and shining bright no matter what.

 To protect our practice we all make the choice to surpass all difficulty and shine bright no matter what. It is our choice and we can do it! It is there for the taking! All that we must go through to endure strengthens us. It isn't the mastering of a movement alone. It is the choice to persist which is a strong choice which motivates us to be stronger. Facing adversity also gives us a power, strength and belief in ourselves. Sometimes we may have to face other dancers who do not believe in us or our dance form for whatever reason and we must be ready to face them too and to remain centered with the vision of our dance and what we love.

 You'll get more out of a long term committed dance practice than being awesome or a name to drop. You'll get a new life and more and more ability to step forward with persistence and strength in any area of your life.

 Anything you need to create solid reminders to practice do it now! Create a dance diary and fill in your goals and thing to practice on for each date, search for apps to bing you so that you'll be reminded of when to get ready for dance practice and register for a 6-8 week Belly Dance class in whatever style calls you!

 Do it now!

My Belly Dance Journey Part 3

 During my years away from teaching and performing an article was posted on-line. I thought about it for years. It was "Why I Can't Stand White Belly Dancers!" I gave what she was saying a chance but there were holes in her argument or any other dancers argument who said that ATS was cultural appropriation. I never gave up belly dancing but I could not offer classes and perform until I was solid. Solid not just in being ready to teach again but solid in my philosophy of why ATS and Tribal Fusion are valid and great dance forms that are not cultural appropriation. Some people may still think so and I'm sure they do. But my body has been wedded to these styles just as much as American Cabaret which I started with and Yoga. There is an elegant beauty to ATS that is about community and that is something I really love. I also believe in growing art forms, fusing different styles together and being unique. People will always blanch at originality and see it isn't the " twue" way.

 As for the white dancers who are American Cabaret that say ATS is cultural appropriation, there are people who would say that by the very fact that they are white, teaching classes and performing is cultural appropriation and stealing opportunities away from dancers who were born of the Middle East Culture. I had one person confront me on ATS in this way once and I was flummoxed. It had never happened to me before. The other reason I believe the whole "ATS dancers are stealing opportunities away from AmCab" is complete bull is that people choose what they like. To be a dancer and take what you know out there and advertise it and then have people come to you for your service is the public's choice. I also believe that people still want AmCab and there are plenty of ATS dancers and Tribal Fusion Dancers that believe in the importance of AmCab to practice it regularly on the side of the other dance forms. And these dancers use to to inform and structure their performance and art as an ATS or Tribal Fusion Dancer. I am interested on all styles of belly dance. At this time I focus on ATS, Tribal Fusion and AmCab with aspirations of focusing on Turkish and the oldest most historical styles of Belly Dance that still exist today.

 If a dancer is not getting gigs for teaching or performing there are hundred of reasons why that may be happening. And it could be that there is no one to blame. Timing sometimes is all that we can blame when we've done all we can ourselves to advertise.

 So that is where I stand on the whole cultural appropriation. It's a sticky issue and I do my best to respectfully represent these art forms. When we see another dancer make a mistake I would hope that the issue would be calmly brought to their attention rather than chastising and humiliating them in public or on-line. None of us can know absolutely everything and as we know everything is a process including being a Belly Dancer.

 Other things slowed down my process as a dancer. I grew up in a home that cannot be described as dysfunctional because there is no word that can describe the extreme of what it was. My mother was and is mentally ill so I had lived with someone mentally ill for all of my childhood until I moved in with my boyfriend and his family. He also had a mental illness. Not the same extreme as my mothers but enough of an extreme that it tore my life apart. In the midst of all this difficulty I began belly dancing. It was all I had to ground me and to force me away from it. And it was all I had that helped me to feel strength and freedom, liberty. Looking back on these things it is why I could never give up Belly Dance. Not for anyone saying that they " Can't Stance White Belly Dancers". It was too personal to me. Not just something physical or something to blow up my ego.

 All through my years teaching and performing I had everything going on in the background. I struggled but chose to keep my head high as a dancer. At times if felt like too much to put on a public face. And at times my life was far too distracting. Words again cannot describe what it is like. It is not something you can just will away. To just choose to not care about and do your own thing. Mental illness of any kind is frightening whether it affects you or the person you live with. I was not an untouchable island where I could keep it from affecting me. There were some years where I could not focus enough to take on a committed belly dance practice as I had before. I had been weakened by too many events that had happened in the meantime.

 But I'm stubborn. And that is how I eventually came to be where I am now. For years my husband did not have medication. He had been on it before and the effects were scary to both of us. So we both did our best with him not being on anything. We relied on meditation, psychology and other things. But none of it was enough especially when it was hard to find good therapists who knew how to help him. His anxiety disorder was not just from how his brain just ended up working. He also had a poor upbringing. Different from mine but it affected him opposite from me. I have the ability to be resilient. I don't know why. I just do. Even if I am weak,off balance and off center I can within a second snap back into place. At times when a person is so upset that they have less and less ability to call on their logic and ability to see the situation from a birds eye view, I can. I also have a sense of humor and it takes a lot for it to recede back for any length of time. I am always working on my ability to bounce back quicker because I can't afford to lose time. And I have come to accept that by my nature because of where I am from I am more vulnerable to some things than maybe others would be. Why? Because my cup is overflowing. I had to live with more things in my first eighteen years than some people do in an entire lifetime that no one could understand unless they come from that kind of place themselves.

 We all fall down sometimes. If you haven't I don't know how but I just call it luck. I wouldn't wish the life I've had on my worst enemy. I do have enemies that wish to see me fall and to them I wish for them to have exactly what they need to lose their ignorance. I have studied a lot of new age philosophies and during the time I immersed myself in being a yoga teacher I was more so. So whenever bad things happened to me it was all made worse by the philosophy that bad things happen for a reason, because you did something bad in a past life etc. I had to fight this idea and I still have to fight it because I spent years working with this idea. I thought if I believed in it and do all that I could in accordance with it that I could break the curse that my whole seemed to have been. It certainly felt like a curse!

 So if all of that happened to me just so I could erase ignorance and tell people to throw that philosophy in the trash so be it! But I seriously believe that things good and bad just happen and who knows why? The other reason why this belief was bad for me is because it lowered my esteem and ate away at it over time. I could never know what I had done to deserve all I had. There is more to my story and I won't mention it here. The idea that people born again are ignorant of their past lives and their mistakes is wrong. The idea that they deserve whatever bad in relation to what they did which they are ignorant to is wrong, because how can a person learn anything that way if they don't know what they did? If this idea is true the cycle repeats itself. The person keeps making mistakes. They might think they aren't because they are a yogi or buddhist letting karma " play itself out". But according to the idea they are always creating karma. And attaching yourself to a name like "yogi" or " buddhist" so you can now put a gloss over every time you hurt someone is just wrong!

 There is a lot that I mention that has absolutely nothing to do with dance but dancers are people and everything affects the dance. Everything is inter connected, never separate. We like to believe things are so we can protect something or ourselves. But we are infinitely connected to other people, to our environment and everything in our lives. We can choose but we are human. Life has forces which are stronger than we ourselves are. Sometimes it takes an entire life to learn that. There are some things that we can get up from quickly and there are other things that we cannot and we need to wait. We need to do what we can do to ready ourselves for getting up whether or not it looks awesome to other people. Most people won't see it because this work is done alone and perhaps in prolonged seclusion.

 I share my story because I need to for myself, because it is what my belly dance journey has been and for people who are belly dancers and who are struggling or have struggled. My story has come around to a stronger and better part to my life finally through many different things that I needed to make it possible for me to step forward. The laser therapy, the taking time away to heal, my husband going on medication, changing my last name and my own stubborn will were all what brought me here and made it possible.

 I don't know how classes and workshops will go. I learned from the last times I was a teacher that a "watched pot never boils!" And that I need other things in my life to feel balanced besides belly dance. I accept that I am not finished or perfect as a dancer or teacher because who is? If my classes and workshops don't take off I accept that too. I'll keep dancing, maybe do workshops out of town, focus on fiber arts, music or painting. I also don't know if I'll lose my ability to walk.

 On my fathers side there is a hereditary illness called Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia which I have 50% chance of inheriting or not inheriting. So far I have not fallen down all of a sudden which is what happens. In the old days, people who had this illness were thought to be drunk. It still is not an understood illness and most people have never heard of it ever. A person loses their ability to walk more and more as the nerves that are responsible for transmitting signals to the legs are damaged.

 I mention this because if I ever fall down while teaching or taking a class by another teacher I want people to know why I have fallen down for seemingly know reason. I will have no bracelet to alert anyone because till that second I will have had no symptoms.

Over the past year or so I started developing heart arrhythmia which is when your heart beats rapidly and irregularly. It was scary. I thought it was going to lead to a heart attack at just 35. I'm 36 now. It happened when I did a gentle belly dance practice. It took me time to figure out what it was. I assume it is caused by the asthma medications that I take which lower the magnesium level in your system. I started taking magnesium supplements as well as coq 10 and vitamin d. I have had a lot of improvement. I can practice hours a day and complete advanced workouts with weights. But it still is triggered if I haven't had enough sleep too often, have missed taking the supplements or have been overly stressed. 

 Everyday I am grateful that I still walk, that my heart rhythm is normal, and that I can dance and do anything else that I can do with my body. I am grateful that the physical pain I was in has been healed so that I can be productive. I am grateful that my asthma is quite under control which it hasn't been in the past. I am also thankful that I did not inherit schizophrenia from my mother or an anxiety disorder. Sure I get anxious about things but that does not automatically label someone as having anxiety disorder just like being sad is not the same as having the long term condition called "depression". There is a difference!

 I am starting up again and it was hard for me just as it is to share my story with so many people. If you've made it this far thank you. I know that Part 2 is especially long. I hope from reading my story maybe you feel more accepting of yourself, more grateful for the tiny things that are actually quite big and important, that maybe you see success in a different way. I also hope that it makes you think about what you prioritize, how you see yourself and others. Maybe to understand yourself and others better with more compassion and understanding that it's ok to not handle everything perfectly. That indeed to handle perfectly is impossible! I hope you understand more about mental illness and how it affects people who are close to them. I do my best to get rid of the stigma surrounding mental illness and all that goes with it.  It's something that more people need to talk about.

 I share my story no matter how hard it is so that people can know who I am as a dancer and a teacher. When I teach and perform it isn't just about doing movements or becoming popular.

 It's about freedom, survival, and liberation of the human spirit! It's about being born again. It's about knowing yourself which is the greatest power. It's about discovery and exploration. Seeing with new eyes. Developing a new relationship with yourself and others. It's about exploring cultures across the world that you may have felt separate and very different from to discover the differences and similarities which are all good! Dance teaches you to keep getting up and to explore. It gets you out of the corner you've been painted into either by other people or yourself.

 Thank you for listening to me share my story.

Thank you to my teachers and thank you to all who have been my students in the past and who will dance with me in the future.

Peace.

My Belly Dance Journey Part 2

 All of my story is very personal so if you do not wish to continue for that reason that's fine. This part of my story is very personal and involves a lot of heavy issues. I do not need anyone being smug about how so much bad has happened in my life and so much good has happened to them because we all reap what we sow and get what we deserve.

 Also if you are a person who believes that bad things happen to bad people or that bad things happen for a reason please leave now because you are not worthy of my story. Or if you believe that everything that happens to us is our own responsibility and therefore our fault please leave now. I believe that things happen to us not of our control. To say that everything that happens to us is because we caused it in whatever way runs completely counter to philosophies in therapy. Survivors that come from a place similar to where I come from have to work constantly to live in peace. And living in peace means sloughing off the responsibility for others actions!

 Continuing on from Part 1 of My Belly Dance Journey Laser Therapy at Signature Spinal Care also helped with something I never though could be helped. It's still a problem for me sometimes but not to the degree it used to be for years before I had the Laser Therapy treatment. When I was a janitor years ago during my first year of yoga teacher training in 2005 I was beginning to have spasms in my back. I would bend forward just slightly to reach for something and find that my back would for an instant lose it's ability to stay up. Hard to describe but it was like a switch had been turned off for just a second and then was turned back on. I had to wonder what was going on. So with x rays it was found that I had Minor Leveroto Scoliosis. I have been told since then that the scoliosis I have shouldn't cause me pain or stop me from doing things or that they have never heard of the term that was told to me.

 Needless to say, I know my body more than anyone else and it affected me for years before the injury I had further up my spine. It was always painful in my lower back and it affected the muscles running down my left leg which is the side that is slightly lifted. Doing dishes would hurt a lot. Having to stand in one place hurt a lot. It was a constant companion just like my later injury became. I was always trying to find ways to release the pain through yoga and strengthening exercises from different traditions. I was told by some physiotherapists to give up Yoga and to focus on Pilates.

 Working in retail was hard on my lower back and it was hard on my knees. The buses in Halifax NS were horrible and I would end up having to run to catch multiple buses to get to where I worked in Dartmouth. I was wearing shoes or boots not meant for running and having to stand up on the bus with the constant jerking forward when the bus stopped was awful. Each way it was an hour and a half and added up to three hours each time I had a shift.

 I know that other people have to do the same thing and worse for their work. I'm just saying how these things affected my own particular body. It was horrible because even with how my back had been my body had been most comfortable when I was a belly dancer full time. To jump ahead, it's why I am a full time dancer now. I do other things that I am developing but dance is very important to me for many reasons including feeling physically comfortable in my own body. I can give credit to belly dance for this and not any other tradition. I do practice other kinds of exercises but when I have focused on one of them I was never as comfortable physically as after dedicated belly dance practice.

 All in all a combination of various styles of Belly Dance, Yoga, Pilates and old school weight and lower body exercises is great for my body. When I was focused on yoga more than anything else I practiced hours of yoga at a time and my body hated it! I kept wondering why because the idea was that more yoga was better and would make you feel energized and happy. My low back really hated a lot of yoga practices that teachers led. It didn't matter if I just contracted my glutes more! Over the years I have kept yoga practice at a distance treading carefully. There was a time where I had to omit specific poses altogether which I am now able to do. The poses I can do again without ruining my knees is pigeon pose and seated hero. I'm watching them carefully though in case my knees have something to say.

 Going back to the time when I was attempting to establish yoga classes I was referred to a First Aid teacher by the owner of the studio I was teaching at. It was something I needed to renew as part of the requirements for teaching there. The training was thrown together by a man who had gotten drunk the night before, came in with a hangover and a cocky attitude but without the test! So he asked each one of use from our seats one question. It wasn't very good quality but at the time I accepted it. I also wanted to do more things to bring in some cash but that were also meaningful to me. He had a course he was offering for First Aid Teacher Training.

 So, I decided to start up with it the next day. I got a ride from one of the other attendees and it was held at a security training facility next to the police station. It was in a place I was not familiar with and far from home. There was only four of us. The trainer who taught the first aid the day before, one of the owners for the security training facility, the guy who gave me a lift and me. During the first aid training it became very macho. All of them were very into martial arts. It;s something I am interested in but it took over the whole first aid teacher training. The teacher wanted us to teach something that we knew to them so he could see our teaching style. I taught them yoga and they taught martial arts. What happened next changed everything and it had far reaching effects.

 The guy who gave me a lift was teaching how to get a grip on someone at the wrists and how you could keep them locked. I knew how to get out of it and I did get out of it a couple of times and chuckled about it. Apparently I had just made him feel like less of a man by being able to get out of the grip he had on my wrists. Because then he did a move I was not prepared for because i have not gone to martial arts classes enough to counter that kind of attack. The next thing I knew he was behind me and holding my right arm up  and bent, pinning it against my back. This is the same side I had injured  the previous fall a few months before. I knew a little to try to throw him off but not enough. I stepped back and used my core to pull him forward with me. I could not throw him but I attempted to take out the knee that was closes to me. I missed the first time but the second time I used all of my leg strength and stomped down on the side of his knee. After that we were standing up again. He wouldn't let me go. Finally I said and pardon my language " Let me the fuck go!"

 Finally he did. It did not feel like anything that should have happened either in these circumstances or in a martial arts class. And from the description I just gave it's obvious that enough went on that enough time had passed for either the co owner of the security training facility to step in or the teach of the first aid teacher training who used to be part of the RCMP. I was upset and felt like I shouldn't be. I could not get a lift back home from the person who I felt had just attacked me over petty macho ego. The teacher of the first aid teacher training gave me a lift. He acknowledged it was wrong but dropped responsibility for stopping it from continuing. He said and I quote " It all happened so fast." I'm not sure what kind of former cop says that. He also did not understand when I said that I did not want to continue the first aid teacher training and after that I cut contact with him.

 After the experience I felt shattered. I also felt that what happened was totally crazy. I felt the need to talk to people and not just with my husband. Why? Because what happened under the specific circumstances was so crazy. I needed to hear from other people that it was indeed strange and wrong. Although what had happened was bad and very upsetting, what was to come was even worse. People I talked to about did not understand and thought I was over reacting. One person even said " But isn't that part of the training?" I talked to the studio owner who had referred me to him for the first aid teacher training. I didn't want her to refer anyone to him again. When I exclaimed "Why did this have to happen to me?" she chastised me like a child or in my case as a yogi who had failed to see clearly. I wasn't supposed to wonder " Why me?" And eventually she said that she wanted to cut off anymore discussion about what happened. She also did not understand when I said I could not teach at her studio anymore. After that I found replacement teachers for my classes, I cut contact with the studio owner and I receded into the shadows trying to feel normal again.

 Some people I spoke to did understand and I am thankful for those people who were a support even if it was only on facebook, at that time. But there was one person I considered a friend who turned on me. Apparently I had done something on Facebook that she didn't like a few months before and when I started up a " This situations was so crazy!" conversation with her boyfriend who I had met she became very angry. She wondered what I was doing talking to her boyfriend. I had no idea she would take it the way she did. She wondered why I had talked to him instead of her because she was on-line. I replied saying that she wasn't showing up as on-line. This was pretty much the end of our friendship.

 The whole situation and everything involved left me sore for years. I actually developed a fear of teaching yoga or anything at all. Every time I did yoga I would be faced with it. I had other crazy things happen to me before this situation that I consider not commonplace and crazy in my attempt to teach yoga classes. I believed from repeated crazy happenings that if I taught yoga that it was asking for trouble. I became superstitious about it and wanted to avoid any association which is what people do when they develop PTSD. I closed myself in and pried myself out by going to ATS classes in Halifax. But it was hard because I didn't feel back to myself. I still felt really alienated and when you feel that way it's hard to feel connected to the people around you. The effects wore off a little over time but it took a long time for me to dip my toe into teaching again.

 The first time I started teaching after this experience was after I moved back to Fredericton NB and taught a student ATS privately in my apartment in the fall of 2014. It was a great way to begin again and she was a great student to teach. It helped heal the wounds my ego took as a teacher and as a person during that time. But it wasn't complete. After a few months she left for Turkey which was great. I did not try to advertise as a teacher anymore for years after that. I needed to get my bearings more and figure out my priorities.

 Belly Dance never went away though I wanted to give it up. Why did I want to give it up? Because I wanted to save money for clearing debt. Part of what caused debt for me was buying costume pieces from a credit card. At the time I wouldn't have been able to get them otherwise and my dream of all I wanted to do would have been on hold. I didn't even indulge in costume buying as much as I could have.

 My story continues with Part 3.