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Sacred Dance 
In the beginning was Dance. She came spinning out of the stillness of nothing, weaving a web of interconnected patterns with Her swift, light feet. Upon Her head was a crown of stars and in Her hands she held a white dove close to Her breast. The dove listened to the beat of Her heart. She listened to the beat of His heart. Both awakened to the warm, pulsating, beat of the Heart of the Dance.
As Dance moved among the stars, the dove released itself from the hands of Dance and flew far and wide. Wherever the dove flew, all things came dancing into Being.
All of life danced together, running, swirling, leaping joyously. This was when gods and goddesses, nature spirits, creatures and humans, danced together in harmony. These sacred dancers moved to the rhythm of their hearts. Joining together, the dancers created and embraced the elements of life with the wholeness of their Being.
One day as all life danced, the dove cooed into someones ear. From then on, everyone discovered the beauty of the voice. Everybody sang: humans, nature spirits, creatures, gods and goddesses all sang. This was the birth of the great choir. The dance then began to reflect the moods and shapes of sounds. All of life started to listen and reflect on the sounds they heard.
And so the dance now had structure and variety, with the beauty of sound vibrating to every move.
As the dancers continued to sing, someone created a word. So the gods and goddesses, animals and humans started playing happily with words to express life as they danced. This brought in another dimension to their dance: humour, poetry, and drama. Life celebrated these new ways of expressing themselves and everyone rejoiced.
The nature spirits saw the power of the words and although they celebrated these changes to the sacred dance of life, they did not follow the ways of this world. They continued to develop the ancient ways, with soft mystical sounds of great power and beauty. The nature spirits wanted to share their ways with humans, but humans became more and more wrapped up in the cleverness of words, until the voice of the Earth was silenced. Eventually most humans lost contact with the nature spirits and gods and goddesses. They could not remember the Dance of the heart and so could no longer communicate with other worlds.
As the Dance was forgotten, humans started to separate into different areas of their world, and created systems and regimes to structure their lives and took great pride in their achievements. While humans intellectualised and debated on the dance of life, there still existed, in some areas of the world, sacred dancers who continued to move to the rhythms of Her heart.
To those who remember the ancient ways, She reveals Herself in all Her beauteous Wisdom. She dances in the stillness of night and the stars, twinkle with delight, shape-shifting to the Dance of Life.
Dance Today.
Today, dance finds ways of returning to those who wish to express themselves physically, mentally and spiritually. People of all ages can find dance to suit their needs, from disco to ballroom dancing and from Spanish flamenco and line dance, to street dance and much more. The New Age is attracting people to a whole range of dances. We may sample anything from belly dancing to Gabriel Roth and the Wave, whirling dance, trance dance and Dance of Universal Peace. If you want to express yourself through dance, there are many ways to do so.
Look and you shall find.
Communicating Without Words
If one is unable to communicate through words, (maybe we are hearing impaired or maybe we simply cannot find the words to express what we mean) the body will express what the voice cannot. And when the body expresses itself: it is the direct voice of the Soul. Dance is the voice of impulses from the heart, without the intervention of words. Dance is a primal, pure, immediate form of communication. When asked the meaning of the dance she had just performed the famous Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova replied,
If I could have said it, I shouldnt have had to dance it!
We learn our first moves as we kick about in the mothers womb. After we are born, our parents guess what our needs are through our facial expressions and bodily movements.
As children, we naturally express our feelings through movement. For example, when we are happy, we may leap up into the air with joy. And when angry, we may stamp our feet and raise our arms with clenched fist. Perhaps we can remember times when we may have expressed joy by running about and jumping onto the sofa, oblivious to the adults around us. However, as we grow up, we learn to control our emotions and keep them in check.
When we are able to release inhibitions, we express ourselves freely, abundantly and creatively with our whole being. To the ancients all of life was sacred, and dance was an outward physical expression of the Divine.
The Butterfly Dance
So what are we waiting for, lets dance!
Here is a dance exercise called The Dance of the Butterfly. This dance gives you an opportunity to express your journey on earth, through the life of a butterfly. You may explore this idea in your own home. Clear away an area for this purpose, obviously the more space you have the better for moving about. (Yet it is amazing how much we can move our body, just on the spot!) Please make sure you will not be disturbed for at least forty-five minutes. You may dance with, or without music, it is up to you.
Before you start your dance, sit quietly on the floor in the space you have created for yourself. Sitting, with your eyes closed begin by previewing the life of the butterfly using your inner eye and imagination. Watch as the butterflys life unfolds. Starting with an egg, see the larva hatch out, then see the larva change into the caterpillar. (A larva may shed as many as four skins before becoming a fully-grown caterpillar). Watch the caterpillars nutritive existence as it lives to eat, devouring one leaf after another. Now see the caterpillar make a journey in search of a strong stem or twig with which to attach itself by a thread of its own weaving. You may see the chrysalis suspended in mid air and tightly bound up like an Egyptian Mummy. Imagine you can see the inside of the chrysalis transforming into liquidity. Then see the magical metamorphosis take place as it hangs there, seemingly motionless from the twig. Watch the chrysalis skin split open starting again at the head. The butterfly pushes against the insides of the skin, and swallows air to swell itself up. It pushes more and its legs are free to cling onto the twig. When the butterfly has freed itself from its encasement, the wings gradually unfold and expand to full size. See the butterfly in all its glory flying off up into the air. Spend a moment to observe its beauty; the wings may appear to shimmer in a thousand iridescent colours. This delicate creature of light now lives its short life using its wings to fly from one beautiful flower to another.
Now, return to the beginning of the butterflys life. Begin your dance by forming the round shape of the egg lying on the floor and curling your body up into a tight ball. YOU are now the egg. From here, allow the wisdom of your body to guide you into movements to express the different stages of the transformation all the way through to the butterfly. Give flight to your feelings!
When you have finished your dance, you may wish to lie or sit down quietly for a moment, observing your breath and relaxing all your muscles. You may have experienced what it is like to become the butterfly. The becoming is the beauty that is within you, always.
- Nina Cooper 2005 ( Nina currently teaches courses in Ritual dance, including Mask dances and Renaissance Sacred Dance, which includes Hula dance, Tribal belly dance, Persian dance, Creative ballet, and Improvisation. )
"Dance becomes sacred when it is expressed from the soul of the dancer, and the dancer moves, being guided by the Heart." Nina Cooper
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