It helps me to keep track of what I've been up to and to decide what/where next.
Putting it all in one page makes it easier for me to get an overview.
Monthly Newsletters
Didactic Work
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Thank you also for your encouraging feedback
"Having attended most of the study groups held by Paola, I would like to share my experience. The information she brings to these sessions is so clear, powerful and appropriate for facilitators to expand our knowledge about Biodanza, how to apply it to our facilitation and our lives. I leave each session with so much inspiration, new material to think about, and can incorporate into the classes I facilitate. Also with a feeling of joy, laughter and warmth. Thank you so much Paola."
SKILLSHARE PROJECT
Day Workshops, Tasters & Festivals
Bristol
| Somerset & Dorset
| Ystradgynlais
|
- July: The Healing Weekend Holistic Festival in Somerset
- Aug: 3 vivencias at the International Biodanza Festival in Dorset with Niraj Skillbeck, Alice Plummer, Lit Eziefula, Yamil Jasa from Uruguay, and Lenny Lencina from Spain
- Nov 28: Intro to Biodanza (talk & taster at a local meditation group)
- Dec 6: A festive taster for a group of retired people
15 Blogposts
WEEKLY ONLINE GROUPS: Themes
Tuesdays M3 Wondrous experience Awakening the Yang-Water Tiger Staying Alive & Staying Human M6 Instinctual Wisdom M7 Wisdom, Freedom & Authenticity (Sartre) Dancing Through the Decades Body Care as Self-Care * The Quest for Harmony Cultivating Balance Dance Meditation Prioritising Self-Care this Festive Season | Thursdays M3 The vivencia: a magical feeling M4 Touching the miracle of being alive M5 Physically well M6 Emotion in Motion M7 Archetypal Mythology Dancing Through the Decades Body Care as Self-Care Boosting mood with music and motion Yin-Yang Harmony; Energy, Balance & Flow Embracing Healing Embracing the Unknown Prioritising Self-Care this Festive Season |
MORE DETAILED INFO BELOW
January
Wondrous Experience: Feeling the fullness of the lived experience, connecting with the innermost nature of life which can only be experienced from within 4. The Heart´s Desire 11. The Pleasure of Living 18. Giving of Oneself 25. Experiencing the Elements | A Magical Feeling: The expression of felt-experience draws from the unphadomable depths of the unconscious - yet, it can reveal more of the core of inner life than any introspection can even glimpse. Join us to explore the amazing world of feelings and the power of self-expression. 6. The Poetry of Life 13. The Pleasure of Living 20. Passion & Tenderness 27. Angelic Beings of Light |
February
Awakening the Inner Tiger We´re entering the Chinese Yang-Water Tiger year, so let us ride the big changes ahead with hope, enthusiasm and determination. Let us feel empowered, energised and fearless... assertive, confident unstoppable... focused, passionate, dynamic and expansive... to feel the power of our will, our intention, our resolve... our capacity to leap forward... And to balance all these powerful energies with the qualities of the Water element to stay adaptable and in the flow... generous, kind and receptive... empathic and enjoy your relationships. 1. The opportunity to change 8. Giving your very best 15. Doing what’s best for all 22. The Water Tiger | M4 Touching the miracle of being alive What is this beingness, this aliveness, this animateness, this capacity to perceive and to feel? What is this that distinguishes us from inorganic matter? That allows us to connect deeply with the inner and outer worlds? This and more we will explore on the danza floor. 3. Being one with Life 10. The inner life 17. A living star 24. Alive in a living universe |
March
Staying Alive & Staying Human Guided by a lovely team of facilitators from the UK, the Netherlands, Belgium and South Africa. 1. Get Vital with Jeanne Gommers 8. Sensual with Caroline Dekeyser 15. Creative with Paola 22. Warm-hearted with Jackie Said 29. Transcendent with Jeanne | M5 Dancing Away Stress Releasing Mood-Lifting Neurotransmitters Let´s make time to connect, to move, breathe, rest and restore. Join us to de-stress, to release muscle tension and to stay positive. Come and feel the positive impact of music, movement and human connection on your body and on your overall sense of wellness. Let us the focus on homeostasis i.e. on helping your body maintain internal stability to function well. Your nervous system and the endocrine system - with its neurotransmitters and hormones -, are responsible for this, so give them a helping hand with your dancing feet! And make time to honour your triune brain too! |
April
Instinctual Wisdom! What exactly are instincts? In what way are they relevant? How do they influence our lived-experience? How is all this related to emotions and emotional expression? How does it feel to express or repress your emotions? How does it impact on our body, on our health, and on our relationships? How can the expressive arts help? How do we apply all this on the danza floor? An invitation to be present to the ever-changing experience of each passing moment, and to connect with the way your innate impulses and desires urge you to respond to the world. In other words, to explore the basic instinctive forces governing your life. By honouring your innate instincts you learn to move towards that which will nourish your life. Your life instinct tells you when you are tired and need to rest. It helps you to keep your body in balance. Your sexual instinct shows you the need for wholesome sensory pleasure. Your exploratory instinct helps you to adapt to change, to find your creative flow and to create the life you want. Your gregarious instinct drives you to connect with others. It makes you love your family, look after your children and strive to build happy communities. The fusion instinct enables you identify with others and experience a sense of belonging. It's what makes you feel part of nature and at home in the universe. Join us to awaken and experience your own instinctual wisdom! | Affective Regulation aka Emotion in Motion! Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and will come forth later in an uglier ways. Sigmund Freud An invitation to feel all your emotions and allow them to be fully expressed in a natural and spontaneous way through the joy of moving to music in great company! All welcome! Whatever you might be feeling right now, these sessions are a reminder that emotions, whether pleasurable or displeasurable, are in permanent flow - if only you don´t get in the way! Honouring the raw truth of your felt-experience, come join us if you want to open up to the possibility of enjoying the emotional flow. |
online celebration with 9 facilitators
reaching 23 countries and 6 continents!
May
"The search for authenticity and existential freedom is present in Sartre" ~ Toro
These sessions are a reminder that you can embody your inalienable freedom, become who you truly are and align your actions with your values. We are our choices. Will you choose to join us?
Archetypes of the Mythic Unconscious: Demeter, Dionysus, Jesus, Orpheus, Buddha
Like Carl Jung, RT also took myths seriously, and created a series of archetypal dances and postures. Archetype refers to the primary structural element of human psyche. Dancing archetypal images, like ancient gods and goddesses, we discover unconscious patterns of instinctual behaviour.
Embodying archetypal images through posture, gesture and movement can help us tap into ancestral wisdom, become aware of instinctual behaviour patterns, and gain insights about previously unknown aspects of ourselves. This sequence of sessions will explore four archetypal figures. Demeter, the fertility goddess who shows us the divine presence in nature, the deep connection between mother and child, the need to overcome the pain of the empty nest by let go of unhealthy modes of attachment, and the wisdom of realising that it is death that continuously births the new. Dionysus, who reveals a way of embodying the joy of living and the felt-experience of ecstatic pleasure. Jesus, the archetypal figure of humility, compassion and the love of humanity. And Orpheus, the legendary musician in ancient Greece who was famous for his ability to charm all living things and even stones with his music. For Toro, he represented the power of music to induce deeply transformational processes. I invite you to this felt-experience of myth for personal integration.
Join us in-person to awaken the archetypal Buddha within, to explore the Buddha both as a historical philosopher and as the archetype of your own highest potential. The Buddha's life is a great example of the hero journey, with the call to destiny, the great renunciation, the great struggle and the great awakening. The hero's journey demonstrates that change is possible for everyone, and that we can all affect the world in some way. The Buddha contributed to the world by teaching a path away from suffering and towards happiness. He is often compared to a physician because his first teaching follows the medical model of diagnosis, treatment, and cure. I invite you to taste the medicine of friendliness, appreciative joy, fortitude, perseverance, generosity, focus and clear seeing. These medicinal attitudes can take us far - according to the Buddha, all the way to enlightenment! Join us in Bristol to taste your own radiant, luminous and joyous nature on the day the Buddha reached enlightenment.
June
July
August
September
The Quest for Harmony Four sessions, four approaches to harmony. 6. Body Harmony: the potential for biological balance, homeostasis, which is the source of the energy you have to face the world 13. Inner Harmony: the Buddha 20. Social Harmony: compassion in action Gandhi, Schweitzer as role models 27. The Arts, which can also express the attraction to chaos and the desire for harmony and order. | Yin-Yang Harmony * Energy, Balance & Flow Come and join us to harmonise your yang side (active, initiating, outgoing) with your yin side (yielding, nurturing, and inward) by balancing these opposing yet complementary forces. These sessions aim to leave you feeling integrated and energised. The Taoists believe that everything in the universe is energy (Chi). If your Chi moves, your body can be healthy; if it is restricted, your Chi stagnates and illness can set in. So this month we will also get our energy moving with Tai Chi style dances and exercises involving slow, continuous, flowing movements. As always, all welcome. |
October
Cultivating Balance Four sessions, four types of balance Tue 4. Conative, i.e. the power of intentions, goals, priorities, resolve & commitment to action Tue 11. Attentional, i.e. focus, vividness with ease, mindfulness. Flow state. Tue 18. Cognitive, i.e. direct knowing. Being present with experience as it arises moment by moment, attending just to what is being presented to one’s senses without projecting Tue 25. Affective: emotional stability, care and constructive emotions | Heal Yourself, Heal the World Thu 6. Heal your body: feel enlivened, renewed, reenergised, healthier and more embodied Thu 13. Heal your heart-mind: strengthen your resolve, intention to act and enthusiastic perseverance Thu 20. Heal your relationships: connect with yourself, develop self-understanding and self-empathy. Communicate your truth and enjoy the intimacy that this honesty brings. Thu 27. Heal your spirit: celebrate the sacredness of the here and now, connect with something greater and find deeper meaning in life. |
November
Dance Meditation Five sessions exploring different kinds of meditation through dance, movement and stillness. Music will be used to help you meditate with the breath, calm your emotions, and open the heart. You will be invited to sense your body, to experience bowing as practice, to explore the power of chanting, and to abide in non-dual awareness. This and more we will explore on the danza floor. | Embracing the Unknown There is the unknown and there is the not-knowing. Both can paralyse you. And liberate you. Then, there is the intentional act of unknowing, triggered by the realisation of the need to unlearn. Finally, in the field of transcendence, the Unknowable, ungraspable by the mind but intimately felt when you finally surrender to its music and let it move you. Simply Indescribable. |
December
Let us start with self-empathy. What are you needing to receive in order to give of your best?
| To relax and enjoy the festive season
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Final thoughts
- deep disillusionment with certain structural aspects of the movement
- questioning both theoretical and methodological aspects of the system
- struggling to come to terms with some controversial views of its "creator"
- struggling with what I (potentially mistakenly) perceived as an overall unwillingness from the part of my colleagues (apart from some exceptions) to face and discuss difficult topics
- questioning the identity of biodanza
- reflecting on the identity of the biodanza facilitator
What I discovered in the process of applying to open a school (first in 2015 and then at regular intervals as I got invited to reapply at least five times) has contributed to the loss of my rose-tinted glasses. I came out of it with the impression that what I had naively believed to be an organisation dedicated to making the world a happier place was, in fact, at least to my eyes and from where I was standing, more like an "education cartel" fiercely protecting its existing members from the possibility of any future competition. A painful realisation for an idealistic person like me, which triggered a kind of "biodanza dysphoria". "If those who had been doing biodanza the longest had this sort of attitude", I thought, "then biodanza doesn't really do what it says in the box". This led me to question not only its organisational structure but also the very foundations of the system. I now believe there is "a glitch in the system" causing it to malfunction and needing to be corrected. For these reasons, my identity as a facilitator started to change and I begun transitioning from "cisbio" to "biodanza-expansive". As a consequence I got cancelled and ghosted by some; mostly for asking uncomfortable questions and speaking up about inconvenient truths.
Leaving all that aside, when it comes to action on the ground - and action is my language of love -, this year looked like this: 100+ vivencias, 8 workshops, 2 festivals, 2 tasters, 1 weekend, 9 didactic sessions, 15 blogposts, 50+ newsletters...
Bigger events included an online celebration of International Day of Biodanza involving a team of 9 facilitators and reaching 23 countries. The skillshare project also went from strength to strength with 17 sessions offered by 14 contributors representing 9 countries and reaching people from 30+ countries and 6 continents! I love this project because it is about giving facilitators a chance to shine.
All this sounds quite impressive (at least to me!) as I can't quite believe just how much was done. However, in life it is not the quantifiable that matters but the quality of the human encounters and of the lived-experience. This is what makes life truly worth living. So I can only say a huge "Thank You!" to all the amazing people who remained with me throughout this process and who joined me throughout the year. I deeply appreciate your support and your presence in my life! Xxx