Embodied People

Season 3, Episode 10: Navigating the Polarities of Life with Body-Half Patterning

You have a left side, you have a right side. These two sides of your body are distinctly different, even having their own personalities... In babies and toddlers we see this pattern develop in their crawling and creeping as they make their way to vertical. We feel it in our (adult) selves as we see and perform our side-sided-ness. And we hear it in our language 'on one hand' and 'on the other hand' as we make decisions. Body-Half helps us make decisions, feel into what is right for us, and clarify our perspectives. Join Sarah for a quick run through this Pattern of Total Body Connectivity!

 

Art by Erin Law

Music by Nate Anderson

Season 3, Episode 9: Locomotion and Expression in Upper - Lower Patterning

The Upper-Lower Pattern focuses differentiating and connecting the Lower Body and the Upper Body. The lower body excels at how we locomote, that is move from one place to another, and the upper body emphasizes how we express ourselves and communicate. When our movement reflects a connected and congruent relationship between Upper and Lower we can move about our lives with greater ease... In this mini-sode Colleen walks us through some basic aspects of the Upper-Lower Pattern of Total Body Connectivity.

 

Music by Nate Anderson

Image by Erin Law

Season 3, Episode 8: The Beautiful Balancing Act of Our Bodies - Head/Tail Patterning

Your spine is a messenger between your big brain and brilliant body. In this mini-sode with Sarah, explore how the spine's internal balancing capacity teaches you balancing not just in your head, but throughout your whole body! The spinal nerves move your brain throughout your whole body. Another way to think of this is intention in the tail end, attention in the head end. 

 

Image by Erin Law

Music by Nate Anderson

Season 3, Episode 7: Me/Not Me - Core - Distal Patterning

Find the center of your body; find the six distal edges. The center is ME, the distal edges take me to the world our there - the NOT ME. In this mini-sode, Colleen reflects on the Core - Distal Pattern of Total Body Connectivity. This motor pattern, started in utero and repeated throughout our lives sets up knowing physically and psychologically in which we experience the differentiation of self and other, and learn to support ourselves and our movement from an alive and adaptable center. 

 

Image by Erin Law

Music by Nate Anderson

Season 3, Episode 6: Embodied Knowing and Movement as a Guide to Life - an Interview with Colleen!

Consider the moving body as a wise counselor to where we put energy in our lives and who we become. Another extra special episode this week as Sarah interviews Colleen on how she has turned to movement as support for the creative unfolding of one's life, including her current research within the large climbable icosahedron (the Maverick), and her model for creativity based on human movement. 

An Icosahedron for Two: A Many Sided Look at Making a Duet

Colleen's website

ColWahl on IG

Laban/Bartenieff Movement Studies: Contemporary Applications by Colleen Wahl

The Maverick

Music by Nate Anderson 

Image by Erin Law

Integrated Movement Studies

Season 3, Episode 5: How creative play builds skills - an Interview with Sarah!

This SPECIAL EPISODE is an interview with host Sarah Donohue. She discusses her life, how she got where she is and the major themes of her development, especially the important of creative, playful expression in life. She discusses how eh started dancing, her years of rigorous training, the impact on her psychology, and how she teaches now based on it. 

She also discusses her most recent work that involves the exploration of grief. Here is a link to that work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bn2QjAmySY

 

Music by Nate Anderson

Image by Erin Law

Season 3, Episode 4: Joy in Movement through Function and Expression with Juliana Hane

Sometimes we think of our bodies as functional, anatomical and mechanistic, other times expressive, imagistic, creative and meaningful. We circumnavigate questions about how we work with the functional and expressive aspects of our bodies to guide what we pursue in life.

Explore the connections between these tensions in this interview with Juliana Hane - CLMA, dance artist, pilates instructor and candidate in Physical Therapy doctoral program. 

Sponsored by Integrated Movement Studies

Image by Erin Law

Music by Nate Anderson

 

Season 3, Episode 3: Embodied Shoveling

Learn to shovel better, maybe even with joy along with the difficulties! Sarah brings us tools to increase the connectivity of shoveling to reduce the pain and strain that comes from heaving snow across the drive. 

 

Images by Erin Law

Music by Nate Anderson

Season 3, Episode 2: An interview with Madegan Lynch on somatic/Laban for ballet dancers

This is an interview with CLMA and somatic educator Madegan Lynch. One of Madegan's projects has been to work with ballet dancers to increase their skills through somatic practices, including the Laban/Bartenieff approach to movement education and IMS's touch for repatterning. Among other things, Madegan discusses the relationships we develop with our bodies based on how we train it, as well as the importance of core support and grounding.

 

Please check out her website: https://www.kinesthesiamovementtherapy.com/

 

While this week's episode is different than usual it highlights how the study of Laban/Bartenieff Movement Analysis can bring new understandings and deeper connections to movement in so, so many areas of life. 

Season 3, Episode 1: Yielding - the bonding that sets up activation

Yielding as an act of bonding - of connecting to something or someone in order to eventually take bigger action. This mini-sode is an embodied meditation on yielding and setting up an info-energetic pattern that develops tissue tone and is the preparation for bigger action.