Begin by choosing a piece of music that is mantra like. Taize, chants of other kinds, open ended meditative music, or any music that feels right to you, can work.

The facilitator can develop a series of 5 to 7 movements, or the participants can each find a movement or movements that come to them as they listen to the music.

The whole group can learn all the movements developed in a sequence, in one direction, and one tempo.

This create a body mantra, or riff, that they can refer to when they don’t want to improvise fully.

The movements can be done in different sequences, directions and tempos, and in any combination of one or more.

To begin, the group can do the movements in one direction, sequence, and tempo, then break off in different directions and all other variations as well as going into full improvisation, or interspersing improv with the set movements.

Then we add interaction.

There are different ways in which humans connect with each other.

We listen, look, and just pay attention to each other. We move close together, touch, lean. We can connect while we are close, or when we are across the room.

We can copy each other.

We can disconnect by turning away, or just changing mental focus. We can stop looking at each other, stop copying, move away from each other, stop touching.

Combining the set movements with their variations, with the connecting and disconnecting activity creates a never ending dance of life.

Sara Street
7/1/18
www.aaavinc.org