I went to the farmer's market, and just to be thorough, I bought Morels, garlic tops, carrots, walla walla onions, two pints of strawberries, and a half quart of chocolate milk. And then I splurged on a 15 minute massage. The massage (after a Pilates workout) left me reeling and unable to keep on very many electronics. It was really similar to energy work. This is either a sign that the masseuse was really good, or that I was really able to relax in his hands, or both?
On a dinner note, I'll tell you - braised chicken, garlic tops, walla walla onions, cranberry beans, and a homegrown salad is the way to eat.
Here's the key to enjoying vegetables and the farmer's market. Don't buy what you would buy in a store. Buy what's fresh, buy what the farmer's are excited about. Buy green, and when you don't know what it is or what to do with it, ask. And then you will have a good meal, I promise. I've been reading two books today 1) Salad Bar Beef by Joel Salatin - a guide to raising commercial beef in a humane, sane, and healthy way and 2) Animal, vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver - a story of she and her family eating truly local for one year in the Shenandoah valley. The thing that has really impressed itself upon me in both books (through different verbage - God v. evolution) is that nature has a plan. We are best not to disregard this, but follow what has worked for however many thousands (or millions) of years past.
I encourage you all to follow my footsteps in the past 6-8 months and embrace Michael Pollan's definition of food (that which your grandma or Great-grandma would recognize as food) and feel better. I'm telling you, go feel better. And break the routine. There is more to life than apples and spinach. You'll see.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
tired
I think my soul is tired. I don't feel like dancing to old jazz music. I don't feel like dancing to blues. I feel like dancing to Mary J. Blige.
money and back pain
I'm watching my money dwindle away. My successive failures at turning a profit while teaching dance have a tendency to wear on my mind. I am, maybe oddly, consoled by a fortune I received at the Chinese garden a few weeks ago. It read, "Prosperity will come when you most want it and least expect it." A part of me has felt that way since leaving school. I watched my inherited stocks drop, and then felt compelled to sell at a low point, so that I could be sure to be out of school debt. Now my life seems to be more and more a walk of faith, and somehow I believe this is the only way it could be. There is something about a safety net that inherently holds us back. We may walk on a tight rope with a net below us, but our spirit stays small.
I'm reminded of Nikos Kazantzakis' The Last Temptation of Christ. There's a scene where night has fallen and Jesus is standing on a hill above a small town, watching the fires cast their light through the darkened sky. He considers the idea that he is at his most content while possessing nothing and placing his trust in God and man in order to survive.
I live in a world of wealth and excess. This is my safety net. I forget how much lower I could fall and still not lose my soul. To keep that safety net in place, I am tempted to abandon my hopes and dreams. The safety net provides me with comfort and the luxury not to examine myself.
What does a man with nothing have? Can we really be true Christians and glaze over Jesus' claim that it's harder for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven? There's something here. I don't know what it is.
My back has started hurting when I stand with my hips forward. This is good pain, because it keeps me aligned. I danced a little tango last night, and I realized that as soon as I enter the tango embrace, I compromise my posture in this way. With my back hurting this is impossible. I have to fix it immediately. It is an interesting thought that what provides us with pain and pleasure is in such a flux - that we can actually shape these things.
I'm reminded of Nikos Kazantzakis' The Last Temptation of Christ. There's a scene where night has fallen and Jesus is standing on a hill above a small town, watching the fires cast their light through the darkened sky. He considers the idea that he is at his most content while possessing nothing and placing his trust in God and man in order to survive.
I live in a world of wealth and excess. This is my safety net. I forget how much lower I could fall and still not lose my soul. To keep that safety net in place, I am tempted to abandon my hopes and dreams. The safety net provides me with comfort and the luxury not to examine myself.
What does a man with nothing have? Can we really be true Christians and glaze over Jesus' claim that it's harder for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven? There's something here. I don't know what it is.
My back has started hurting when I stand with my hips forward. This is good pain, because it keeps me aligned. I danced a little tango last night, and I realized that as soon as I enter the tango embrace, I compromise my posture in this way. With my back hurting this is impossible. I have to fix it immediately. It is an interesting thought that what provides us with pain and pleasure is in such a flux - that we can actually shape these things.
Sunday, June 6, 2010
challenges
I had a private lesson today that I didn't feel too confident about. It actually turned out better than the others I had had with the same students, but it took a little work. Then I taught a workshop that I had advertised for a week or two. I wasn't as prepared as I should have been, and I probably didn't advertise as much as I should have. Three people came, and one left early because it obviously wasn't what they were looking for. It was a little discouraging to say the least. I felt like I really failed, because my lesson plans weren't clear, the class was pretty low energy and not very fun, and I didn't really own the material. I'm hitting this wall where I'm not sure what to teach. I've been relying, like many of my other friends, on material from the trainings with Barry and Brenda, but it's feeling stale. I need my own material. I'm starting to develop my own persona in my classes, and trying to bring the quirky me out a little more, but I don't really have the material to back it up. I suppose it just takes more lesson planning, because my choreo classes that I prepare lots for have been going really well. Lessons learned.
Sometimes it's just hard. I'm still avoiding dancing, and I hardly know what to do with myself because of it. I'll leave for California on Friday, so I've got something to keep me busy.
Sometimes it's just hard. I'm still avoiding dancing, and I hardly know what to do with myself because of it. I'll leave for California on Friday, so I've got something to keep me busy.
Saturday, June 5, 2010
dancing tonight?
I put my hair into a faux hawk and have been walking around in jean cut off shorts. I am so Portland. But to see just how Portland I am, to understand my roots to the place, observe...
All in all, I now have growing 5 butterhead lettuce plants, 3 red oak leaf lettuces, some leeks, sage, oregano, basil, red kale.
And in the pictured garden, which is at Brenda's house, there is:
Yellow Chard
Ruby Orach
Zucchini
Arugula
Dragon Beans
Edamame
Yellow Beans
Green Zebra tomato
Black Pear tomato
Stupice Tomato
5 varieties of peppers including Mexican hot peppers and Italian sweet peppers.
plus
3 more potted cherry tomato plants
potted strawberry plant
I'm really tired after all the planting and sun.
Thursday, June 3, 2010
o h t h e p l a c e s y o u ' l l g o
I'm swung over the edge. I fear writing this blog post, because I can imagine the scepticism from all my east coast friends and peoples. I went to work with Brenda yesterday on posture. At Camp Blues, I was realizing that I push my hips forward when I relax and often when I dance. This strains my lower back. And as always, my legs are in varying amounts of pain and discomfort.
So we worked on feeling how to properly use the legs and pelvis. The way we work on this stuff is getting more and more esoteric. She stood back so that she could see the energy flowing in my body. And when I work on my body, the only thing I can really tell you that I feel is that weight of my body sinking through my skeletal system and into the floor. The equates to energy in my mind. We worked and worked on the legs, feet, pelvis, chest, shoulders, and neck. We were getting each in the right position as I went into a pliet in parallel. Finally Brenda started talking about grounding cords. A line of energy drawn from your base chakra into the ground and into the center of the earth. She practiced doing a few pliets with and without a grounding cord, and what do you know, I could see the difference. It is in fact quite clear to my eyes. It's not that I saw the energy flowing, per se, but rather that the quality of movement changed drastically. I could see the groundedness, power and strength when she used this method to ground.
It suddenly became clear to me that this is what postural and dance imagery is attaining. It is having you move energy. The imagery always contains something moving or falling or going somewhere, and it correlates perfectly with the way I think about the energy in my body. There is an image that correlates to the image I use with my pelvis. One should imagine a plum line falling from the base chakra (the area between the anus and genitals). There should be an invisible weight falling to the ground, so that the pelvis stays heavy and in a neutral position. This was my realization last night. This position allows me to engage my inner thighs and hamstrings, taking the strain off of my knees.
So I'm sold. I've been dabbling in this energy stuff halfheartedly. I did it through imagery for the past two years. I played with it in meditation. I unconsciously used intention and preparing my mental state for achievements like getting a job cooking in a restaurant and getting into Yale. But the time has come where I completely accept it. I admit now that I see the world as a large energetic system. Everything seems to be in flux - trees, plants, tables, people - and each thing interacts with each other. It turns out that the world finally makes sense to me viewing it through this lens. To understand people's behavior, how people convince others of things, what makes quality movement is all describable in terms of the energy we use and expend.
In all my studies, it seems universally true that to hold onto energy is counter-productive. To try to keep it for yourself achieves nothing, but to let it flow through you - giving as much as you receive - turns the world around. Suddenly there is nothing to fear. Nothing can harm you. It makes sense that Socrates did not fear the hemlock, although I'm certainly not there yet.
The other amazing thing about this is that my teachers can be anything. I can learn from simply watching the energetic flow in the world. I understand when Isadora Duncan says she learned her hand movements from the fluttering of palm leaves, or when Musashi claims his teachers were the rocks and streams, or how O-Sensei could "see" the paths of bullets. I know many of you probably don't understand. But at the end of the day, I think my way of looking at the world is very similar to any other way; it's just that I'm giving words and imagery to things that most of us feel and act on without consciously thinking about it.
BOOM.
So we worked on feeling how to properly use the legs and pelvis. The way we work on this stuff is getting more and more esoteric. She stood back so that she could see the energy flowing in my body. And when I work on my body, the only thing I can really tell you that I feel is that weight of my body sinking through my skeletal system and into the floor. The equates to energy in my mind. We worked and worked on the legs, feet, pelvis, chest, shoulders, and neck. We were getting each in the right position as I went into a pliet in parallel. Finally Brenda started talking about grounding cords. A line of energy drawn from your base chakra into the ground and into the center of the earth. She practiced doing a few pliets with and without a grounding cord, and what do you know, I could see the difference. It is in fact quite clear to my eyes. It's not that I saw the energy flowing, per se, but rather that the quality of movement changed drastically. I could see the groundedness, power and strength when she used this method to ground.
It suddenly became clear to me that this is what postural and dance imagery is attaining. It is having you move energy. The imagery always contains something moving or falling or going somewhere, and it correlates perfectly with the way I think about the energy in my body. There is an image that correlates to the image I use with my pelvis. One should imagine a plum line falling from the base chakra (the area between the anus and genitals). There should be an invisible weight falling to the ground, so that the pelvis stays heavy and in a neutral position. This was my realization last night. This position allows me to engage my inner thighs and hamstrings, taking the strain off of my knees.
So I'm sold. I've been dabbling in this energy stuff halfheartedly. I did it through imagery for the past two years. I played with it in meditation. I unconsciously used intention and preparing my mental state for achievements like getting a job cooking in a restaurant and getting into Yale. But the time has come where I completely accept it. I admit now that I see the world as a large energetic system. Everything seems to be in flux - trees, plants, tables, people - and each thing interacts with each other. It turns out that the world finally makes sense to me viewing it through this lens. To understand people's behavior, how people convince others of things, what makes quality movement is all describable in terms of the energy we use and expend.
In all my studies, it seems universally true that to hold onto energy is counter-productive. To try to keep it for yourself achieves nothing, but to let it flow through you - giving as much as you receive - turns the world around. Suddenly there is nothing to fear. Nothing can harm you. It makes sense that Socrates did not fear the hemlock, although I'm certainly not there yet.
The other amazing thing about this is that my teachers can be anything. I can learn from simply watching the energetic flow in the world. I understand when Isadora Duncan says she learned her hand movements from the fluttering of palm leaves, or when Musashi claims his teachers were the rocks and streams, or how O-Sensei could "see" the paths of bullets. I know many of you probably don't understand. But at the end of the day, I think my way of looking at the world is very similar to any other way; it's just that I'm giving words and imagery to things that most of us feel and act on without consciously thinking about it.
BOOM.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
The day after Returning from San Francisco
I have so much to share, but I hardly know where to begin. And I'm about to meet Brenda and Julie (a girl who I couldn't remember where I had met, but it finally occurred to me that we met in Herrang, Sweden. She's from Seoul, Korea.)
Camp Blues was intense - tons of work and emtional intensity, but I was PAID! I met some people who might be interested in helping put on workshops in Ashland, OR and Maui, HI.
My routine is going well. We are one week away from finishing, and will have to wait to perform until after I return from California.
Brenda asked me to go teach with her in China in October. One of the goals I set for myself (with the encouragement of Napoleon Hill, the author) included buying tailored suits in China. It was a goal that could certainly happen in the next year, but actually the one that seemed most unlikely, because I didn't see why I would be traveling to China. And then Brenda asked me to go with her, and I started wondering what there is to this Napoleon Hill stuff... You see, he says that we must define our goals without any concern for whether they seem unachievable. He talks a lot about creating a mental state that is always thinking of the goal and then the subconscious will always be seeking a way to make your dreams into reality. A dubious claim if it weren't for my studies in the past years. I think a serious and prolonged study of faith is what we all need.
Tonight, my modern class is performing, and I'm going to usher and watch the show.
Camp Blues was intense - tons of work and emtional intensity, but I was PAID! I met some people who might be interested in helping put on workshops in Ashland, OR and Maui, HI.
My routine is going well. We are one week away from finishing, and will have to wait to perform until after I return from California.
Brenda asked me to go teach with her in China in October. One of the goals I set for myself (with the encouragement of Napoleon Hill, the author) included buying tailored suits in China. It was a goal that could certainly happen in the next year, but actually the one that seemed most unlikely, because I didn't see why I would be traveling to China. And then Brenda asked me to go with her, and I started wondering what there is to this Napoleon Hill stuff... You see, he says that we must define our goals without any concern for whether they seem unachievable. He talks a lot about creating a mental state that is always thinking of the goal and then the subconscious will always be seeking a way to make your dreams into reality. A dubious claim if it weren't for my studies in the past years. I think a serious and prolonged study of faith is what we all need.
Tonight, my modern class is performing, and I'm going to usher and watch the show.
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