Coordination & Connection
A workshop with Pedro de Alcantara
Saturday & Sunday, May 26 & 27, 2018
Feel alive, feel rooted, feel stable, feel fluid . . . feel and enjoy feeling so much life.
What: Two separate but linked days of creative games designed to open your mind, free your creativity, and embody your freedom.
When: Saturday & Sunday, May 26 & 27, 2018. From 2 to 7 PM, with a tea break. Bonus: on Monday, May 28 from 10 AM to 1 PM: optional Practice Lab. At no extra fee, come play with your new creative tools in the company of your new friends!
Where? Studio Bleu, 7/9 rue des Petites Ecuries, 75010 Paris. Métros Château d'eau (line 4) or Strasbourg-Saint Denis (lines 4, 8 and 9). The Studio Bleu is on the first floor of the building sandwiched between the Franprix supermarket and the New Morning jazz club.
For Whom: Anyone interested in skills of observation, creativity, mindfulness, and adaptability. Limited to 12 participants. Past participants have included artists, musicians, singers, writers, health professionals, public speakers, and creative individuals. No previous experience needed.
How Much: Each day costs €120. Take both days and receive a discount: €200 instead of €240. Payment ensures your registration. Cancellations are cost-free up to May 20 when payments become non-refundable unless someone else takes your place. Please email me for more information or to register.
Program
1. Back & Shoulders. We’ll practice The Plunge, an exercise that highlights the connection between the back and the shoulders while giving you a sense of the whole body in movement and in reaction to a situation with multiple dimensions. (Like all good exercises the Plunge is a portal to the awareness of the whole dynamic self.) And we’ll start our exploration of Object Wisdom. Carrying a large package up two flights of stairs, you soon conclude that there are some objects that definitely invite you to misuse your body. By the same token, however, there are plenty of objects that help your coordination, if only you attune yourself to their basic properties. In Object Wisdom we take a fresh look at ordinary household objects—cell phones, brooms, brushes, soccer balls, elastic bands, water bottles, and anything else around the room—and see what lessons the objects can teach us about perception, conception, reaction, and movement.
2. Back & Pelvis. We’ll model the pelvis—that is, gather practical information about it that allows you to visualize, feel, and control your pelvis with ease. We’ll practice a profoundly effective exercise for the connection between the back and pelvis. The Möbius Strip is a simple posture you can learn in a minute. Strangely and wonderfully, the posture seems to create an infinite circuit of connections from head to toe, back and front, up and down, inside and out. When you establish these connections, energy flows unimpeded through you, and also to you and from you. We’ll learn the posture, use it for speech and for locomotion, and also for studying the connection between the back and pelvis and the separation between the hips and the legs. And we’ll learn two other exercises to heighten your awareness of the pelvis: a sequence of moves inspired from aikido, and a simple movement and posture from daily life.
3. Arms & Legs. We’ll learn the basics of pronation and supination (the rotations of your arms in movement and at rest). We’ll study several exercises based on Quadrilateral Transfer—that is, the dialogue between the arms and the legs. Some of the exercises are static or “positional,” others are dynamic and “relational.” Learn both dimensions, and you’ll be whole and balanced. We’ll learn the Invisible Samba, an exercise that integrates the freedom and stability of the pelvis with locomotion, the use of the arms, rhythm, and language.
4. Hands & Fingers. We'll explore an interesting dynamic arrangement called Elbows Out, Wrists In, which helps you free your arms and become dexterous in daily life. We'll learn The Looping Circuit, a simple exercise that allows your fingers to become rather intelligent. And we'll practice Five Healing Exercises to make your hands and fingers the softest, warmest, sweetest bearers of good energy.
Resources: Chapters 11 to 15 of Integrated Practice.