Sometimes you see people dance effortlessly, carelessly
Children, drunk people and old people can dance. Sometimes, in-love people. And people who think (know) they are good.
Why? Because they don't care what people think about them, what people say about them, who will laugh at them. They just do it, for the sake of doing it. They feel it in their body, and they answer that call to move! It's very simple.
How do you dance? You just move! Listen to the music, feel it in your body, follow the beat/flow.
All babies and little children can dance. Most just lost that ability as they grow older.
Same applies to drawing/painting, making music and other artsy stuff.
Why you cannot dance?
Because at some point in your life, someone tells you that you can't, or make you think that way, or you grew up got too self conscious about your self and your body to just let it move, and when you needed to be cool, and letting your body to just move wasn't cool.
Because at some point, people start to make you think that dancing has to be in a certain way, a certain steps, a certain style, attend a certain class, follow a certain teacher, be in a certain group, using a certain kind of music, confining you to these so-called standards, instead of allowing your personal style to be expressed.
Because, you haven't moved listening to a music since you were 3 years old, because people ask you to sit down and be quiet, or just follow what they do. Any skill unpolished is not surprisingly rusty. If the last time you actually tried to dance was during your kindergarten concert, don't be surprised if you still dance like a 5 year old. You're not untalented. You just didn't.
Monday, February 25, 2013
Thursday, February 21, 2013
Money and Fat
Many times when I talk to people about losing weight, I talk about being aware of and accepting your fats.
Accepting my fats?!
The money story
OK, think about when you withdrew cash from your bank account. What happens after a couple of days?
Most likely, you will be asking yourself, "Where have all the money gone?"
Hands up if this did not happen to you. How come you can sometimes live with very little money in your wallet and still somehow get by, but when you withdrew the money fresh from the ATM, it will all be gone before you even noticed?
How to safe all the money
If you are planning to safe money, first you will have to spend less than you earn.
Every month, you put aside an amount that you want to safe, and then you get to spend the rest. You might even spend a little extra sometimes, but it is OK if you make up for it the next time.
Keep the money long enough and it will start accumulating some interests on its own. Get them in to fixed-deposits and you can accumulate even more interests, and you credit them to principal, and eventually, the interests will start compounding into significant amounts!
Spending the money
If you have lot of cash, and you keep it at home, or in the bank, you're not gonna use it anyway.
So no matter how rich you are, if you don't carry your wallet around with you, you're not gonna have money to use. You'll have no money to pay for your ride, no money to buy things with, or buy food with. So what's the point of being so rich? If you're not gonna spend some money on yourself (or others), why gather so much money?
How to spend all that money?
So let's say you are in a situation where you have too much money. So how do you get rid of it?
Just grab some cash and credit card, stuff it in your wallet, ask a few friends out to the mall, and just watch the money disappear! Poof! That's it, before you even realise.
Sometimes, you may feel uncomfortable carrying all that money. It's cumbersome, you might get robbed, applying for credit cards are troublesome, but if you don't take it along with you, you won't use it.
So what's the point here?
The point is, in your workouts and in your daily activities, if you don't "carry your fats around with you", you're not gonna use it.
This has to do with the tendency for us to adjust our posture according according to the fats we've accumulated. Like if your butt is heavy, you'll tend to stick it out more. If your belly is huge, you'll let it drop in front of you. If you're generally heavy, you will be more likely to drag yourself around more, reluctantly. So all these habits are not very "spending". In fact, the longer you conform to the bad posture, the faster your fats will turn into fixed-deposits, with compounding interests!
Generating cash-flow
Using up fats takes muscle tone and blood circulation.
When we are in a bad posture, we tend to be straining smaller groups of muscles while neglecting some others, failing to use the muscle system as a whole. And it is where these neglected muscles are that fats will form and skin will sag. And it is where the muscles will feel the weakest and most reluctant to work after a period (sometimes lifetime) of inactivity.
Having the right posture tends to force these muscles to work - especially muscles around the core. The more the muscles are stimulated, the more blood will flow through, and the faster your fats will be replaced by muscle mass.
It's like carrying cash in your wallet
Sometimes, people complain that they workout so much, yet they couldn't get rid of the fats in some areas.
If you are in this situation, you might want to recheck your posture, especially during your workout. If your posture isn't right, you're not working the right muscles.
It's like going out without taking your wallet with you, and the money is still in the bank!
In fact, if you have the right posture, your body will start working those muscles even when you're not at the gym. That happens when every regular movement such as sitting, walking and going up the stairs uses whole groups of muscles instead of the few.
Along with that, by being conscious of my fats, my body alignment is more accurate, and it triggers a kind of awareness in my body that says "these are extra fats, I don't need them," and they will eventually get the job done.
So when you start working out with the right posture, you may initially find that it forces you to do it the hard way, your body will feel different, awkward, it is alot more tiring, requiring fewer reps, but at the same time, every little movement seem to force alot of muscles to get working.
It's like spending all your money on one or few expensive items, rather than buying many small, regular items. The money just goes out alot faster.
So, the next time you walk up the stairs, do jogging, or go for your next workout session, uplift the bum, bring your tummy with you, or whatever fat part that is, feel the fat, and watch it get worked out.
Good luck!
Accepting my fats?!
The money story
OK, think about when you withdrew cash from your bank account. What happens after a couple of days?
Most likely, you will be asking yourself, "Where have all the money gone?"
Hands up if this did not happen to you. How come you can sometimes live with very little money in your wallet and still somehow get by, but when you withdrew the money fresh from the ATM, it will all be gone before you even noticed?
How to safe all the money
If you are planning to safe money, first you will have to spend less than you earn.
Every month, you put aside an amount that you want to safe, and then you get to spend the rest. You might even spend a little extra sometimes, but it is OK if you make up for it the next time.
Keep the money long enough and it will start accumulating some interests on its own. Get them in to fixed-deposits and you can accumulate even more interests, and you credit them to principal, and eventually, the interests will start compounding into significant amounts!
Spending the money
If you have lot of cash, and you keep it at home, or in the bank, you're not gonna use it anyway.
So no matter how rich you are, if you don't carry your wallet around with you, you're not gonna have money to use. You'll have no money to pay for your ride, no money to buy things with, or buy food with. So what's the point of being so rich? If you're not gonna spend some money on yourself (or others), why gather so much money?
How to spend all that money?
So let's say you are in a situation where you have too much money. So how do you get rid of it?
Just grab some cash and credit card, stuff it in your wallet, ask a few friends out to the mall, and just watch the money disappear! Poof! That's it, before you even realise.
Sometimes, you may feel uncomfortable carrying all that money. It's cumbersome, you might get robbed, applying for credit cards are troublesome, but if you don't take it along with you, you won't use it.
So what's the point here?
The point is, in your workouts and in your daily activities, if you don't "carry your fats around with you", you're not gonna use it.
This has to do with the tendency for us to adjust our posture according according to the fats we've accumulated. Like if your butt is heavy, you'll tend to stick it out more. If your belly is huge, you'll let it drop in front of you. If you're generally heavy, you will be more likely to drag yourself around more, reluctantly. So all these habits are not very "spending". In fact, the longer you conform to the bad posture, the faster your fats will turn into fixed-deposits, with compounding interests!
Generating cash-flow
Using up fats takes muscle tone and blood circulation.
When we are in a bad posture, we tend to be straining smaller groups of muscles while neglecting some others, failing to use the muscle system as a whole. And it is where these neglected muscles are that fats will form and skin will sag. And it is where the muscles will feel the weakest and most reluctant to work after a period (sometimes lifetime) of inactivity.
Having the right posture tends to force these muscles to work - especially muscles around the core. The more the muscles are stimulated, the more blood will flow through, and the faster your fats will be replaced by muscle mass.
It's like carrying cash in your wallet
Sometimes, people complain that they workout so much, yet they couldn't get rid of the fats in some areas.
If you are in this situation, you might want to recheck your posture, especially during your workout. If your posture isn't right, you're not working the right muscles.
It's like going out without taking your wallet with you, and the money is still in the bank!
In fact, if you have the right posture, your body will start working those muscles even when you're not at the gym. That happens when every regular movement such as sitting, walking and going up the stairs uses whole groups of muscles instead of the few.
Along with that, by being conscious of my fats, my body alignment is more accurate, and it triggers a kind of awareness in my body that says "these are extra fats, I don't need them," and they will eventually get the job done.
So when you start working out with the right posture, you may initially find that it forces you to do it the hard way, your body will feel different, awkward, it is alot more tiring, requiring fewer reps, but at the same time, every little movement seem to force alot of muscles to get working.
It's like spending all your money on one or few expensive items, rather than buying many small, regular items. The money just goes out alot faster.
So, the next time you walk up the stairs, do jogging, or go for your next workout session, uplift the bum, bring your tummy with you, or whatever fat part that is, feel the fat, and watch it get worked out.
Good luck!
Monday, February 18, 2013
Life Lessons from Dance Improvisation
Stop thinking and let your body do the dancing
Authentic improvisation comes from the body, not the mind. You do not think about what move you are gonna do. You just get your mind out of the way and let your body move. Set steps, techniques and movement sequences are not necessarily you. They may not be true to the moment, or your mood, or the music you are dancing to. They may not even be true to how your body should move! To find true movement, sometimes you may have to unlearn what you practiced, and let the movement from your body flow through...
You may have been taught about what you should do or how you should be, but that may not be necessarily true to you. Sometimes, you may have to let go of conscious thought and let your heart go. Then can you live true to yourself.
Be conscious of the body and space in the current moment
One movement may lead to a shape. From the shape, a new movement awaits.
If you find yourself following up with the same kind of movement every time, perhaps you have "automated" your dancing. You are dancing by memory, you are not really improvising at the moment. Choose to be conscious about your body, and discover other potentials of movements following the previous movement, and you may discover something totally new!
The process is a partnership of the body and mind - body exploration, mental consciousness. A good balance produce wonderful results.
Just as many processes and risk-taking require both instinct, strategy and self-awareness. A combination of both gives the best results.
Go the distance
Being conscious of the moment also mean going the distance with each move, maximizing the extends of each shape or movement, be it an extension, a contraction, a release, or a fall. Then only can you truly enjoying the dancing, in addition to appearing more dynamic and interesting.
If you haven't gone the distance in the endeavours you undertake, you probably haven't truly discovered your true potential in it, and learn to truly enjoy it. People say, do it well before you give it up.
Don't take yourself so seriously
Let go and have fun! Jump like a kid in a puddle. Skip around, sway, fall, act and be playful! There are no rules when it comes to improvisation. You can do just about anything. Only thing is, you need to take risks and let yourself go. Try movements you've never done before. Do things you would never think of as a dance. No one can tell you what you can't do. Most importantly, people will notice it if you're enjoying yourself, and they would have so much fun watching you too!
People love to see people who make them happy. Afterall, who can tell you how to live your life?
I would love to hear about the principles from other disciplines as well. Do you have any?
Authentic improvisation comes from the body, not the mind. You do not think about what move you are gonna do. You just get your mind out of the way and let your body move. Set steps, techniques and movement sequences are not necessarily you. They may not be true to the moment, or your mood, or the music you are dancing to. They may not even be true to how your body should move! To find true movement, sometimes you may have to unlearn what you practiced, and let the movement from your body flow through...
You may have been taught about what you should do or how you should be, but that may not be necessarily true to you. Sometimes, you may have to let go of conscious thought and let your heart go. Then can you live true to yourself.
Be conscious of the body and space in the current moment
One movement may lead to a shape. From the shape, a new movement awaits.
If you find yourself following up with the same kind of movement every time, perhaps you have "automated" your dancing. You are dancing by memory, you are not really improvising at the moment. Choose to be conscious about your body, and discover other potentials of movements following the previous movement, and you may discover something totally new!
The process is a partnership of the body and mind - body exploration, mental consciousness. A good balance produce wonderful results.
Just as many processes and risk-taking require both instinct, strategy and self-awareness. A combination of both gives the best results.
Go the distance
Being conscious of the moment also mean going the distance with each move, maximizing the extends of each shape or movement, be it an extension, a contraction, a release, or a fall. Then only can you truly enjoying the dancing, in addition to appearing more dynamic and interesting.
If you haven't gone the distance in the endeavours you undertake, you probably haven't truly discovered your true potential in it, and learn to truly enjoy it. People say, do it well before you give it up.
Don't take yourself so seriously
Let go and have fun! Jump like a kid in a puddle. Skip around, sway, fall, act and be playful! There are no rules when it comes to improvisation. You can do just about anything. Only thing is, you need to take risks and let yourself go. Try movements you've never done before. Do things you would never think of as a dance. No one can tell you what you can't do. Most importantly, people will notice it if you're enjoying yourself, and they would have so much fun watching you too!
People love to see people who make them happy. Afterall, who can tell you how to live your life?
I would love to hear about the principles from other disciplines as well. Do you have any?
The Edge of Competency
Many times, I am given a task to do something, I hesitate. I hesitate to start and I hesitate to finish. Some people call it procrastination. Some people call it lazy. I call myself both. Add it bits of perfectionism, and it's very close friend - feeling not-good-enough.
A Chronic Case of Feeling Not-Good-Enough
Looking back, I find myself being very attached to this feeling not-good-enough. It is as though I'm really that bad at doing anything, that I didn't want to do it at all. Or if I started, I am too ashamed to submit it or post it up anywhere.
I tried a few methods to work myself out of it. This blog being one of it.
Finding reasons to be not good
So I had this habit of constantly finding people and things that are leagues above me, and comparing myself with them. I know that the feeling is partly rational. Looking around me, I certainly know who I am better compared with, but my mind and emotions are fairly focused on the people who are better than me.
I initially started off with people who are just a bit better than me, but I gradually worked up to those of world class standards.
While technically, it is good to aim high and to develop some constructive criticism of ourselves, you know what people say about aiming too high.
Not only that, I also find myself constantly searching for something new to do, some new skill set to develop, and something that I am not good at.
Not that it's bad to challenge yourself with learning a new skill or pushing your standards, but I came to find that it's really not helpful to do everything at the edge of my competency. In fact, this edge has become some sort of a comfort zone, which acts as an excuse for me to not do anything substantial, to push further up on expertise in one skill set, but rather meddle with many.
*Ironically, my writing of this former paragraph still lies within the same pattern of judging myself towards incompetency.
Focusing on strengths
Positive psychologists found that managers who focused on their employee's strengths are able to significantly increase employee productivity. People who have a good understanding of themselves and constantly work on developing their talents were able to achieve more success compared to those who are more focused on improving their weaknesses.
Not only is working on something that you are already talented at improves productivity, it also opens up the avenue for you to push it to a higher level of competency (metaphor: climbing the hill of competency), as opposed to staying mediocre, and needless to say, it is also much more helpful for your self-esteem, passion and desire to do more!
*Which leads me to some new questions:
- Which "hill of competency" should I climb?
- Should I be an expert "meddler"?
I am a hill
So, to ask "Which hill of competency should I climb" already made an assumption that "I am incompetent."
A more positive approach would be:
I am a hill, I become more of myself.
But to "become more of myself" implies that I am not "myself enough".
I become myself
To have to "become" myself implies that I am not myself.
I am myself.
I am who I am.
....It's who I really am...
A Chronic Case of Feeling Not-Good-Enough
Looking back, I find myself being very attached to this feeling not-good-enough. It is as though I'm really that bad at doing anything, that I didn't want to do it at all. Or if I started, I am too ashamed to submit it or post it up anywhere.
I tried a few methods to work myself out of it. This blog being one of it.
Finding reasons to be not good
So I had this habit of constantly finding people and things that are leagues above me, and comparing myself with them. I know that the feeling is partly rational. Looking around me, I certainly know who I am better compared with, but my mind and emotions are fairly focused on the people who are better than me.
I initially started off with people who are just a bit better than me, but I gradually worked up to those of world class standards.
While technically, it is good to aim high and to develop some constructive criticism of ourselves, you know what people say about aiming too high.
Not only that, I also find myself constantly searching for something new to do, some new skill set to develop, and something that I am not good at.
Not that it's bad to challenge yourself with learning a new skill or pushing your standards, but I came to find that it's really not helpful to do everything at the edge of my competency. In fact, this edge has become some sort of a comfort zone, which acts as an excuse for me to not do anything substantial, to push further up on expertise in one skill set, but rather meddle with many.
*Ironically, my writing of this former paragraph still lies within the same pattern of judging myself towards incompetency.
Focusing on strengths
Positive psychologists found that managers who focused on their employee's strengths are able to significantly increase employee productivity. People who have a good understanding of themselves and constantly work on developing their talents were able to achieve more success compared to those who are more focused on improving their weaknesses.
Not only is working on something that you are already talented at improves productivity, it also opens up the avenue for you to push it to a higher level of competency (metaphor: climbing the hill of competency), as opposed to staying mediocre, and needless to say, it is also much more helpful for your self-esteem, passion and desire to do more!
*Which leads me to some new questions:
- Which "hill of competency" should I climb?
- Should I be an expert "meddler"?
I am a hill
So, to ask "Which hill of competency should I climb" already made an assumption that "I am incompetent."
A more positive approach would be:
I am a hill, I become more of myself.
But to "become more of myself" implies that I am not "myself enough".
I become myself
To have to "become" myself implies that I am not myself.
I am myself.
I am who I am.
....It's who I really am...
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
What Education
So the question about education is a hot topic now, brewing somewhere just below the surface of other concerns like the economy and the environment. But in fact, it is the foundation in which all these factors were laid.
If the world is wrong today, so what happened in education for the last 10, 2- to 40 years that made it wrong? Is it getting increasingly wrong? Will the nest 10, 20, 30 years be even worse than where we already are? What about some of the mini revolutions that were so strongly advocated as the new order thinking, providing a great leadership future for the next generation, holistic education and all.
But what's the hit? And what's the miss?
Why is traditional schooling and exams irrelevant?
Lets be honest. How many of us did not agree that 90% of what we studied in school is no longer used in the working world, except for that rare group of people who actually went back to school and teach the exact same things to kids as a job?
Some of those 10% were expanded upon in college, and depending on what course you major in and what job you end up taking, many more were thrown away.
Simple fact that everybody knows.
So school subjects are useless?
Well, I'm not saying that we shouldn't learn about our bodies and how the heart pumps blood through our blood streams that runs through our bodies or how rain cloud is formed and why there is rainbows.
In fact, I'm all for science and knowledge gathering, if just to understand our world a bit more - which certainly helps for us to function a little better. Takes some of the fairy tales and guessing games away as we grow up, didn't it?
And who can deny the importance of literacy? If we are to gather more knowledge through reading, surely the mastery of its language is of foremost importance.
Well, of course we use math on a day-to-day basis. You count your money, you count your time. You count your people, you count your percentages, your probabilities... and that's probably as much as the average usage of maths on a day-to-day life. And that's math up to... lower secondary school.
So what are we missing out on?
Most of us who went through formal education would emerge through life to find ourselves barely prepared for certain things in life, things that we didn't know we didn't know, until we are face to face with situations which slams on our face, making us begin to question things like:
A human or a photocopier?
How students are assessed and evaluated determines the outcome of an education. Whatever the desired outcome is, the students and teachers will work towards.
In the traditional sense, parents, teachers and the students themselves want more As. And in most education systems, having more As mean memorising tons of factual information, calculation formulas and rediculously, entire sentences of fact, word for word. Some even go to the extend of memorising entire essays, so that they could score a language subject!
Technically, what the exam system asks of is for a student to be a photocopier! That students spend most of their time memorising and using various techniques to remember whole text books.
Then why do we need a human brain when there is a text book?
The human brain is made to think. It is made to be capable of exceptional cognitive abilities; gathering multitude amounts of data that we don't even realise we are gathering, processing these information into personalised meaning, weighing its pros and cons and delivering its results to you, all in a split second...
Like why you would smile and make friends with this other person, why you would tell them your deepest darkest secrets, why a baby would keep crying until he is delivered to his mother.
Why you just have that gut feeling that this sales man is lying to you, or when you should switch lanes on the road.
Things like how to write a new story, how to create a new device, who to marry, how to solve the current economic crisis, how to save the world...are questions that have no answer in the textbook.
So why all the emphasis on what's on the textbook?
OK, I guess I have spoken enough and I will not prescribe what's best for the next generation/your child here.
But I do invite all of you to stop, think and reconsider, why we study what we study, or why the next generation should continue what we have done.
Feel free to share.
If the world is wrong today, so what happened in education for the last 10, 2- to 40 years that made it wrong? Is it getting increasingly wrong? Will the nest 10, 20, 30 years be even worse than where we already are? What about some of the mini revolutions that were so strongly advocated as the new order thinking, providing a great leadership future for the next generation, holistic education and all.
But what's the hit? And what's the miss?
Why is traditional schooling and exams irrelevant?
Lets be honest. How many of us did not agree that 90% of what we studied in school is no longer used in the working world, except for that rare group of people who actually went back to school and teach the exact same things to kids as a job?
Some of those 10% were expanded upon in college, and depending on what course you major in and what job you end up taking, many more were thrown away.
Simple fact that everybody knows.
So school subjects are useless?
Well, I'm not saying that we shouldn't learn about our bodies and how the heart pumps blood through our blood streams that runs through our bodies or how rain cloud is formed and why there is rainbows.
In fact, I'm all for science and knowledge gathering, if just to understand our world a bit more - which certainly helps for us to function a little better. Takes some of the fairy tales and guessing games away as we grow up, didn't it?
And who can deny the importance of literacy? If we are to gather more knowledge through reading, surely the mastery of its language is of foremost importance.
Well, of course we use math on a day-to-day basis. You count your money, you count your time. You count your people, you count your percentages, your probabilities... and that's probably as much as the average usage of maths on a day-to-day life. And that's math up to... lower secondary school.
So what are we missing out on?
Most of us who went through formal education would emerge through life to find ourselves barely prepared for certain things in life, things that we didn't know we didn't know, until we are face to face with situations which slams on our face, making us begin to question things like:
- Life and death, the spirit and the meaning of our existence
- Relationships and social skills
- Psychology, mental-emotional health
- Happiness and satisfaction in life
- Health care and medicine
- Management and leadership
- How money works, economy and finances
- How to survive in the modern world
- How to survive if you're thrown into the jungle
- How to survive a disaster/accident/outbreak
- Questioning, reasoning, critical thinking
- Curiosity and investigation
- Fun, play and humour
- Sex, marriage, childbirth, child-rearing
- Personality building
- Human rights, criminality and justice
- Love, conscience and compassion
- What we really want
- How to care for wildlife and the environment
- How to care for other people
- Culture, history, human nature and it's implications
A human or a photocopier?
How students are assessed and evaluated determines the outcome of an education. Whatever the desired outcome is, the students and teachers will work towards.
In the traditional sense, parents, teachers and the students themselves want more As. And in most education systems, having more As mean memorising tons of factual information, calculation formulas and rediculously, entire sentences of fact, word for word. Some even go to the extend of memorising entire essays, so that they could score a language subject!
Technically, what the exam system asks of is for a student to be a photocopier! That students spend most of their time memorising and using various techniques to remember whole text books.
Then why do we need a human brain when there is a text book?
The human brain is made to think. It is made to be capable of exceptional cognitive abilities; gathering multitude amounts of data that we don't even realise we are gathering, processing these information into personalised meaning, weighing its pros and cons and delivering its results to you, all in a split second...
Like why you would smile and make friends with this other person, why you would tell them your deepest darkest secrets, why a baby would keep crying until he is delivered to his mother.
Why you just have that gut feeling that this sales man is lying to you, or when you should switch lanes on the road.
Things like how to write a new story, how to create a new device, who to marry, how to solve the current economic crisis, how to save the world...are questions that have no answer in the textbook.
So why all the emphasis on what's on the textbook?
OK, I guess I have spoken enough and I will not prescribe what's best for the next generation/your child here.
But I do invite all of you to stop, think and reconsider, why we study what we study, or why the next generation should continue what we have done.
Feel free to share.
Sunday, February 3, 2013
Why Dance Education?
During my time as a full time teacher, I was asked many times, "Why do we have to learn dance?" by my students. Some parents ask the same, even many teachers do. My subject was considered unimportant in school, especially when other than the International Baccalaureate students, they are not taking any formal examinations for it.
So why am I teaching it? Why is the school offering it? Why does all the students up to year 9 have to do it?
Well, at first, I even questioned myself. I did not grow up in a different environment from them. I went to government school, where language, math and science were given top priority. Subject like art (specifically visual arts), were looked down upon as unnecessary, an extra A for the gifted and that's about it. It was simply my love for the art form that caused me to take it seriously. But yet, it still appear very co-curricular and seemingly exists in the realm of leisure and entertainment.
Why? "I don't know."
"Because you are in this school and the school wants you to."
"Because you need to move and get some exercise."
"So that you can relax and take your mind off the books for awhile."
"Because you have a body..."
But really. "We all have a body, don't we?" as Sir Ken Robinson mentions in his speech in TED, which beautifully and humourously illustrates the importance of dance as an arts education.
So well, as long as we have a body, and we live in/with it until the day we die, shouldn't we learn more about it? Learn how to use it, take care of it, get creative and have fun with it? (in many more ways...)
And learning dance is more than just learning to use it athletically like in PE, but the benefits of learning dance includes those of learning music and visual arts.
From simple dance exercises, students learn to listen, pay attention to and respond to music, its beats and nuances.
In a creative dance or improvisation class, students learn to create and express their emotions through a healthy physical channel, and learn to develop a aesthetic considerations in the process. This kind of class is also very therapeutic.
And not to forget, it is also a fun way of getting to know your friends and yourself!
But one of my biggest reasons for loving and teaching dance was simply about connecting with the body, the anatomy, the movements, the sensations, and wonder.
So, as I often say, learning dance is not just about another subject in your time table. Learning dance is learning about yourself, your body, your emotions. It's your life...
So? Do you have other great answers to this?
So why am I teaching it? Why is the school offering it? Why does all the students up to year 9 have to do it?
Well, at first, I even questioned myself. I did not grow up in a different environment from them. I went to government school, where language, math and science were given top priority. Subject like art (specifically visual arts), were looked down upon as unnecessary, an extra A for the gifted and that's about it. It was simply my love for the art form that caused me to take it seriously. But yet, it still appear very co-curricular and seemingly exists in the realm of leisure and entertainment.
Why? "I don't know."
"Because you are in this school and the school wants you to."
"Because you need to move and get some exercise."
"So that you can relax and take your mind off the books for awhile."
"Because you have a body..."
But really. "We all have a body, don't we?" as Sir Ken Robinson mentions in his speech in TED, which beautifully and humourously illustrates the importance of dance as an arts education.
So well, as long as we have a body, and we live in/with it until the day we die, shouldn't we learn more about it? Learn how to use it, take care of it, get creative and have fun with it? (in many more ways...)
And learning dance is more than just learning to use it athletically like in PE, but the benefits of learning dance includes those of learning music and visual arts.
From simple dance exercises, students learn to listen, pay attention to and respond to music, its beats and nuances.
In a creative dance or improvisation class, students learn to create and express their emotions through a healthy physical channel, and learn to develop a aesthetic considerations in the process. This kind of class is also very therapeutic.
And not to forget, it is also a fun way of getting to know your friends and yourself!
But one of my biggest reasons for loving and teaching dance was simply about connecting with the body, the anatomy, the movements, the sensations, and wonder.
So, as I often say, learning dance is not just about another subject in your time table. Learning dance is learning about yourself, your body, your emotions. It's your life...
So? Do you have other great answers to this?
Thursday, January 31, 2013
The Mind and Body of Pain
Many people unknowingly live with joint pains in their lives. As they go about their day to day lives, as age increase, workload and responsibilities mounting, it is easy to ignore the body and the sensations that it is giving. It is not until a problem becomes too persistent and too painful to ignore that a problem in the body is addressed.
"No pain, no gain" is the mantra that has been taught to us, about the wisdom of working hard and persevering for long term benefits. However, in medical understanding, pain is attributed to a sickness or a problem. As a part of the human survival instinct, pain is designed to help humans or living things identify danger or harm. So how come we are contradicting ourselves?
According to The International Association for the Study of Pain, pain is defined as "an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage, or described in terms of such damage".
While there are many causes for joint pains, including bone or muscle injury, and various other diseases such as rheumatism and arthritis, (an exhaustive list here) and may need medical treatment, some of the more common pains are simply caused by muscle tension and repetitive strain injury - strain caused by activities that we perform on a day-to-day basis, which may not appear harmful or injurious, bu causes damage in the long term.
Some of us experience pain that have no apparent causes or notable injuries when we seek the doctor, and there is little that a doctor can do. Yet, this kind of pain can be very persistent in our everyday activities, especially if you are an active person or needs to perform physical tasks on a regular basis. This kind of pain can stem from muscle tension, joint misalignment or even mental-emotional - such as stress, grief or anxiety, the type which experts call psychogenic pain.
In such cases, the best relief is to be able to alleviate tension through the practice of relaxation of the mind and body.
Breaking The Pain Pattern
As we continue to accept that constant pain and tension is necessary part of our lives, we will continue to breed behaviours and habits that will continue to give us pain - like how you would keep pressing onto that sore knee every time you walk up the stairs.
Eventually, such a pain will become unbearable and you would start to avoid using it all together, and put weight on the other side of your body. This in turn causes pelvic and spinal imbalance, which will create new pains in your hip joints and lower back.
See how this can continue developing into a pain pattern?
The Recovery Loop
We may not realise it, but we may constantly be putting unnecessary strain into little joint muscles to bear the burden of our body weight, muscles which are designed for light movements, whereas large muscles meant to carry the body weight lie dormant. But because we have been so desensitised from responding to our bodily pains, we continue to repeat the habit until the tissues becomes inflamed and sore.
Such as in the situation mentioned above, the tiny muscles in front of the knee cap were forced to bear the burden of pulling the body weight up, when you should really be lifting yourself forward using all the big muscles in your core, buttocks and thighs.
However, by learning that the load of your body weight is not meant to be supported by any one small muscle, but distributed across your body, you understand that the pain is not necessary at all, or can be significantly minimised at the very least. In the process, your body feels lighter, your movements easier and swifter, and at the same time, you are also working those areas that have been gathering fat - your tummy and buttocks - all at the same time.
The truth is that, your body knows exactly how to work and heal itself, if we allow them to. If you can learn to listen to your body more often, to be mindful of how it should really work, and allow its natural processes to take over, you will begin the cycle of healing and increased wellness.
Long-Term Pain vs. Short-Term Pain
So can you avoid pain altogether?
If you have participate in any sports lesson, the first thing you notice after your first class is how sore your muscles are. But this does not mean that you should stop the activity altogether. In fact, when you grew your first teeth, and your wisdom teeth, the process was painful too, at varying degrees. And when you get that wound falling from a bicycle, there were some pain and discomfort underneath that scab that you so badly want to scratch and poke.
The point is, pain is not entirely avoidable. We are meant to deal with pain at one time or another. However, the difference lies in dealing with long-term pain or short-term pain.
Identifying Injuries
1. Lazy habits - Most injuries that develop over time were the result of bad habits which I would label as laziness - habits such as slouching is a posture from the unwillingness to hold up the body using the core muscles, but letting the body "rest" which in actual fact, puts strains on particular small muscles.
2. Wrong technique - Perhaps, you may find that certain exercises you do don't seem to give you better results even if you have repeated it for several weeks or months regularly. But instead, you experience pain in the course of the activity, and the pain may have even increased even though you did you increase the intensity of your exercise. In this case, you should know that you might be using the wrong muscles to perform this activity, as if you have done it correctly, you should see improvement over time, and pain from unfamiliar muscle activity would cease.
Another good indication of technique is the area of pain. Pain in the muscles from overworking is much less of a problem compared to pain in the joint. As muscles are made of elastic tissues and have ample blood supply, it can stretch, and recover itself easily when experiencing microscopic tears (which is common in weight training). However, the joints are made up of tendons and ligaments, both which are non-stretchable. But when stretched or strained, they are slow to heal and generally does not go back to its original form.
Sharp pain is another indicator for wrong technique. Tears in tendons, ligaments, muscles and fascia. Other possibilities include pressing on nerves, which may also bring about sensations of numbness, giddiness or nausea.
3. Holding in tension - Muscles operate in 2 ways - contraction and extension. The alternation of this contraction and extension of muscles create movement in our joints. And naturally, we would think that holding a position means keeping the muscle contracted, and the sensation of contracted muscle seem to communicate strength, control and work. However, the contracted muscle is stiff, and if we attempt to stretch it, we would be fighting with our own body, causing tear and harm. Muscles are mean to be mobile and dynamic, to assist us in movements. If holding muscle contractions is a constant habit, you may have many sores and injuries in your body.
Also, if we are in a state of emotional stress, it is a natural response for our body to contract its muscles, to keep us in a state of vigilance. This state is tiring and it will not take long before the body is exhausted. To maintain endurance, become more flexible and minimise injury, the muscles need to work in a relaxed, extended manner. This not only appears graceful movement, it also helps one feel calm and light!
Change That Attitude
Training, stretching and your favourite activities need not be painful or injurious, if done the right way. Physical activities should be enjoyable, help you stay healthy, fit and most of all, happy!
So if you find yourself in the habit of hurting yourself, ask yourself again:
- Is this the right way to do it?
- Should this be so painful after so many times? If not, then what is the right way to do it?
- How can I use my whole body so that the load of my body weight is distributed across the large muscle groups?
- How would my healthy body do it?
If you are certain that the issue is physical, you can always ask your teacher or trainer for advice, or if you don't have one, attend classes from a teacher who can help you with these issues. Some teachers may dismiss pain and injury as common or part of the process, but a good teacher would be able to point you in the right directions. Otherwise, you may hire a specialised practitioner, counsellor or a coach who can help you specifically with forming movement and emotional habits.
Feel free to comment on if this article have helped you, or if you practiced other techniques that were really effective in helping you deal with pain healthily.
To find out more about how you can improve your life through , email movenphil@gmail.com.
"No pain, no gain" is the mantra that has been taught to us, about the wisdom of working hard and persevering for long term benefits. However, in medical understanding, pain is attributed to a sickness or a problem. As a part of the human survival instinct, pain is designed to help humans or living things identify danger or harm. So how come we are contradicting ourselves?
According to The International Association for the Study of Pain, pain is defined as "an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage, or described in terms of such damage".
While there are many causes for joint pains, including bone or muscle injury, and various other diseases such as rheumatism and arthritis, (an exhaustive list here) and may need medical treatment, some of the more common pains are simply caused by muscle tension and repetitive strain injury - strain caused by activities that we perform on a day-to-day basis, which may not appear harmful or injurious, bu causes damage in the long term.
Some of us experience pain that have no apparent causes or notable injuries when we seek the doctor, and there is little that a doctor can do. Yet, this kind of pain can be very persistent in our everyday activities, especially if you are an active person or needs to perform physical tasks on a regular basis. This kind of pain can stem from muscle tension, joint misalignment or even mental-emotional - such as stress, grief or anxiety, the type which experts call psychogenic pain.
In such cases, the best relief is to be able to alleviate tension through the practice of relaxation of the mind and body.
Breaking The Pain Pattern
As we continue to accept that constant pain and tension is necessary part of our lives, we will continue to breed behaviours and habits that will continue to give us pain - like how you would keep pressing onto that sore knee every time you walk up the stairs.
Eventually, such a pain will become unbearable and you would start to avoid using it all together, and put weight on the other side of your body. This in turn causes pelvic and spinal imbalance, which will create new pains in your hip joints and lower back.
See how this can continue developing into a pain pattern?
The Recovery Loop
We may not realise it, but we may constantly be putting unnecessary strain into little joint muscles to bear the burden of our body weight, muscles which are designed for light movements, whereas large muscles meant to carry the body weight lie dormant. But because we have been so desensitised from responding to our bodily pains, we continue to repeat the habit until the tissues becomes inflamed and sore.
Such as in the situation mentioned above, the tiny muscles in front of the knee cap were forced to bear the burden of pulling the body weight up, when you should really be lifting yourself forward using all the big muscles in your core, buttocks and thighs.
However, by learning that the load of your body weight is not meant to be supported by any one small muscle, but distributed across your body, you understand that the pain is not necessary at all, or can be significantly minimised at the very least. In the process, your body feels lighter, your movements easier and swifter, and at the same time, you are also working those areas that have been gathering fat - your tummy and buttocks - all at the same time.
The truth is that, your body knows exactly how to work and heal itself, if we allow them to. If you can learn to listen to your body more often, to be mindful of how it should really work, and allow its natural processes to take over, you will begin the cycle of healing and increased wellness.
Long-Term Pain vs. Short-Term Pain
So can you avoid pain altogether?
If you have participate in any sports lesson, the first thing you notice after your first class is how sore your muscles are. But this does not mean that you should stop the activity altogether. In fact, when you grew your first teeth, and your wisdom teeth, the process was painful too, at varying degrees. And when you get that wound falling from a bicycle, there were some pain and discomfort underneath that scab that you so badly want to scratch and poke.
The point is, pain is not entirely avoidable. We are meant to deal with pain at one time or another. However, the difference lies in dealing with long-term pain or short-term pain.
Identifying Injuries
1. Lazy habits - Most injuries that develop over time were the result of bad habits which I would label as laziness - habits such as slouching is a posture from the unwillingness to hold up the body using the core muscles, but letting the body "rest" which in actual fact, puts strains on particular small muscles.
2. Wrong technique - Perhaps, you may find that certain exercises you do don't seem to give you better results even if you have repeated it for several weeks or months regularly. But instead, you experience pain in the course of the activity, and the pain may have even increased even though you did you increase the intensity of your exercise. In this case, you should know that you might be using the wrong muscles to perform this activity, as if you have done it correctly, you should see improvement over time, and pain from unfamiliar muscle activity would cease.
Another good indication of technique is the area of pain. Pain in the muscles from overworking is much less of a problem compared to pain in the joint. As muscles are made of elastic tissues and have ample blood supply, it can stretch, and recover itself easily when experiencing microscopic tears (which is common in weight training). However, the joints are made up of tendons and ligaments, both which are non-stretchable. But when stretched or strained, they are slow to heal and generally does not go back to its original form.
Sharp pain is another indicator for wrong technique. Tears in tendons, ligaments, muscles and fascia. Other possibilities include pressing on nerves, which may also bring about sensations of numbness, giddiness or nausea.
3. Holding in tension - Muscles operate in 2 ways - contraction and extension. The alternation of this contraction and extension of muscles create movement in our joints. And naturally, we would think that holding a position means keeping the muscle contracted, and the sensation of contracted muscle seem to communicate strength, control and work. However, the contracted muscle is stiff, and if we attempt to stretch it, we would be fighting with our own body, causing tear and harm. Muscles are mean to be mobile and dynamic, to assist us in movements. If holding muscle contractions is a constant habit, you may have many sores and injuries in your body.
Also, if we are in a state of emotional stress, it is a natural response for our body to contract its muscles, to keep us in a state of vigilance. This state is tiring and it will not take long before the body is exhausted. To maintain endurance, become more flexible and minimise injury, the muscles need to work in a relaxed, extended manner. This not only appears graceful movement, it also helps one feel calm and light!
Change That Attitude
Training, stretching and your favourite activities need not be painful or injurious, if done the right way. Physical activities should be enjoyable, help you stay healthy, fit and most of all, happy!
So if you find yourself in the habit of hurting yourself, ask yourself again:
- Is this the right way to do it?
- Should this be so painful after so many times? If not, then what is the right way to do it?
- How can I use my whole body so that the load of my body weight is distributed across the large muscle groups?
- How would my healthy body do it?
If you are certain that the issue is physical, you can always ask your teacher or trainer for advice, or if you don't have one, attend classes from a teacher who can help you with these issues. Some teachers may dismiss pain and injury as common or part of the process, but a good teacher would be able to point you in the right directions. Otherwise, you may hire a specialised practitioner, counsellor or a coach who can help you specifically with forming movement and emotional habits.
Feel free to comment on if this article have helped you, or if you practiced other techniques that were really effective in helping you deal with pain healthily.
To find out more about how you can improve your life through , email movenphil@gmail.com.
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