June 29 - July 4 schedule and special Day of IndepenDance class!

Hi everyone,

I am working on my July newsletter and will be sending it next week. In the meantime I wanted to make sure you are up to date on this week’s schedule since it is a holiday weekend!

Regular class schedule this week including:

• Wednesday, June 29, 2011 at 5:30pm at Community Fitness 65th St. Studio ($12 drop-in)
• Thursday, June 30, 2011 at 6:30pm at Fresh Fitness and Dance in Wallingford
• Saturday, July 2, 2011 at 1:00pm at Community Fitness Roosevelt Studio ($12 drop-in)
• Sunday, July 3, 2011 at 10:30am at Delilah’s Belly Dance Studio in Fremont

NO class on Monday evening July 4, 2011, 5:30pm at Open Flight Studio…instead I am teaching a special class in the afternoon. Details below.

Please join me for a Special IndepenDance Day class on Monday, July 4, 2011, 1pm in Greenwood:

Date: Monday, July 4, 2011

Time: 1:00pm - 2:20pm (80 min class)

Where: Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood - 124 N 103rd Street, Seattle, Washington 98133

Map: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=124+N+103rd+Street,+Seattle,+Washington+98133+&hl=en&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=33.901528,75.410156&z=16

Fee: $13

Class focus: The freedom and joy of FreeDance

Class description:

In this special class we will begin with a movement exploration of the five floor-based movements that make up the Nia 5 Stages. Knee pads will be provided. We will then experience an hour-long Nia class. Both parts of class will be done to music with the focus of FreeDance. We will be dancing to specific choreography and you will have an opportunity to explore your movements through a guided FreeDance. The intent of this special extended class is to discover your unique self-expression, experience freedom of movement, and to delve more deeply into your dance by using the stages of FreeDance.

Curious about the Nia 5 Stages, watch a short video demonstrating the five movements on my blog: http://everybodyloveyourbody.blogspot.com/2011/06/nia-5-stages-of-healing.html 

FreeDance was one of the most challenging aspects of Nia for me when I first started dancing back in 2003. It took time for me to let go and allow my body to move without fear of judgment or feeling awkward. I promise to guide you through the FreeDance songs with openness, love, and compassion. You will not experience any judgment in this class. Come play with me!

I am looking forward to dancing with you this week! Stay tuned for my July newsletter.

Happy IndepenDance day weekend :)

Jennifer

Nia Benefit Class Photo

Thanks to all who came out tonight to dance and support Nia community member, Gina Chapman, in raising money for the Susan G Komen 3-day Walk for Cure! 100% of the proceeds went to the Susan G Komen Foundation.

Our class focus was on honoring the feminine through opening the chest. It was a wonderful class and we even danced with scarves!

The Group

Kim, Gina, Gretchen and Jennifer

Express Your Inner Fire

The focus of tonight’s class is dancing with passion! The intent is to connect with and express the fire within you.

One definition of passion is a "powerful or compelling emotion or feeling." I like to think of it as the expression of our fiery spirit.

I’ve assembled a mix of songs from different routines: Velvet, Opal. Passion, Aya and AO. Get ready to move your body and use your voice to express your most passionate dancing self.

Here is one song from tonight’s playlist to get you up and dancing:



Join me for a passion-filled class tonight from 6:30pm – 7:30pm at Fresh Fitness and Dance in Wallingford.

Opening the Chest Celebrating the Heart

“The power of love to change bodies is legendary, built into folklore, common sense, and everyday experience. Love moves the flesh, it pushes matter around.... Throughout history, ‘tender loving care’ has uniformly been recognized as a valuable element in healing.” - Larry Dossey

The focus of tonight’s Gentle Nia class is to access and dance with the energy center of our heart via opening the chest.

The heart chakra (energy center) is located in the center of the chest at the breastbone. It is considered the emotional center and gateway of love, compassion and joy. We will sense the beat of our heart and the love that originates and spirals out of this energy center to fill our entire body and our world.

The Institute of Heart Math, a nonprofit research center that has been studying the electromagnetic energy generated by emotions and the human heart for over a decade, recently found that:
“Compared to the electromagnetic field produced by the brain, the electrical component of the heart’s field is about 60 times greater in amplitude, and permeates every cell of the body. The magnetic component is approximately 5,000 times stronger than the brain’s magnetic field and can be detected several feet away from the body with sensitive magentometers.”

The Voice of the Chest

I am the voice of your chest – the birdcage of your heartbeat.

I include your ribs, thoracic cavity, sternum or your breastbone, cartilage and twelve thoracic vertebrae.

I govern the space where love and heart power grow.

By design, I am open to the light, yet, like a birdcage, I protect something sacred and precious, your heart and lungs, the internal organs that make you human.

I also support your shoulder girdle, giving freedom to your winged arms and hands.

You keep me healthy by breathing, moving your lungs inside me.

Through my openings, pulses the sound of life heard as a beat, the eternal rhythm of life.

I provide a path to your heart, a home for feelings of love, sadness, grief and joy, and an awakening of your most expressive self.

When Dancing Through Life sense life inside your chest.

Inhale and smell the moment, sensing movement from the inside, out.

On the hour, every hour, pause and sense the movement of breath expanding your lungs and gently encouraging movement of the birdcage of your chest.

Adapted from Nia Technique Book and Nia 5 Stages module on the Chest.

Come dance your heart energy tonight from 5:00pm – 6:00pm at the Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood.

This will be my last Sunday evening class at the Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood. I am still working on identifying a space and time to continue teaching the Nia 5 Stages-Gentle Nia class. Stay tuned!

Moving Your Shoulders as Elegant Wings

The focus of tonight’s Combined Nia 5 Stages and Gentle Nia class is movement with the shoulder blades. The intent is to provide more freedom, mobility and expression of the shoulders, chest and upper back.

The shoulder blades are two thin, flat bones on the back of the body. You can visualize the shoulder blades as hands on the back of your body or like elegant wings expanding out the side of your body. One of the essential functions of the shoulder blades is to provide freedom and to give life to your hand and arm expression.

The movement of our hands has a direct impact on our shoulder blades. The simple reciprocal action of moving the palms up and down stimulates the back of the body (sensing nerves) and the front of the body (motor nerves). Moving the palms up, leading with the pinky finger, allows you to sense support from behind and underneath while opening the shoulder joint and allowing your shoulder blades to swing down and out. Moving with palms down, leading with the thumb, moves energy down and allows your shoulder blades to return to resting.

The entire shoulder girdle is meant to be mobile. We will work with various movements tonight to free the shoulder joint and allow for mobility and full range of expression.

Here is a wonderful little one-page Nia student handout on the shoulder girdle.

Join me tonight for an exploration of your elegant wings from 5pm- 6pm at the Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood.

Sensation of Flexibility

The focus of tonight’s combined Gentle Nia and Nia 5 Stages class is the sensation of flexibility.

We played with this sensation in class on Friday evening in a classic Nia class but tonight we will add another layer by incorporating the five movements of the Nia 5 Stages: embryonic, creeping, crawling, standing and walking.

Flexibility is sensed as energy moving out along the bones. We will receive the sensation of flexibility through the architecture, shape, size, speed and the relationship we have to gravity. The movements will vary so they can be small to target the intrinsic muscles or larger to activate extrinsic muscles. Finally, we will explore how speed influences flexibility.

We will begin with a gentle Nia class and end with Nia 5 Stages. Join me for an exploration of flexibility tonight from 5pm – 6pm at the Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood.

Hello Spring

The focus of tonight’s class is celebrating the arrival of Spring.

The Vernal Equinox signifies the passage of Winter into Spring. I love the idea of our dancing through this passage and of making this journey uniquely our own.

Spring represents rebirth, renewal, growth and new life. Spring can be a time to clean out the old (spring cleaning), plant seeds for the future and recommit or commit to goals old and new. Most of all, it’s a time of renewed, fresh and vibrant energy.

I read the following today on Joan Borysenko’s Facebook feed:
“The Vernal Equinox has arrived. Today hours of dark and light are in perfect balance. Stop for a time and be still, experiencing the ancient "heartrest" of full moon and equinox coinciding...nothing either waxing or waning...a portal to the heart of the Universe. May the rest we experience within be a tuning fork that brings the world around us into balance.”

Come join me in dancing through this portal with a restful and full heart and with open arms and hands ready to receive renewed energy. Class from 5pm – 6pm at the Civetta Dance in Greenwood.

Tonight: Celebrating Love Through Nia (Class by donation)

I want to dance with you!

Join me tonight for a special hour of dancing to songs of love. The focus of tonight's class is celebrating our bodies, our lives, friendship, community and Universal love. Come dance your heart out.

Celebrating Love Through Nia

Class fee: Pay what you can

When: Sunday, February 13, 2011

Time: 5:00pm - 6:00pm

Location: Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood, 124 N 103rd St (between N 1st Ave and N Greenwood Ave), Seattle 98133

New to Nia? Come check it out!

Learn more about Nia here.

Come with a playful Spirit and an Open Heart.

And...

Donate Your Toiletries!

For the month of February, my Nia colleague and dear friend, Gretchen Musgrove, is collecting donations of travel-size toiletries for Noel House, a loving refuge for homeless women in downtown Seattle. Please bring whatever you can to the Civetta Dance Space tonight and I will bring your donations to Gretchen.

Celebrating Love Through Nia (Class by donation)

I want to dance with you!

Join me for a special hour of dancing to songs of love. We'll be celebrating our bodies, our lives, friendship, community and Universal love.

Celebrating Love Through Nia
Class fee: Pay what you can
When: Sunday, February 13, 2011
Time: 5:00pm - 6:00pm
Location: Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood, 124 N 103rd St (between N 1st Ave and N Greenwood Ave), Seattle 98133

New to Nia? Come check it out!

Come with a playful Spirit and an Open Heart.

Shoulder Blades as Elegant Wings

The focus of tonight’s Combined Nia 5 Stages and Gentle Nia class is movement with the shoulder blades.

The shoulder blades are two thin, flat bones on the back of the body. You can visualize the shoulder blades as hands on the back of your body or like elegant wings expanding out the side of your body. One of the essential functions of the shoulder blades is to provide freedom and to give life to your hand and arm expression.

The movement of our hands has a direction impact on our shoulder blades. The simple reciprocal action of moving the palms up and down stimulates the back of the body (sensing nerves) and the front of the body (motor nerves). Moving the palms up, leading with the pinky finger, allows you to sense support from behind and underneath while opening the shoulder joint and allowing your shoulder blades to swing down and out. Moving with palms down, leading with the thumb, moves energy down and allows your shoulder blades to return to resting.

The entire shoulder girdle is meant to be mobile. We will work with various movements tonight to free the shoulder joint and allow for mobility and full range of expression.

Class tonight from 5pm- 6pm at the Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood.

Movement of the Head and Neck

The focus of tonight’s Combined Nia 5 Stages and Gentle Nia class is on movement of the head and neck.

Everything we do, such as looking, listening, eating, smelling and taking affects what happens in the head and neck. Even our sleep position affects our head and neck.

Tonight we are going to work with the movement of the head and neck to help release tension, stimulate breathing and strengthen the muscles along the core of the body: pelvis, chest and head.

As infant's, the world around and the knowledge that one gains from the world around, is guided by the senses - not guided by an intelligence of “I’m looking to see something.” It’s about curiosity and moving in natural time, which happens from the eyes looking around and the head moving. That's what we are going to recreate the sensation of tonight.

Movement the head and neck also affects the alignment of the rest of the spine. One of the ways we integrate movement of the head in Nia is to use our eyes. We can follow the movement of our hands with our eyes to keep the neck relaxed and encourage movement of the head in a way that is more efficient than commanding the head to move up and down. We can also focus on our sense of sight, looking at specific things or simply out into life, to encourage movement of the head.

Our intent is to feel more relaxed and aligned. If we move something above (our head), and we move something below (our tail), the stuff in the middle gets to relax and find a new kind of alignment. The head moving up and out of the torso will create some flexibility in the thoracic spine. That additional space below is going to create freedom above, versus having the head packed down and being pulled down by gravity. Often the discomfort one feels in the shoulder girdle and between the shoulder blades is the head being packed down without enough extension up and out. The lengthening up, the extension up, helps to create what the body wants, which is space between the shoulders and ears.

Join me tonight for a conscious movement journey of the head and neck. Class is from 5pm-6pm at the Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood.

Christmas Eve and New Years Eve Morning Nia with Jennifer and Jena

Jena and Jennifer at the Fall Nia Jam 2010

Join me and Jena Hennessey on Christmas eve and/or New Years Eve morning to celebrate the season and dance into the New Year with Nia! All ages are welcome to both classes. What a great way to get your holiday moving!

Friday, December 24, 2010 
9:30am - 10:30am

Friday, December 31, 2010 
9:30am - 10:30am

Fee: $13.00 drop-in for each.

Both classes held at the Civetta Dance Space in Greenwood,124 N. 103rd Street, Seattle 98133.

Questions? Contact me or Jena.