The body emotion

In Wednesday’s class we were concentrating on our tail bones and our head to tail connectivity. We were thinking about how our tail bone and head is connected by our spine and feeling in our bodies how this connection made us want to move. At the start of the lesson just warming up our bodies this made me really exaggerate my torso movement and use my spine to its maximum.

http://polestarpilatesasia.com/pilates-continuing-education/ceu-study-options/pathokinesiology-of-the-lumbar-spine

During the lesson I kept thinking about my head to tail connection and it made me think about my core distal as everything is connected to my centre in someway and thinking about my head/tail connection reminded me of my relationship with my limbs and how each one is connected to my centre and has a relationship with the other.

In this class I also realised to let emotion come out in our movement if that’s how we feel. As we do classes every morning and I concentrate on feeling the flow of the movement sometimes the movement can create a feeling that I can express through a certain phrase. To really feel the movement flow can cause me to express an emotion which therefore gives the movement a real sense of freedom.

In the reading ‘Motion and emotion’ it talks about how our emotions are ‘doorways’, and some of the stronger emotions are ‘gateway’ emotions that permeate the entire body like fear or anger for example. These emotions lead to more diverse emotions and sensations (e.g. relief) and protect us from some feelings that are overwhelming. I can think about myself personally reading this as I can see how feeling sadness or loss is sometimes followed by frustration and anger, to protect ourselves from the overwhelming feelings of sadness that can lead to depression.

Linking emotions to dance can increase out resources to work with; and can ‘open more doorways’.

“When we can surrender to a feeling of participation in out emotions, creativity abounds” pg 198.

Letting you feel certain emotions and work with them to create movement and choreography that if you were feeling another emotion at the time; would not have been created.

I was particularly interested with the exorcises at the end of this extract that track our emotions in the body. Using breath, sensing emotions and the physical changes that they cause in our bodies. One exorcise notices the capacity to change mood with mind and asks me to ‘talk myself’ into a bad mood, and then again into a good mood. Noticing what happens to my body; get hot, get irritable and fidgety or remain calm and serene. This can then be linked to movement and posture, as there are certain postures which can cause an emotion. E.g. upright and weight above the legs will feel energetic whereas slouching with shoulders hunched and head slightly hanging will cause a sad and calm emotion. ‘Movement affects mind, and mind affects movement’