Summary

The web content is a reflective narrative exploring the profound relationship between a dancer and the art of dance, symbolizing the journey of life and self-discovery.

Abstract

The article delves into the existential dance of life as experienced by a dancer, who encounters the dance as a living entity. The dancer grapples with the duality of being part of the dance and yet feeling disconnected from it. Through moments of doubt, fragmentation, and questioning, the dancer ultimately finds resolution in the dance itself, which acts as a catalyst for transformation and enlightenment. The dance challenges the dancer to confront and transcend limitations, leading to a state of unity with the universal rhythm. This journey is not just about the physical act of dancing but represents the spiritual and emotional odyssey of the dancer, culminating in a harmonious fusion with the essence of dance and life.

Opinions

The author portrays the dance as a transformative force that breaks down the dancer to rebuild them, emphasizing the dance's role in personal growth and self-realization.
The narrative suggests that the dance is both a nurturer and a destroyer, presenting life's paradoxes and the necessity of experiencing darkness to appreciate light.
The dancer's journey is seen as a microcosm of the human experience, with its cycles of creation, preservation, and dissolution.
The article conveys that the dance is a mirror to the dancer's soul, reflecting the inner turmoil and the path to inner peace.
The dance is personified as a guide leading the dancer towards a higher state of consciousness and awareness.
The author implies that the ultimate goal of the dancer is to transcend the ego and the physical limitations of the body to achieve a state of oneness with the dance.
The piece reflects on the idea that the dance of life is an eternal cycle, where every end is a new beginning, and every movement is a step towards a greater understanding of existence.

This Perpetual Dance of Life

Conversation of a Dancer with the Dance

There is a dancer, beyond this body. There is a dance, devoid of movement. There is the danced, here and then simply gone…

Dance of Life. Picture of the author from her live Kathak performance at India Habitat Centre, New Delhi. Photo courtesy: Sanjay Kaul.

The dance of this existence is continuous. I join it in my own way, every day. Someday becoming its core, on others opposing its forces. Some days being its muse on most days being inspired by its images and ideas. On few occasions adding my rhythm to it and on others finding a link to become the very tempo of nature. At times being a name, performing its rasa (emotion) and then at times being the energy of its dance.

There are these divine days and moments, beyond words, that string together in every dancer’s life. Once we have felt it, we wish to savour it, hold it and experience it again and again. But then, the realities become the looping disruptions. The clamour, chaos, confusion, crowds of the thoughts, judgements, doubts, voices come labelled in the names and unknows.

Leaving the dancer broken.

The dancer in me paused mid movement; perplexed, lost and disillusioned. Inhaling the questions and exhaling the anxiety. Weighed down by the world and its words. Pressured by eyes, opinions, judgements. Feeling each pore in the body tingling to the loss, destruction, devastation. Confused, dejected, … completely fragmented.

The Dancer asked the Dance, “Where is my doorway? Why do I keep circling in this life? Who is my Dervish, the one who will be the light?”

Deluged in the reality of pain and negativity all around, the dancer crumbled to the floor. The body that carves the space, left feeling insignificant and shattered. The beat of the heart which is the rhythm, engulfed in the sounds of the other. The senses that feel each emotion with sensitivity, left objectified, helpless, numb. The vibrations that become a vehicle to heal, left anxious, restive, perplexed… the control lost.

There were tears or the sweat. There were noises or the music. There was drowning or grounding. There was a storm or a silence. The dancer knows not.

But suddenly,

The tumult breath became the conduit, the seven notes of consciousness travelling in the reed of the flute

The erratic heartbeat became the canvas the language of the healing chants guiding the path to peace

The ruinated body became the blank the nine planes rewriting the dancer through the sounds of the bells

Was this the answer of the Dance? I thought, slowly gaining myself back.

Suddenly the Dance said,

I break you, so that you leave yourself at the door I leave you parched, so that you become your own elixir I display the negative, so that your eyes seek the consciousness within I tie you to the chains, so that you explode in the profusion of ideas I am the questions, so that the answers are lived in fleeting movements I dictate the rhythmic patterns, so that your heart begins to fight its battles I am the restive soil, so that you escape the confines of the seed to sprout I create the storm, so that you find the stillness in motion I embody the intoxicated ego, so that you let go with completeness I jumble the words, so that you become your own hidden meaning I show you the aggression, so that you travel the path to find the peace I communicate through gestures, so that you open yourself to possibilities I adorn the motif of woven realities, so that you go beyond the inspiration of the images I flow like the bleeding pain, so that you destroy yourself in the confluence to begin your journey I become the honesty in the mirror, so that you reflect upon your true self without doubts I drape the darkness, so that the desire in you can be disciplined into surrender I live in the marketplace, so that you learn to see the love orbiting in the centre of the world I guide you as the bank of the river, so that you flow ceaseless until the confluence with the ocean I am the closed coffin, so that you grow your wings of abandon and let go I choose to be your duality, so that we become a whole, complete in the divine

Beyond the Dance. A portrait of Kathak in monochrome of the author for the calendar shoot of Indian Classical Arts by Innee Singh. New Delhi, India.

The Dance began a movement aligning the Dancer with the existence

Where is the need for the door you wish to knock upon? Every beat of the rhythm, is a step placed higher towards Elysium.

Why the resistance to flow in the cycle of time? Each emotion is a colour elevating the canvas towards Blankness.

What is the search for the light that shines on the transcendental path? Every moment lived with totality ignites a flame within towards Awareness.

With tears clearing the haze of the mind The energy in the movement guiding the body The sound of the ankle bells healing the soul

I was no longer a dancer wanting to perform I wasn’t a seeker lost in this space I wasn’t a me more than the other

And then the Dance began Till there was no more.

Celebrating the World Dance Day on 29th April, 2022 and urging all the dear fellow travellers to find the dance in the everyday and be an expression of this Dance of Life. Carolyn Hastings Sahil Patel Nandkishor Shingne Suntonu Bhadra Ali Jan Sebastian Liberty Forrest, Author Eunice Rabert Hernández Neera Handa Dr Mahein Kazi Joe Merkle Jane Smallwood

The author is an Indian Classical Dancer, Performer, Educator, Storyteller, Writer and TEDx Speaker. For more works from her, do follow on Instagram and Facebook.