Jun 4 2011

Sometimes It’s Not Beautiful

Yannori

Sometimes it’s not beautiful…

Because it’s new and you’re learning.

Because it’s old and you haven’t done it in a while.

Because you’re tired and feeling clumsy.

Because you’ve forgotten the steps.

Because your muscles feel tight and your mind feels sluggish and your soul just doesn’t have the same passion as yesterday.

Sometimes it’s not beautiful…

But YOU still are.

Sometimes you need the world to recede. You need to hide from it because it’s simply too much to bear for one moment longer. And your practice slows down. You stop dancing so hard, so fast, so strong. You stop stretching to your maximum potential. You stop meditating everyday. You just need it all to STOP because it’s spinning too fast for you to handle and you’re just trying to remember how to Breathe.

So let it STOP.

Let it stop NOW. Right NOW. Let the world go. You don’t have to hold it together one second longer. You don’t have to make it all work perfectly. That’s not your job right now.

You’re job is to BREATH.

You’re job is to put your feet on the ground and feel the earth pulsing underneath your toes.

You’re job is to simply experience what it means to be completely and totally alive exactly where you are and exactly who you are at this second in time.

And then when you are ready.  When you can feel your breath moving in and out.  When the energy of your own life is gently humming through your fingertips.

Then and ONLY THEN…

Let it begin again.

But this time, look at it with a child’s wonder.  With a beginners mind.  To a child, every moment is a new opportunity to play, a new opportunity to learn, experience, grow, laugh, and love life with an open heart.

Open your heart to your true Self.  This is who you are.  This is how you dance.  This is how you spin and twirl.  This is how you bend and extend.

This is your body and this is how it moves. This is how it feels to fly.

Maybe it feels old. Maybe it feels young.

Maybe it feels tired.  Maybe it feels energized.

Maybe it feels dirty.  Maybe it feels clean.

No matter how it feels, it also feels alive.  Because when you dance like a child, like a beginner, your dance comes alive.

Alive with truth. Alive with Breath. Alive with every emotion and experience you’ve had since your eyes first opened to this world.

And whether the dance feels beautiful or not, YOU, and the child inside you, are more beautiful than words can describe.

To commit to a lifetime of pole dancing, yoga, or meditation can be difficult especially when your progress feels frustrating and slow. Share your fears and how you find the Beauty in movement again in the comments.

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Twirl, Swirl, and Fly!

22 comments   |  tags: , , | posted in Beauty, Yannori's Story

Mar 1 2011

Why I Dance (Almost) Naked

Yannori

Once upon a time…

…there was a beautiful and vivacious woman, although she didn’t usually think so, who was diligently folding the laundry.  It was late, the house was fairly quiet and she was enjoying the time alone, even if she was stuck doing a few domestic chores.

As she slid her fingers across a soft silk bra, one of her favorite songs began to play on the radio.  The deep and luscious beat was hypnotic, seeming to beg her hips to move.

She looked around, smiling at the guilty thoughts playing across her mind, and gave in to the music. Slowly, slowly, allowing her hips to shift and tilt, turn and grind, circle and shake. She let the laundry drop from her hands and brushed her fingers through her hair. Such softness, such a tingle as she soothed the pressure points along her skull and caressed her lovely cheeks.

Suddenly she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, and stopped. Surprised by the sensual smile on her own lips, the sexy curve of her hips, the acceptance of her self in her own eyes. She considered stopping, wonderding what would happen if someone caught her in such a precarious position.  But the song pushed through her senses, it’s beat too infectious to ignore and she let the mirror’s vision slide from her sight.

Realizing she was simply too warm, she found her fingers tugging at her clothes, pulling down the edges of her pants, lifting the straps of her tank top.  Everything seemed to tickle her, the smooth cotton surrounding her, holding her too tightly.  She needed to move freely, uncontrolled, unconstrained, completely released from emotional and physical boundaries. She knew she had to decide between dancing and clothing, and it was simply to late to stop.  First the shirt, slid over her head and shoulders.  And then the pants, bit by bit, fell from her undulating hips. The air tickled along her exposed skin and a welcome sigh escaped her lips.

When her legs began to shake from such playful exertions, she fell backwards onto the bed.  Her feet dangled, then swung from side to side, and finally kicked in a happy tantrum, feeding off the passion of the singer’s voice. The sheets were soft and easy to slide along as she rolled and twisted, moving slowly, deliberately, yet giving in to the emotions curling through her mind. She wondered again, how sensual her lips might look, lying on the bed with her tush in the air.  She decided a peek at herself wouldn’t hurt and looked over her shoulder at the mirror again.

The sight that greeted her almost brought tears.  Her body glistened; glowed with vitality and the feminine form.  Every curve melded seamlessly, sensually into the next with an easy grace– even the ones she had never liked before. For once, her body seemed happy, her mind content with the sight of herself, without needless worry, without misplaced shame.  Perfect and whole as she’d always been without having to change a thing.

She sighed as the song released it’s final notes and winked at her own reflection. Letting the memory of her movement, her honest beauty, her sensuality be captured and held.  She finally understood that she was truly sexy, and vowed to remember this fact today and every day after.  Perhaps all that she needed was to dance naked…. right after she finished the laundry.

A Call To Action

I invite you to discover your own hidden dancer.  The one you hide from while you do the laundry or get ready for bed.  Forget about the pole, forget about special clothes, forget about everything but the song and the feeling of being in your body, in your breath, in this exact moment.  You don’t need anything special, except your amazing self, perfect and whole exactly as you are.

Sexy is a realization, a state of mind that you are amazing just as you are. Simply choose a song and let the music infect you with it’s passion.  Or better yet, use a song to transform your body into pure emotion.  Let creativity, truth, and sensuality be your guide.  Let go of your worries for the length of just one song and you’ll soon see that they will never be as important, as alive as you are when you dance with your whole self.

Give in to passion, give in to life, give in to love…. and you may soon find yourself dancing naked.

Just try it, even if it takes a glass or two of wine.  I dare you to Dance (almost) Naked and rediscover how surprisingly sexy you really are. Please share your anonymous and not-so-anonymous thoughts in the comments.

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Twirl, Swirl, and Fly!

8 comments   |  tags: , , | posted in Beauty, Exotic Dancing, Sexuality

Jun 17 2010

Pole Cliques Suck Red Scrunchies!

Yannori

I’ve spent the last 6 months in a partial Pole coma.  I pulled back from the glittering visions of pole performance after pole performance.  I stopped going to conferences and competitions.  I stopped watching hours of pole dancing on youtube.  I stopped paying attention to who was opening up which studio where.   I also almost stopped teaching completely, although a couple of my die hard students refused to let me go.  (Thanks ladies, you know who you are) All because I didn’t want to deal with the intense drama anymore.

I have felt so blessed to see the awesome art of pole dance grow and blossom from a fire in a few woman’s beautiful bellies into a fabulous movement…. but when it transformed into an exercise industry, I felt a little betrayed.  As if the love and attention I’d showered on it was being thrown away.  I watched, with fear, as pole dancing moved from a shared experience between friends into hidden pockets of sometimes vicious fights between jealous cliques. Cliques I didn’t want any part of but couldn’t seem to ignore.  (I’ve never been much of a joiner).

You already know that I wholeheartedly believe and encourage the different styles of pole dancing.  I’ve got my own opinions about teaching methods, pole dance, pole fitness, exotic dance, and being a woman in general.  Obviously I’ve voiced some of these ( Pol’ympics, Pole Dance vs Pole Tricks, Why The Other Side is a Pain in My Ass).  But it makes me very angry when I see individuals or groups acting as if they invented everything related to pole and that their way is the only way. As if pole dancing doesn’t have a rich and awesome history from every walk of life.

Can we really deny that the pole dancing we all enjoy today came from belly dancing, yoga, circus and most importantly stripping? Yes, I said the dreaded S word– STRIPPING. You know, where women take their clothes off in a sensual manner for money. Are we really so frightened of our own vagina that we have to pretend pole dancing doesn’t have a sexual undertone? Are we really going to pretend that a shiny metal pole doesn’t remind anybody of a man’s tallywhacker?  Not even a little bit?

I’m not saying you HAVE to dance sexually.  I’m not saying that you HAVE to take off your clothes either.  I’m saying that we need to stop undervaluing an entire part of our collective woman’s history, and celebrate the beautiful pole dancing art form that came from it. We don’t have to belittle our sensuality and our sex to bring pole dancing into the mainstream world.

Secondly, do we really believe that only one person discovered all the varied and beautiful tricks that we perform with our shiny poles, and hence only one person should get to name that trick for the rest of us? (I understand having a common language, but it doesn’t mean this name is THE ONLY NAME) Can we honestly say that there is only one way to perform or teach a trick?  Should every woman ignore the length of her arms & legs, avoid the gracious curve of her hips, or beat herself up over the size of her thighs & booty?  Does every woman really have to torture herself to get into the trick of the week instead of finding the movement, transitions, and tricks that complement her body and her style?

As a teacher, this one seriously pisses me off.  Personally, I believe that there are many performance level tricks that should never be taught in a regular pole studio group class environment.  They are too dangerous and too damaging to the body unless the student’s aspirations are to compete and perform at a professional level.  But ignoring that, I believe it is critical that students understand that every woman’s body is different.  Some of us have large hips, some of us have large breasts, some of us have small feet and short legs.  Physically (and by that I mean the Laws Of Physics), this changes the way we have to balance our body and grip the pole.

We shouldn’t belittle or demean ourselves if we can’t do a specific trick exactly like HER (meaning whichever phenomenal pole performer you are watching at the moment).  We should celebrate it.  Instead, try to be playful and joyful as you experiment with the different ways your body can move.  I love helping a student tweak a trick until it clicks,  and she finally finds a way that works for her. It’s as if her body heaves a sigh of relief and her entire movement changes from challenged to blissful.  Don’t force yourself into the “Perfect Trick” (a statistically impossible falsehood) and deny the experience of your body in luscious movement and harmony.

Grow beyond your own boundaries and expand your strength and skills, but do it your way.  Don’t let the cliques or drama queens of pole, force you to betray your own bliss, your honest and authentic sensuality as a woman and as a pole dancer.  Let them know you’re not buying their Bullshit anymore.

Don’t wear the red scrunchie! Don’t drink the drano!

Your body is the temple where your soul abides. Use pole dancing to express your authentic sensuality as a woman, to cherish your inherent individuality while being exactly who you are right now,  to move and be and live as your true heart desires. And you can bet, we’ll all be there, cheering you on!

Does the sensual aspect of pole dancing turn you on or off? How do you feel about pole cliques? Please share your opinions in the comment section.

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Twirl, Swirl, and Fly!

17 comments   |  tags: , , | posted in Beauty, Most Popular Posts, Sexuality