We Move, Therefore We Are

Humour me just a little longer, will you? Now think of a happy memory. Is it a still image? Or can you visualize it happening all over again, complete with actions, perhaps even sounds? Notice how your body responds to this recollection. Is that a smile forming on your lips?

Descartes was nearly there when he said, I think, therefore I am. It is true that our ability to think is indeed what brings meaning to our individual existence. However, believing that the thinking occurs only in the mind is far from the truth. It is as if the mind and the body are two separate entities going about their days, merrily doing their own thing, never having to consider the other. Whereas the mind and the body are just two sides of the same coin. They have to coexist. The mind cannot decide on its own how hot it is going to be outside until the body directly feels and experiences the intensity of the sun. And the body cannot seek shelter under a tree or in an air-conditioned room until the mind tells it the best possible course of action. Similarly, the mind cannot decide whether we love something or better yet, someone without the embodied experience of the warm and fuzzy feelings when we are around them. And the body cannot reach for an embrace without the mind’s insistence that it may be safe to do so.
We aren’t just thinking beings. We are thinking, feeling, living, breathing, and experiencing beings. What the body experiences, the mind makes sense of. What the mind decides, the body executes. Long story short, there exists a mind-body connection that we no longer can and should turn a blind eye to. I, for one, think that most of us have lived long enough denying the existence of this connection and forcing ourselves to pick one over the other. Choose the mind over the body and you will have a successful day at the gym and if you happen to choose the opposite you are deemed a potato. But allowing the body to rest when needed, as you must have read several times, especially in the last couple of years, is just as productive. Then why not listen to the wisdom of the mind AND the body in tandem?

Cue Movement Therapy!

Movement Therapy?! What is that? Do I need to dance? No way can I do that! I don’t intend to sign up for a dance class. I don’t need therapy let alone movement therapy. Pfft!

Hold your horses. Breathe in, breathe out, remember? Allow me to explain and take you on another journey to the wondrous and vastly untapped world of Dance/Movement Therapy (DMT).

Movement is a language. Even before we start talking and stringing words together, we as babies communicate through nonverbal cues and movements such as yawning, cooing, crawling, reaching for things, flapping our tiny arms and legs, giggling and of course, crying. A Dance/Movement Therapy practitioner considers nonverbal just as important as verbal communication if not more. Movement can be developmental, communicative, functional and expressive and a DMT practitioner will observe these and facilitate a process towards addressing the emotional, social, cognitive, and physical integration of an individual to achieve the larger goal of improving one’s health and wellbeing.

Speaking of nonverbal and movement cues, it is also important to look at the ways in which we perceive the world around us. Most of us perceive it through visual cues, some through auditory cues, and others through kinesthetic or sensory cues. In fact, all of us use all these faculties to varying degrees.

It is then safe to assume that dancers and athletes are more attuned with their kinesthetic senses and are more aware of their bodies. For this reason, most mental health professionals engaging in the field of Dance/Movement Therapy have had some prior experience or relationship with dance. I spoke to a few of them and when asked about how they found their way to Dance/Movement Therapy especially since it did not gain much popularity in India until a few years ago, most of them had similar yet uniquely insightful experiences to share. “6 years of professional dancing and I had never felt my emotions, my body and myself the way I did in one DMT session,” said Pallavi Shimpi who is now a psychologist focused in trauma and body-based work.

Damini Sahay who is a belly dance artist and a DMT practitioner was already working as a child psychologist and a clinical psychologist while also working as a belly dance instructor when she started to understand the value of movement in therapy. She said, “I witnessed so much therapy and healing work happen in the bodies of the women and even men who came to these dance classes more than I ever saw in my work as a psychologist which is when I decided to pursue and study it in depth.” I found this especially meaningful because while dancers or athletes have quicker access to the body’s knowledge, anyone who engages in their natural and authentic movement consciously will be able to tap into the same knowledge residing in their bodies without even realizing that they are engaging in healing or therapy. A trained facilitator can then just hold space for the movement to occur and help you make sense of what you uncover. And let’s face it, our words do have the potential to lie. We have all done it at one time or another. But our bodies are incapable of concealing our truth. Try to sit up straight at the end of a long, tiring day and you will have your answer. This is the beauty of body-based work.

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