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Poems from Laura Hays

Deep Listening”

This deep listening to body impulse is radical
like what babies do
explore without agenda
seeing cooing touching toes
it ’s unlike anything we do in daily life
most of our waking hours we direct our bodies from point A to point B
purposefully attempting to get somewhere or accomplish something
proprioception is in the joints, to join, one English word for different things
today my toes head spine hands all want to contact wall
gently press both sides of head with palms
back body settling into quiet restful stillness
amazed that i am still amazed after all these years of listening in this way
i soak up the fullness
and witness the infinite possibilities…10/19/15, Laura Hays

"Sanity and Madness"

Spine on earth
feet on earth
blue sky
green pine needles
brown leaves clinging to November branches
seven women and granite boulders deposited by glacier
large enough to hold the pain of the world and speak of the unspeakable
130 slaughtered in cold blood in Paris
hundred of thousands fleeing Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Africa on leaky boats and worn feet
the Middle East catching wild fire like the parched trees in California
When do we humans lay down our weapons and choose love?
who will protect us from ourselves?  11/2/15, Laura Hays

Authentic Movement virtual meeting in the UK with Emma Meehan (Leamington Spa) and Amy Voris (Manchester) in honour of Mary Starks Whitehouse


We took part in the Global Virtual Event Long Distance Authentic Movement Circle to Share Your Dreams for Authentic Movement
October


We followed the score for Movement:
Connect to yourself, open your awareness to include the space that you’re in, and eventually your peers you are moving with.
Begin to open your awareness to all the other movers around the world. Follow your inner impulses in relationship to this awareness of the larger collective. Be curious and notice if you have a wish or a dream for our community.


Following a transition period of writing and drawing, we shared witnessing via Skype.


Emma’s writing
Lying on my back, stretching right leg then left leg out to side, a gentle opening, restful. I feel a breathing space between joints, muscles, bone, a gentle spreading and opening of hips, groin, knee, ribs, and a releasing into the floor. I wish for more time to move and movement to become part of my desk work.


Feeling of warmth and opening and sensitivity in my chest, imagining Amy move in Manchester– I can visualise and feel her closeness, proximity, warmth, sounds, feeling connected. Coming back to this room, how can I get a sense of connecting without imagining? Thoughts crowd in and I feel confused between here and there, trying to find a ground for sensing my own body and connecting with the virtual world. Constantly moving arms and legs, soreness in neck, trying to reach arms over head. Gentle moving –connective tissue being opened out, breathing life into it, opening spaces and gaps between fibres and tissue and muscle and bone.


Kneeling on floor, hands upturned. Stillness and a sense of solid core, imagining threads connecting me to the rest of the world. Imagining other movers everywhere, like me, doing Authentic Movement, breathing, reaching an arm in the air, like me. I feel a sense of confusion and frustration and unsettling in nerves, wondering how can I connect here and now? Leaning forward into a child’s pose, messaging shoulders, aching in muscle.
















Amy’s writing
I am pushing into the wall with right hand
and left foot.
Playing between pushing
and yielding.
Feedback from the wall into my
bones is satisfying.
A slotting into a place.  
Leaving that place.  
And returning.  
There is warmth that turns
into heat and then back to warmth
again.





Dialogue
We discuss connections in our moving and witnessing with previous conversations about finding a place or a home.  We also note our explorations in Authentic Movement in performance, where Authentic Movement ‘materials’ are revisited through repetition with a difference.


We move on to the sense of confusion about the word ‘community’ – what is a community? What is the Authentic Movement community?  Is there a space to express and contain tensions? What is the relationship between elders and the next generations?


We explore these questions in relation to our moving.  In Amy’s there is a wish for resilience in the field to handle the tension between points in the community.

In mine, there is a wish to find space as a way of connecting – like connective tissue or a web of connection, with substance and space to allow contact, relationship, movement.

Sharing our dreams by Carol Zahner and Annie Blair

Celebration of Mary Whitehouse Day - Portland Oregon to Bogotá, Colombia


Annie Blair in Portland and I in Bogotá had a good time moving across long distancAnnie and I have known each other for many years, first in Maine and then in Portland Oreon.  And now on Skype!!

It was very satisfying to feel our connection across thousands of miles on the two American continents.  Below are some of the images that I caught on video camera.
Carol – Bogota, Colombia

Relating with Carol through Authentic Movement reminds me again how the form brings a special kind of intimacy to our friendship. 
Annie Blair - Portland, OR









Sharing our dreams from Alison Buck



Greetings on this world wide honoring of Mary Starks Whitehouse’s birthday!  In honor of the day, I am sharing several things. 
Here are links to the article on the website of my homeopathic colleague, Anneke Hogeland, who with another colleague, Judy Shriebman, has written a remarkable article on the making of a homeopathic remedy that began as a healing intention.  I participated in that process, along with a number of homeopaths, some of whom are international.  You will need to go to each of the following three links to get the full story:


You will see in the third link above, if you scroll to the section of my account of some experiences I had in making the remedy, that we began the whole process with me facilitating an Authentic Movement session with the homeopaths.  This is probably the first time that has happened, and it is one of the ways I envision realizing my wish for Authentic Movement.

In the second link above, you will see among many, an excerpt of a case I shared, in which I reported what happened in giving this remedy made from the healing intention of cancer.

Overall, I think you will also see in the creative work that was done in conjunction with the making (aka “proving”) of the remedy,  that there was a creative forming process occurring quite spontaneously, and it has a lot in common with what happens in Authentic Movement.  And you may see other things about this remarkable work that you can relate to, from your experiences in Authentic Movement.

MARIA ELENA GARCIA - OCEANO GROUP Sharing our dreams


Arriving to my seventies I want to thank my peer group: Oceano (Marcia Plevin, Antonella Monteleone, Anna Weatherhogg, Maria Luis Merlo, Piera Pieracini, Antonella Adorisio, Leonella Parteli) we have been moving together for 25 years, since the time of the retreats guided by Janet Adler in Tuscany. We have been witnessing each other along the different phases of our life.
In these days, feeling the distant but strong connection with all the A.M. community, and particularly with my peer group, I could see my fear loosen the grip, less fear about the unknown, about the future, about the crisis in the world
On October 4th, the International authentic movement day, at the end of a short practice with Simonetta Cianca
“I find a stable vertical axis and a clear direction for my eyes. I am turning and turning slowly while my arms open and close, caressing the world and turning after to my center. Finally my movement stops, I am listening to my heart, I notice some emotional intensity yet. I wait for peace” So I find my dream for the A. M. Community: all of us trying to develop our consciousness us a humble contribution for stability, clear direction, compassion and peace in the world.



Oct 5 Authentic Movenment virtual communication from Aileen Crow

My colleague Annette Geiger, from Zurich, and I skype frequently, taking turns moving /sounding and witnessing AM. We met on October 5 and after we did our usual trade, we continued moving and sounding together, now with the intention of  connecting with our whole AM community on the planned “virtual reality” gathering.


First off, I had a strong feeling that I wanted my “best” to connect with all of your “best”.
In my own personal process, it is becoming clear to me that in the absence of trauma, INTRINSIC HEALTH IS THE NORM.  I associate intrinsic health with being at home in spontaneity (AM), and being at home in love rhythms. To me, that’s the “best”.
Words came to me and out of me:  “Make room for all your parts!”
These were words I took in from Luly Santangelo, the leader of a dance therapy group I was in many years ago.


Make room for ALL my Parts? ALL my projections? ALL my emotions?


I remember that we live in a patriarchy which is engaged in a war against women; men like Chaffetz, who are out to Defund Planned Parenthood and deny women the right to their own bodies, making abortion and contraception illegal.


Is the nasty, rude Chaffetz a Part of me? Can I make room for that Part of me?

My training with Shirley Turcotte on transforming trauma helps here. It reminds me that I have vicariously identified with the traditional belief that women are victims. We have been brainwashed to believe that, shamed and blamed, and trained to trash ourselves.  I “see” the movie vision of gorgeous Rita Hayworth singing, “Put the blame on Mame, boys, put the blame on Mame!”



But it ain't necessarily so! Intrinsic health is the norm, with its spontaneity and being at home in the love rhythm: the “best!”.

And we have excellent models, like Maya Angelou, Amy Goodman, Shirley Turcotte, Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, Gwen Verdon, Elizabeth Warren, Patti Smith, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Cecile Richards, Mary Whitehouse, Your Name Here!

Sharing from Ann McNeal


Sharing Gratitude

Our peer group of women met on Tuesday night Oct 6th in Amherst Massachusetts. This group has been going for nearly 20 years, although many of the members have changed. As the early dusk closed around us and the trees were held in deep blue sky, we did our usual practice of moving and witnessing (two moving, two witnessing. and then changing roles, one member being out sick). 

At the end we shared a few words of gratitude to Mary Starks Whitehouse for her generosity and deep insight in giving us this simple form that does so much to sustain us.

Thank you, Mary. And thank you, Elizabeth, for helping to keep the dream alive.

Ann McNeal

Thanks, Ann!  Beautiful said,
    Nina  Weyl

Sharing our dreams from Nina Kungurova many locations in Russia with responses!

many circles
many meetings
to hold the thread of connection
to celebrate International Authentic Movement Day
with gratitude
from Russia





Greetings from our Authentic Movement group in Groningen, The Netherlands. Wishing you all the best! 
Jaques van Eijden

What a great idea so share locations! Fa Winsborough here from an Antonio TX, USA. Greetings!!!!



Nina Kungurova Elizabeth Reid Thank you!.. One group hold the lists of writings about Authentic Movement dreams. Another group hold the letters to oneself in future.
Elizabeth Reid Wow. I would love to read these.
Nina Kungurova Elizabeth ReidFa Winsborough It's possible! I received some writings from participants! "I dream elderly people could practice AM in order to regenerate trust, contact with their bodies and eagerness to perceive" (Olga, Perm). "I dream of a community likeminded people, where we could express all planes of our souls in AM" (Lena, Kazan). "I dream of a group of people in Kazan investigating an AM process as an art form, as a performance" (Alfiya, Kazan). 
LikeReply2 hrsEdited
Fa Winsborough Marvelous!
LikeReply2 hrs

Elizabeth Reid Yes. Thank you!