Dancing for Change

Last night, my hubby and I watched an amazing documentary called War Dance, released in 2007.

It follows a group of students at a northern Uganda school who make their way to a national music and dance competition in the southern part of the country. All of these kids live in a camp of 50,000 people displaced by the horrible internal conflict in that country, caused primarily by a group of rebels, the dreaded Lord's Resistance Army, who commit horrible acts of violence on the country, especially in the northern regions.

The stories of the children's lives are wrenching. The filmmakers, Sean Fine and Andrea Nix, did an incredible job presenting their individual stories and the collective story of this group heading off to the competition.

Readers of this blog (many being my dear friends) know of my love and devotion to dance as a sacred act. This film really helped to bolster my belief about the power of dance and music to transform people's lives — in this case, reconnecting these children with their humanity and their relationship to their history and ancestral power (something the rebels are robbing them of on a daily basis). As they were dancing the Bwola, a dance of their tribe, called the Acholi, I could see the power of their ancestors manifest in their bodies (as well as being able to see the actual spirits surrounding the children at the competition). It was breathtakingly beautiful and inspiring.

I am coming to believe more and more that the power of movement is not something that is just for special occasions — it's necessary to our equilibrium, personally and collectively (and by collective, I mean not just the human family, but our connections to the Earth and her many children).

I think committing to intentional dance on a regular basis would be a fantastic idea for many of us. Whenever I do yoga, belly dance or the tarantella, I start by honoring Mysterious Ones and/or ancestors and state an intention something like,

"With this dance,
I go deeper into the
Rose of Compassion.

I go deeper into my work
As a Priestess of the Body
A Priestess of Dance
A Priestess of Movement.

I know that my body
Changes my life;
I know that my body
Changes the lives of those around me;
I know that my body
Changes the world."

Then I dedicate that session's positive energy to someone or a group of people. Often, it's for the health and peace of my beloveds, and sometimes it's for those who have hurt me in my life (that was an energetic doozy at last week's bellydancing class).

Then I throw on a tarantella or Indian chant or James Brown or some Mary J. Blige and work it out.

Our bodies are the spell.