Dancing through life

From a young age the happiness and joy of dancing filled my soul, growing up I loved the feeling of my whole being and body being lost in music. I spent my 20s and 30s clubbing, dancing being such an important part of my life. As my life became more holistic, with yoga and immersing myself in nature I moved away from the late nights clubbing and partying. However, I craved the freedom and wildness of dancing freely as I did all those years in clubs.

Freedom of expression

A real inspiration to my life has been my experience of travelling South America and particularly Brazil, where spending time with local Brazilians, I felt the soul of the Brazilian culture where they freely express themselves through dance, music and creativity. I danced freely in the streets and clubs with Brazilians and this felt so close to my soul.

Coming back to the UK, I knew I wanted to keep dancing freely like this, I followed my intuition and this led me to discover dancing freeing with others in 5 rhythms and ecstatic dance.

There’s lots of names but it’s really free movement and letting go, letting your body and soul take you in movement.

Letting go

My first experience with ecstatic dance was at the first conscious dance festival I attended. This on it’s own was very intriguing for me to be at a festival with no drugs or alcohol. I knew I wanted to try this and something very strong inside me drew me to the tent. When I approached the tent where an ecstatic dance was being held I felt nervous, not sure how I would be, not sure how to be, wondering what were the expectations with dance. I had danced so many times for hours on end in clubs, beaches, parties but never like this. I knew inside how much I love to dance and felt free when I did and felt so curious to try it this way. 

At first when the music was slow I just felt awkward and wondered why people had their eyes closed, I resisted closing mine at first and then when I decided to just try this I started to let myself go and stopped thinking about what everyone was doing. As the music became more rhythmic and the beats picked up I started to really feel it inside me and let my body go with it. When I started to share the vibrations and energy in dance with other dancers I felt in a natural state of the true me, other dancers were so open with body language I just connected. I felt such a liberation and feelings of euphoria from the raw state of joy in the dance vibrations shared between everyone. I felt I could let out my wild without caring, without being judged. I felt so naturally high and couldn’t quite believe it was happening to me. It was a very surreal experience for me. 

When I walked out the tent I cried with happiness and realised this experience had changed my life forever. To experience the letting go and freedom of dance with no alcohol/substances for the first time meant so much to me and this was now the only way I wanted to dance. I felt so empowered and like I had discovered a very special secret. 

Dancing all over the world

Since that moment I looked for ecstatic dance wherever I lived, experiencing dancing with conscious dance communities in Cornwall, Portugal, London and Bristol. And travelling the world for conscious dance festivals (in Corfu, Portugal and India).  It has been a big part of my life as I strive to be where I can dance with other dancing souls as much as possible in a world. These dance communities are full of authentic, warm and open people who just love to connect by dance freely together. 

Moving through emotions

Dancing consciously has helped me release from anxiety, I feel freedom from the chatter in my mind, feel my authentic self and connect with my soul. When I dance I feel a sense of empowerment and feel such clarity. Throughout the last few years I have danced as a way to keep my being happy, as a way to work through emotions and a way to feel joy every morning. I like to dance early in the morning as I find such a great way to start the day. I almost feel unable to not dance before my breakfast! I feel it’s a habit, a good one :-)

Dancing has helped me through feelings of loneliness, when I dance it’s like something in my soul is soothing me, I get a feeling of everything is absolutely as it should be. 

My journey with dance over the last few years has led me to feel a passion to bring awareness to the world of the freedom of dancing.

Dancing through life, by Hannah Green