Benefits of Oriental Dance

Oriental Dance benefits:

A lot has been written about the physical and psychological benefits of Oriental Dance so I will not repeat whatever you can so easily find in any common website on the internet but I can surely tell you a tale or two about the unbelievable benefits this truly magical dance can offer you.

Let´s start from the beginning, shall we?

I never felt attracted to Egyptian culture, music or dance and I actually came from the opposite side of the barricade: Classical Ballet. By the time I discovered how much Oriental Dance was a considerable part of my soul I was a blank page – opened to whatever experience this dance could offer me and holding no expectations. What happened – credits fairly given to my first teachers: Prisca Diedrich and Shokry Mohamed – was nothing short of MIRACULOUS:

Oriental Dance changed my LIFE (how about THAT for benefits?!), the way I saw, felt and dealt with myself and showed me how empowered I could be by assuming and LOVING all the gifts and even weaknesses I was born with.

I suddenly felt deeply connected with my true BEING (I know how cliché-like this sounds but it´s the delightful truth) and felt comfortable in my own skin – more than comfortable, actually: I felt ecstatic simply by being myself.

I remember leaving Shokry´s classes (in Madrid-Spain, where I was studying theatre at the “Real Escuela de Arte Dramatico de Madrid”) with a sense of Joy I had never experienced in my life: my feet hardly touching the floor or not feeling it at all: light, full of energy and a Happiness that didn´t arise from external causes but from within.

Yes:

I´ve said it several times and I admit it sounds like an exaggeration but – yet again – it´s the truth: Oriental Dance totally changed my Life – not only professionally wise but on a PERSONAL level.

I became a better, happier, healthier and free individual due to this Dance (so you can imagine how grateful I am for it).

Believe this:

Oriental Dance can WAKE YOU UP, SHAKE you to the core and CHANGE YOU and YOU CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE.

Sure there are some practical-physical benefits to this Dance (muscular toning, cardio vascular work, muscle and joints flexibility, a better motor coordination, stress release, blood circulation improvement, a decrease on the pre-menstrual pain and and many other perks) but the most MIRACULOUS ones are – I´ve discovered by my own experience and by witnessing the flourishing of other students/dancers:

*Learning how to KNOW and LOVE yourself – just the way you are (seeing BEAUTY in all those details you used to hate and complain about);

*Being creative with your own body and connecting it with your mind, heart and soul. The freedom you experience in this Dance spreads all over your life turning you into a much more fierce, brave, dynamic kind of person with a strong sense of self-worth and dignity;

*Enjoying yourself – being in your own skin and nobody else´s – and your own UNIQUE gifts to the world and introducing that pleasure of being YOU to all aspects of your life (professional and personal);

* A deeper and healthier understanding of SEXUALITY and the discovery of an organic, natural, free and POSITIVE SENSUALITY that is the base for all Oriental Dance technique, expression and goal. Making peace with your own sexuality – through the movements and creative use of your first and second chakras situated between your hips – and dealing with it in a constructive, uncomplicated manner will drastically improve your own sexual pleasure as well as the CREATIVE POWER that arises from it.

A Woman who does not understand, respect and love her own sexuality is a jailed creature (and that explains part of the reason why women´s sexuality and bodies have been target of control, shame and punishment by so many patriarchal societies and so called “religions”);

* Empowerment of your own character: COURAGE, DARING to be yourself and go out there in the world creating the things, circumstances and LIFE you dream for yourself. What you do in Dance you start to do in Life (and what a joyous ride it is!).

*Many other benefits that I will be glad to share with during one of my workshops-classes-courses somewhere in the world – and over the rainbow.

Notice that there are certain secrets and lessons that are not supposed to be written about: only EXPERIENCED*.