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27. Shaping The Body 7/15/03
Once in a while I have the time to visit a friend who runs the oldest Barn Theater in the US., Priscilla Beach Theater. He works with professional actors and actresses as well as the local people of Plymouth Mass. The programs provide local children and adults the opportunity to learn and perform in stage-plays each week. Geronimo or Dr. G as I like to call him, since his recent schooling at Harvard, includes both alignment work as well as walking mindfulness in his training. Jerry Lewis commented to Geronimo, after working with a group of Dr. G’s, that he had never seen such a well-mannered group of actors and actresses. Dr. G and I agreed that this was a result of doing walking mindfulness.
On this visit, Dr. G was giving a Saturday class to about 15 Youngsters from 8 to about 15 years of age. He asked me to start off the class with some instruction on physical alignment.
On stage we made a big circle and I said hello to all the eager faces. After some talk I looked around to find who would be a good model to illustrate the ideas of alignment. There stood a 12 year old girl straight out of a Rockwell drawing, with pigtail, arms limp and crossed in front, both knees touching with legs in a kind of self conscious inward rotation. Her head and shoulders had a withdrawn quality as if to say what do I do with this? The body that is.
Well Ok, perfect, I went over to her, smiled, and told her she would make a great model. She froze a little, realizing she had been chosen. I had her stand on both legs with knees relaxed and the arch's raised with the weight of the body going in to the ground through the outside of the feet. I was explaining this to the others so they could see and feel these principles on their own body. though they had worked with this before, I felt seeing change take place would really bring the sense of alignment home. After I had her reverse some poor habits regarding the structure of the body we all stood and applied full breathing. I then had every body walk around in a circle while individually coaxing structural alignment as they moved. I guided this young lady also so she could put the feelings of being aligned into motion.
After 20 or so minutes we concluded and I left the theater for some tea. I walked back to the theater about an hour later and entered from in front where it was dark. As I stood and watched the children on stage it seemed that everyone was caught up in the excitement of the play except for my model. She was walking back and forth in the background. I could tell that she was engrossed in feeling what we had worked with on her body as she would peak down at her feet and knees and then raise up and walk some more, firmly meeting the ground with each step.
In 20 minutes, information for shaping the body structure gave this gal a working knowledge of her own body. We can shape our own bodies to a more structurally sound habit pattern that is in agreement with our body as it subscribes to the patterns that are it’s nature. In prior Blogs I have gone over some of the points of alignment that you can work with.
Be strong then, and enter
into your own body;
there you have a solid place for your feet.
Think about it carefully!
Don’t go off somewhere else!
From the Kabir Book by Robert Bly
Posted by harmon July 19, 2003
Comments
What a gift for that girl that someone showed her these things at a young age. I think it's a lot harder when we're in to middle age and the unhelpful neural pathways we accumulate have worn deep grooves into the bodymind. Someone can show us the better way then, but it takes longer to undo the pathways. This is great that you are showing children about alignment and breathing. . .Ruth
Posted by: Ruth on July 20, 2003
An outstanding post Harmon. Thank you!
Posted by: Solstice on July 21, 2003
Ruth, a rich comment indeed. I understand this notion of deep grooves and the difficulty of unwinding some conditioning but I am finding this not that hard for the physical body. For instance walking around baby style with weight on the outside of the feet and knees relaxed, is disarming to body patterns. One, you are playing with some different feels of walking and also being childlike. When you persist at this for say 20 minutes, like walking around the room, the body tends to take this over and uses it as a way for unwinding. Two, this hits in to the normal, I walk because “I am going some where” groove and you become playful with the walk where the body gets into a kind of intuitive play of motion and we can reconnect with a child like feeling in us.
The emotional may be harder to unwind and the subject can become very speculative and wordy. By working and trusting the physical, since it is nature’s child, we can have fun filling in the grooves. Maybe as we go along with the blog subject of alignment and I present sessions and pictures this will become clearer. Thank you for tuning in. Bless
Posted by: Harmon on July 21, 2003
Dr. G sounds wonderful. Would love to meet him and join his dramatic sessions. My husband has called me a born actress......Dorothy
Posted by: D. K. on July 23, 2003
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