As a dancer, my favorite part of life is Rasa and Rhythm. Odissi dance, in the tradition of my Guru Surendra Nath Jena, is loaded with both these secrets of life.
I learnt 20 years back, that something amazing happens when I step into my dance room to practice Odissi in the morning. For that hour or two, my body, thoughts and soul are all one. Complete integration of so many parts of me: my moving hands, fingers in mudras, tilting head, swaying torso, powerful yet fluid leg stances, my roving mind, my deepest ideas, my inner intuition, my praying self... I feel healed and complete, in a state of bliss, right after dancing in the morning. This practice of dance is what we call 'Abhyaas' in Hindi. Abhyaas is everything to me. It's always in the morning, always completely alone, and a time for deep plunging. After dancing Odissi, I find some powerful ideas and thoughts rise, as if some churning was happening, and I often note down those ideas.
I love this rhythmic ritual of my life that unfolds in the morning. Morning, because that's the time I learnt that the mind's best butter can be churned. My dance Guru told me, “If you want your entire Self to come together powerfully, mornings are the time to create.” It tallies well with me, as I am a morning person, and also love to invoke the sun with a few rounds of Surya Namaskaar. I live in a sun-abundant country, and I think my brain and body are synced to the rising sun. I don't know how I would survive in a Scandinavian country.
In the other parts of the day, I love my 'trigger' rituals. I have to have my post-lunch siesta that works on my mind and body recovery like magic. I like to go for long walks in the mornings as well, before my Odissi abhyaas. Walking is my favourite way to experience nature, and I refuse to give up the privilege of this magnificent opportunity, Covid-19 or not. But my walking is very leisurely, revelling in the sky, trees, birds and flowers, while other human beings seem to be furtively exercising around me. I get my exercise with Odissi, so walking is my nature-connect, my way of walking away from all my life concerns. It works powerfully for my mind, while being very relaxing.
I think I often create these little get-away moments through my rituals. I believe in building in more movement into life in the first half of the day, and less thinking. Yoga, walks, Odissi abhyaas, afternoon naps, and then evenings to night I enjoy learning new things, than watching anything unfold on television. Every few years I have tried to learn new things: classical guitar, the Dutch language. It is lovely to do so, creating music and language in my brain feels almost tactile. These are my little joys, where I enjoy just the process. Every evening I can give the guitar or the language just half an hour of practice, and then take it up the next day. When this becomes a daily rhythm, I feel the music or the language growing like a plant inside me, and it becomes like dance Abhyaas. I often like to say, “Its not abhyaas that has taught me dance, but dance that has taught me abhyaas.”
Reading what I wrote, I just realized that I think all my rituals are simply a balance between movement and going slow, active immersion and repose, till I feel the juice of life, the Rhythms and the 'Rasa' that we so enjoy tasting in dance.
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