The dancing started with a bounce, at least for me, anyway. Admittedly ill prepared, the music I had this week at Beautynight was the radio’s top 7. I was overly confident that my will to move and my passion for inspiring it, would creep into even the most reluctant diva’s psyche, inspiring her to bust-a-move with me. I was proven wrong. The problem was obvious; no one was joining me in dance and while my growing group of volunteer friends and I were killing ourselves dancing the Macarena to the Anthem song (featuring lil Jon) none of the women who were there to benefit from our movement inspirations were!
I decided to go to the source and find out, exactly, why we were alone in our movement experiment. Two of the women I spoke to, BJ and her “mom”, B, were the catalyst for what was to follow. The first question that came to mind was to ask them how I could get them to dance with me. The next question seemed obvious, natural. I followed with, “what kind of music moves you?” I facilitate and lead a number of classes per week. Sometimes there is music, often there is not. Usually I choose the set genre, the pitch and the volume. I consider the audience sounds and the desired effect I want the music to have. Sometimes even when there is music, I do not even hear it because I am so focused on what is happening in my body. So it was interesting to learn what kind of music BJ and B like to listen to and to consider what moves them. It was B’s idea for me to take it to the floor and go around and ask other women what kind of music they liked. Clearly, this is what I should have done from the beginning!
Every single one of the gals I spoke to had no problem telling me what kind of music they liked. Some of the music requests included reggae, Cher, Johnny Reed, today’s country, gypsy-even classical. My friends opened up quickly to my inquiry about what kind of music moves them but what I found most curious was how that discussion lead into their hearts. In fact, out of the dozen women that I spoke to, 9 of them revealed something to me that was personal about themselves-what they love and what moves them the most.
In Natural Movement by Susan Aposhyan she writes, “even our thoughts are molecular movements along nerve fibers between neurons in the brain” and that in fact, “Sophisticated medical imaging devices such as PET scans show that thought occurs along certain pathways making a shape in space and time”. It is very likely that my taste in music is not always congruent with the kind of rhythm and music that others find appealing. That said, my question opened up a dialogue about loved ones, children my friends have had or have lost, partners they have lost or were waiting to be reunited with. The response that I got to my questions reflected an inner physiological movement, in this case in the heart, which could happen routinely throughout the day. How we perceive and move in the world specifically to a favorite piece of music is just a reflection of the continuous sequencing of sensations, perceptions and responses that circulate through our bodies and that usually happen unconsciously, fulfilling dozens of functions in the body. However, Aposhyan links conscious movement to feeling an “aliveness” in the body. Perception and response is movement. What we are inspiring at Beautynight is the possibility for sequencing and syncing our sensations with outer expression. To be fully embodied, alive!

About the Author:

Marlene Amado has been a certified pilates teacher since 2004 and has extensive experience as a movement teacher for over 15 years. Marlene completed her BA in Political Science at UBC in 2008 and continues to explore ideas on the body through various research and written publications. She is curious about new and various ways of teaching re patterning in the body as well as finding the deeper nuances of the pilates method. Marlene is committed to facilitating students’ empowerment and positive experience of self through movement. Marlene is a Pilates Alliance Member and is fully certified in all pilates apparatus equipment.

Tuesday night brought some new faces into the Beauty Night arena. When everyone arrived, Alice, the program coordinator from DEWC came up to speak to me about the power outage. There were several things that we had to adjust as the power had not been restored completely. Whether or not it was because they missed us on Monday or due to adjustments during the day at DEWC, we had a full house on Tuesday night. Thank you for everyone for pitching in and making the night flow as smoothly as possible.

One of my favourite parts of the evening was having the dance area. Debbie, one of our yoga instructors and Marlene, one of our pilates instructors and movement teachers encouraged the ladies to dance. Based on the ladies requests for dance classes, Marlene and Debbie (similar to Lauren & I a few weeks ago) asked the ladies to dance. I could hear tons of laughter as the women grooved and moved. At the end of the night, Debbie and Marlene suggested using gentle music for the last hour of the night to get the ladies to stretch and relax. I think this will be a great way to get some of the ladies to try pilates and yoga movement. Most of this will be done in chairs as some of the ladies can not get down to a mat on the floor. Marlene wrote a beautiful piece on our blog about the experience: Connecting Through Movement

If you are interested in writing a blog post for our site, please let me know. We are always looking for volunteers to share their experiences about Beauty Night.

As Bradley suggests, if you are looking for gifts to give, please consider making a donation in someone’s name. We would be honoured if you wanted to invest in our cause.

CKNW: Lives getting better by Cosmetics?

CBC: Downtown Eastside Women Treated to Makeovers

CBC: Early Edition Full Show December 19th

Last night dressed as elves,
we dropped by Wish, Serena’s place and Woodwards.
With gift bags and stockings
we handed out door to door.

My thought’s from the end of last night:
“Sad tales heard tonight
In some cases Xmas stockings
Brought great delight.
Joy to all of the women we saw tonight
Dealing with homelessness,
… Addiction, mental ill health
Poverty, violence and strife.
Glad we were able to share
A little Xmas delight.”

Happy 11 years to all of our supporters, participants, volunteers and corporate and community partners! Thanks for making it possible for 11 years, 16 000 makeovers!