Just checking in...

Life at Home, originally uploaded by lssloan.

Hey! Whatcha looking at? Oh you're probably looking for a new blog post....

They're coming. I'm doing some remodeling in my Internet home and will be back soon with a new look for my blog and website. My goal is to be back up and running by January, 2013.

In the meantime, I'll have periodic posts and updates. So, as they say here in Texas, y'all come back now!

-Lily

CI Jam at the Market

CI Jam at the Market, originally uploaded by lssloan.

On Saturday, I hosted a Contact Improvisation Jam at the Denton Community Market. Many dance students from the University of North Texas volunteered their time (and bodies) to create some dance out in the open, and they did an amazing job!

It's so interesting to see what happens when you take a very personal dance practice and put it out of context, and in front of new faces. It's a little unnerving at first, and a lot fo self-talk comes up. What do they think of me? Do they think this is weird? Wait, is it weird? Oh God, I am so weird....

Then you turn around and see young children imitating you, and people taking videos with their smart phones saying "whoa, cool!" to their friends gathering around to watch. It's working. People like dance. Maybe, just maybe, they need it in their lives.

How else do we share what you love to do? Sometimes you have to just put it out there and see what happens.

Happiness explosion

Need I say more?

Source: flickr.com via Hazel on Pinterest

catch.

catch., originally uploaded by lssloan.

I am experimenting creating 2-D dances. This photo was taken at a Contact Improvisation jam. Thanks to the amazing skills of dancers Cassie Wilson and Nestor Pérez, I was able to capture this shot and turn it into something new.

Don't they look like superheroes?!

Why I Love CI

Today begins one of my favorite weekends in the year: the Texas Dance Improvisation Festival. It's a grassroots festival that was started in 2009 by Jordan Fuchs and Sarah Gamblin, both professors at Texas Woman's University. Throughout the weekend, there are a number of improvisation based classes, many focusing in Contact Improvisation (CI).  In case you didn't know, I am a HUGE fan of CI. It's the kind of dancing when I feel basically like a superhero. I can fly. I can fall and recover easily. I can spin and find myself upside down. In short, it's thrilling. A few weekes ago, I was reflecting on why I love CI so much, and why I am so inspired to share it with other people, especially people that do not label themselves as "dancers." I came up with a short list of life lessons that I gained from practicing Contact Improvisation. See if any of them inspire you to get moving...

1. Trust someone else. But, don’t worry if they don’t have your back, you can catch yourself.
2. Falling is a skill. You can learn how to do it and not hurt yourself. (Hello….metaphor?)
3. Sometimes you should move first. Think later.
4. Follow where the momentum is going and see where it takes you.

Bam!

Go take a Contact Improvisation class. It might change  your life.

Silver Moon Photography

Here we go again!

I'm currently taking an e-course about creative businesses with Kelly Rae Roberts, and am in the process of re-imagining my blog. I set it aside about a year ago because, quite frankly, I didn't know what or why I was writing. I felt like I was just another addition to the often noisy and overloaded Internet. Who needed to hear what I had to say? Why did I want to spend my time at my computer?

But, screw that. This is my "WHY?"

I love dance. I love improvising. I love collaboration.

I am really getting into photography.  I'm a damn good baker.

But, I really LOVE sharing. I get super inspired by other people's stories, so why not think the same of my own?

So, with that said, I am reminded of Ray Charles' song "Here We Go Again, " which I used in a dance once.

Here we go!

They are just arms.

A couple weekends ago, I participated in a performance directed by Melissa Watt, called Body, where I held my arms out in the air for twenty minutes. Like this:

Yeah, that was hard, but not as hard as you might imagine. During the performance, I realized that the task of keeping my arms in the air wasn't the struggle. The struggle was dealing with all the emotions that I attached to my arms. I remember a moment thinking: "I've got to keep my arms up! What will happen if I put them down?"

Guess what? Nothing happens when you put your arms down. They are just arms-- just some muscles, bones, blood, and energy. Everything else is just stuff I attached to them--fear, vulnerability, failure, etc.

Noticing that I was the one making it all a big deal, I stopped and focused on my arms. They were hot, shaky, and tired. So, I bent my elbows, wiggled my fingers, and just kept them up. (They weren't even sore the next day!)

Feeling up for the challenge? Give it a whirl. Keep em' up or put em' down....it doesn't matter, because in the end they are just arms.