I was recently thrown out of a dance studio because I was ” Dancing too sensual.” This studio promoted women being themselves without the patriarchy but they ended up doing the most patriarchal thing in the world to my body and the experience has really messed with my soul – until it happened to me I had no idea that a dance studio could just toss a student out like the trash.
There’s a story about Oshun and how she was born wearing a sparkling white dress. As she grew older this white dress transformed and grew with her. This dress was a part of her and wouldn’t come off, it had all these beautiful designs in it and it was such a gorgeous dress and looked perfect on Oshun, especially with how she wore it.
The other women were jealous of Oshun so they set out to destroy the dress. They threw dirt and rocks at it and the rocks would bruise Oshuns skin. They tried to cut the dress off of her body and even the men joined in. Oshuns dress hung like rags on her body but it still wouldn’t come off.
So they decided to do something so inhuman and vile that it’s hard to even talk about – they soiled the dress in human waste and so the dress stank.
Oshun washed herself and the dress as best as she could but because the dress wouldn’t come off her body you could now smell Oshun before you saw her.
To me the dress represents my sensuality and the feminine vibration of my body. A feminine vibration ( if you were to think of it like a piece of fabric is very light & sensual). People can often sense me coming or vibrationally sense my feminine energy before I even walk into the room. It’s supersonic in a way but unfortunately they have control over how I move.
The dress not coming off of Oshuns body represents how when I dance I don’t intent to be sensual and I’m not attempting to show the dance teacher with my ” Sexiness” in any way, that’s simply how my body naturally reacts to music.
The women hating my dress – or rather “Oshuns dress” is symbolizes how the dance instructors tried to shut me down when I danced because they felt I was taking away from the class when I just wanted to be a part of it – I can’t help how my body chooses to embody the music. And I feel super bad when I start dancing and see other women shrink ( although in some cases others start dancing even sexier too).
I’m not here to make other women feel bad I’m just here to express my body as all women are. I started taking dance classes after a horrible experience in therapy and I needed a way to reconnect my nervous system in my body and so I chose dance. But most people judged me instead of giving me the respect of having my journey. There were too teachers there who saw that the way I danced was actually a cry for help and these teachers resurrected me and secretly poured into me. I don’t think I would have made it without them.
My favorite teacher was told to destroy what she created ( i.e Me). I wish the owner of the studio had , had a conversation with me but she decided not to do that. She decided to buck break me instead.
One day I’ll be okay. Just not now. I’m broken and unsure of where to go because now that I have gotten just a tiny bit of my rhythm back ( and I know there’s still much more to uncover ) – now when I visit dance studios I often get what Oshun experienced with people gawking at her when simply she aka me is just trying to learn how to dance again ( because of a bunch of neurological trauma I’m trying to rebuild my motor skills).
We as women have to stop leaving women unclothed as they heal.
There’s another story about Oshun, A king of a neighboring tribe saw how sensual Oshuns body is and wanted to experience her sensuality for himself so he took her for himself and hurt her as she picking pumpkins in a pumpkin patch. His wife heard the screaming and found them there and instead of helping Oshun she blamed her for her husband’s indiscretion and ostracized her- encouraging all the other villagers to join in shaming Oshun.
Oshun lost control of her body ( other people used it for their own things) and she abandoned herself, she had no love for herself anymore. One day, while bathing in the river Oshun saw a reflection of her body all disfigured and she began to cry. A rare fish in the water heard her bawling and came to the surface to console you- “Oshun why are you crying?” He asked.
” Look how ugly and used up I am! I don’t even recognize who I used to be.”
“Don’t worry Oshun!” The fish consoled her, ” There’s something that can heal all the scars and make all the wounds go away and it’s hidden in the forest. You just have to find it.” And with that the fish disappeared into the water again.
Oshun desperately began her quest to find this rare thing that would heal her. She tried every exotic plant she could find to no avail. She even tried the leaves of a calabas tree that only blooms once every 10,000 years but that didn’t even work. Finally, body shaking in sorrow she started to leave the forest. She was so turned around that she ended on the edge of the very same pumpkin patch that she had been hurt in.
A tiny little pumpkin spoke to her ” I can heal you Oshun, I can make all the scars go away.”
Oshun looked at the pumpkin in fear, pain, and distrust. She had always avoided this pumpkin patch and hadn’t meant to end up here. “This is where I was hurt the deepest.” Oshun vulnerably whispered to the pumpkin- ” How can I trust you?”
” Oh Oshun,” The pumpkin replied with understanding and deep pain in its voice ” What hurts you heals you.”
And with that the pumpkin instructed Oshun to dip inside of it and rub the golden pumpkin seeds all over her body and as she did all her scars and bruises disappeared and her body became even more radiant and beautiful than it was before.
To me this softly represents the moments of sensuality when – too scared to go into another dance class and be gawked at – I quietly dance in front of the mirror and relax into my ” Too sensual body” ( the owner of the dance studios words), and slowly let my own sensuality heal my soul.
I’ve been trying to continue the quest to dance, I love music and movement I just don’t fit in anywhere so often others monitor me and try to make me dance smaller or look at me awkwardly. I’m not writing this blog post because I’m a wellness guru who’s mastered everything.
I’m just a woman trying to heal. Heal through dance. And as I try out different studios ( hopefully I’ve found one ) in true over planner personal trainer fashion I’ve created a list to help me navigate through my dance experience in a safer more holistic way. Because after all I can’t control others, I can just control me – here are a few practices that I try to do…
#1. Collapse the Mean Girl word.
If you encounter someone whose being mean to you in dance class instead of thinking them as a “Mean girl” (which kind of gives them bully power of you) replace the term with the correct term – Insecure woman.
#2. Remember it is a relationship with your body.
Regardless of how many people are in your class or who the instructor is – it could be the best instructor in the world however at the end of the day it’s not even about who is teaching the class or who else is even in the class – dance is about a relationship with your body so experience of the class is designed for your body, YOUR BODY to be in.
#3. Be mindful of what you are asking of your body.
This might seem counterintutive to point #3 however something I keep in mind is that when I dance people often stare of me so I’m asking my body to take the energy on of that stare. That doesn’t mean that I don’t know up to dance class, it just means that I try to make sure it’s the healthiest environment (to the point that I can control) and that I myself am in a healthy open place. It’s beautiful to be around other women’s energy but if the energy is group of jealous women the energy won’t be the same. My best advice would be to be brave and attend dance classes (healthy ones) but also to take private moments to dance at home with yourself too.
#4. Remembering the happy moments I had in dance.
To be completely transparent with you this is something that I’m still working through (because what I’ve been through is a lot of trauma to transmute and unfortunately some of it continued in a place I went after this too). However I try to remind myself that I took 93+ classes and that not all 90 something classes were like this, I had happy moments too and I need to live in that happiness.
#5. Wear a flower.
I wear a flower, a rose in my hair that I’ve put gemstones in. It’s an orchid hairclip that I’ve taken the orchid off of and I’ve put a real looking rose on the hair clip instead and delicately placed gemstones on it. My secret is if I start feeling negative energy coming to me in class or if I start decentering while dancing (since that is really hard for me) then I focus on the rose. It also helps to remind me who I am.
#6. Remember to reflect in your journey.
When things started getting dicey at my studio but I still wanted the simply experience of being and dancing. I was still trying to go because it was just down the street and I could get there without damaging my health unlike other places which are further out. One thing that I did is before class I would meditate and reflect on my divine feminine journey and how I’ve traveled the country several times and everything I’ve been through – it helped to strengthen me before class.
#7. Wear cute clothes.
” When you look good you feel good.” As Deion Sanders has famously said, “If you look good, you feel good. If you feel good, you play good. If you play good they pay good.”
I used to workout and dance wearing tattered clothes because I figured that since I was getting hot and sweaty in them it didn’t matter but as a woman who ultimately loves style and outside of working out and dance always wears dresses dressing up helps to bring out the right energy to dance. After all dance is a vibration. Why not do it in the cutest cltihes?
I made visual diary entries about my experience and shared them on YouTube , their honey for my healing . Here are a couple of them and thank you for listening to my story .
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At the end of the day I can unwrap the box of that I dance too sensual just like the studio did and cloth myself in that or I can open the dress box that my dress is beautiful and sit and try to learn every inch of my fabric even when it hurts.