In beautiful Australia, our year started with the enormous challenges of fires, followed by floods. These calamitous events opened our hearts, with the outpouring of support, for both victims and fire fighters, profoundly generous and expansive. Our compassion for others was engaged, our connection to each other strengthened. As a community, we came together as one – with our solidarity built on empathy.

On a smaller scale, but with no less importance, Alchemy Dance Improvisation provides a space where compassion is cultivated. When the heart is open, there is no separation – we witness and feel each other’s suffering and support each other with sensitivity. Where there is compassion and empathy, there is love. Where there is love, there is the potential for deep connection to our selves, each other and our precious environment.

Compassion starts with our selves – only then can it move outwards, like ripples on a still lake. Compassion is a kind of grace - a gentle stone that falls into the deep lake of self-knowing, expanding outwards to gather others into the vast space of the heart.

My own journey to self-compassion has been challenging, with acknowledging and expressing my own needs, a difficult and at times painful journey. Recognising internal voices that were not mine has taken a lifetime. Letting go of the habit of listening to these voices is ongoing practice. With mindfulness, however, I am feeling an alchemical shift, as the water of self-love and appreciation begins to flow unimpeded. Loving and appreciating myself allows me to love and appreciate others more fully. A more loving relationship with myself is leading to healthier relationships in all corners of my life.

In the Alchemy space, the vast ocean of compassion holds us all. The call to compassion is a gentle invitation, allowing us to access the healing waters of feeling and knowing. As feeling becomes form through the act of dancing, an opportunity is provided to recognise and release what no longer serves us. Within this process, the flowing water of compassion soothes the aching heart, and gathers us together in the nourishment of community. In a community built on kindness, we can see and be seen by each other in a state of grace.

The process of letting go has the potential to reveal the radiant inner self. This radiance is the light of love, the light of self-awareness - drawn up from the flowing waters of compassion. This light emerges from our courageous commitment to see the truth in our selves and each other, and to meet this with compassion and the soothing balm of connection. Movement activates creative flow and love reveals the light of Being.

When we dwell in the realm of Being, we are reminded of our true nature. Our innate and eternal beauty shimmers like light on water.

Anne O’Keeffe

11/3/202

Through movement I come to understand myself and world around me. Deep attention to my sensing, feeling body opens me to awareness....and with this also comes the possibility of change and newness. 

 My deeper sense of self is touched and activated when I dance. And it is through the lens of this embodiment that I can perceive and understand the world around me..........