At the session last night, we warmed up with an hour of "The Wave", which means dancing through the sequence of five different rhythms. There was music on in the room, and, as we turned up, we just went in and started moving to the music, no instructions given, no introductions.
Then we started to do a series of exercises, of which I'll describe just two.
One was: form up into pairs, and take it in turns to introduce yourself to the other person, saying your name, how you came to be doing this weekend, and what you want to get out of it. After we'd done that, the next instruction was, take the intention you've just told the other person, hold it in mind, and allow a small repetitive movement to occur, that holds that intention for you. Just whatever comes to mind. So then after we're all jiggling in some way, he says make the movement bigger, expand it, allow your whole body to participate. And then, out of the repetition of it, take one cycle, make it into a single action.
I like the idea of starting with a repetitive movement, and then trimming it down to a single movement. So many people would have done the other way: find a movement or gesture that holds the intention, and then do it repetitively. This way works much better, rhythmic movement first, then down to a single action.
And then (going round the room), as an intention ritual, demonstrate your action, and name your intention in a word or short phrase for us all.
And then, pick (in your mind) one specific other person in the room, and (going round the room again) show us the action and name the intention, this time in one word, and this time, to (and for) the one specific other person. I like that too, as a way of building "other" into it. I'd say all of that is very Mytho-like.
Where it falls short of what I'd expect from an excellent Mytho facilitator is the setup. For people to do all this successfully, they need to be in the right state. The setup has been "the wave" -- an hour or so of dancing. It works fairly well, but 2 or 3 of the people there are not in the right state, and are not able successfully to form an intention, translate it into a physical movement, and name it.
The other interesting exercise was "being danced" by someone else, that is, letting them guide and move your limbs, to music. It was very cool, both doing it and having it done to. As the recipient, I tended to close my eyes, try to "listen" to the hands guiding me, and dance. That was quite trancey. The person I was doing it to danced rather less; they wouldn't move their feet. They just kind of went fairly rag doll limp, so I started swaying them, taking their weight with my hip, which is itself a trance induction I've used before, and also did some "ambiguous touch" on their arms and wrists. As far as I could tell, they were more or less instantly gone. I resisted the temptation to do as I would under other circumstances (lower them to the floor and start giving them deepening suggestions. . . . )
