During last weekend's Flamenco Retreat at the Oregon Coast (which I'm still on a high from by the way and which you can see pictures of below) we all agreed that flamenco teaches us about life and about ourselves.
So, today I share with you fifty life lessons I've gleaned from flamenco.
Fifty Lessons:
(This list is full of links in case you'd like to dive deeper into some of the lessons.)
- Listen to your intuition, and trust your instincts.
- Express your true feelings.
- Be present.
- Stand beautifully in your power.
- Prepare. (Really prepare.)
- Take risks.
- Focus.
- Act with intention.
- The answers are in the mirror, so look.
- Show up.
I've got two flamenco learning tips to share with you today. One from Mercedes and one from Ani. We're on day two of Flamenco Tour classes, and the classes have been going like this:
Technique with Mercedes in the morning. Bulerías with Ani right after. Then choreography and castanets with Mercedes after lunch and siesta.
Everybody loves Mercedes. Everybody loves Ani. All is well.
Class with Mercedes
The ladies go in and out of concentrating on the steps and being mesmerized by Mercedes and her magnificence.
It was November 2012, and I was in Jerez. My exotic pets had all gone home, except for one that is. And I kept getting messages, important messages... November 7, 2012
I started getting them about a week ago, the messages. Or that's when I started hearing them.
They were sent on various occasions.
But always during class.
And they were all more or less the same.
Occasion #1 | Monday morning at the peña
Things changed in bulerías this week.
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Ok, so I mentioned that I had another resolution, apart from the first one. This one is harder to put into words, so I'm allowing for it to be something other than a concise written statement. After all, soy artista, used to expressing myself in a variety of ways. This resolution has to do with my business, with respecting and honoring it. It has to do with allowing for it to evolve as it needs to evolve. It has to do with me providing the space and time to let this happen. It has to do with allowing myself to have doubts and fears but viewing those with curiosity rather than interpreting them as signals to give up.
¡Dejarlo todo, No!
You see, quite regularly, I think about quitting this all and just going back to working for someone else. It is confusing. And it kind of terrifies me. Maybe I am not supposed to say that here, but it is the truth, and I am saying it. It is not that I don't want to be here or that I don't love what I'm doing. Noooo, not at all. In fact, I have been doing some research and have discovered it is quite the opposite:
So Toshi keeps asking me to do these shows with him. I am considering myself to be very lucky. And I am considering the rehearsals to be like free concerts, free concerts for meeee! Then today during our rehearsal for Sunday's show at Tupai, I realized the musicians were sending me messages. Many many messages. Although I know they weren't meaning to send me messages nor were they aware that they were doing so. Pero los músicos me mandaban mensajes, hoy en el ensayo, muchos mensajes sin saberlo.
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