I’ve always considered myself extremely lucky in the teacher department. To each of the teachers in my life I owe parts of my current Self. They have contributed to my growth, happiness, knowledge, skill set, inspiration, love of learning, love of movement, love of music, love of language, and love of life. Their teachings as… Read More Free to Move
A change in perspective can widen your world. The same goes for exposing yourself to new sensory input, learning a different language, encountering something you’ve never seen/heard/smelled/tasted/felt before, traveling to a new-to-you place, asking different questions, or finding a way of moving that is slightly unfamiliar to you. Try taking in your environment from a… Read More Perspective
Speed, Precision, Control. These are the 3 key elements of practising Haidong Gumdo, or Korean Sword Art. At the heart of each sword movement, all 3 need to be in balance to work well. Which – in a way – translates to the skills of life itself. What good is moving fast if you don’t… Read More Cutting the Maple Leaves
What is strength? And …can this even be done? These were the questions I asked myself this morning, finding myself about to perform 1111 wooden-sword cuts. ‘A Thousand Cuts’ is a sword endurance exercise where Haidong Gumdo (Korean Sword Art) practitioners are asked to do 1000 repetitions of ‘Jeong-Myun Begi’, the basic straight cut, while… Read More A thousand, one hundred and eleven sword cuts.
Stacey Nemour, my favourite flexibility teacher, has just launched a wealth of online courses and streaming DVDs on flexibilitymakeover.com I’m very excited to be trying out her Dance! Flexibility Makeover Power Pack (starting today – eek!), as her previous online course series was already amazing. It got me safely(!) down into front splits for the first… Read More Flexibility Friday
Remember find the green? It counts for other colours, too. If you can, get outside today and go find something beautiful. PS: if you find it, and happen to capture it – share below!
I used to think it was not possible for adults to learn to dance on pointes (or do the splits!), unless they had already practised it extensively as kids. I was also convinced that if I WERE to attempt to learn it, not only would it not work out, I would also be sure to… Read More To the Pointe
Forms (also called ‘poomsae’) are one of my most beloved parts of Taekwondo. To me, forms very closely connect to dance, and to dance practise, combining body, mind and soul in one movement focus. At the moment we are learning Taeguk Pal-jang (8th form), which corresponds to the 1.st Kup (red-black) belt. For inspiration, here are my… Read More Taekwondo Forms
Today‘s post is an ode to rope skipping. One of the easiest, fastest, and cheapest(!) ways to practise stamina, coordination and strength at the same time. I used to love rope skipping as a kid, I had some mean moves (cross arms, double skips) for solo as well as for the 2-rope group skippin’ kind,… Read More Do you skip?
I will be updating the Joy of Movement Blog a bit (or even a lot!) more frequently the coming months, so if you‘d like to receive automatic updates via email you can subscribe to it (and/or to my other mailing lists) via this page: http://eepurl.com/tu4H1 The Plan – if I can swing it, I might… Read More (Re-)Joy of Movement