The Work…

We settled into a broken routine as we had many visitors to tend to which would require us to often cancel the Groundwork (the more 'creative/imaginative' work in the Bodyweather methodology) in the afternoons. However we always managed to do the MB workout in the post dawn mornings performing weird bone breaking, muscle aching, abdominalis tight, tight, tighter and buttocks tighter still (to protect the lower back), making movement patterns up and down, up and down the red dusty court. Most of these exercises required insane coordination skills, such as: arms out horizontal, flap your wrists up and down at one speed whilst turning your head left, right, up, down, whilst keeping relation with the eyes into the landscape, whilst strutting up and down the court in three different speeds. Apparently the whole idea of these exercises IS to scramble your brain so that you decondition the body - once you 'get' the exercise, it's really of no use anymore! It was a good thing for every second day I felt I was making progress and every other day I didn't have a clue. I was always thoroughly scrambled though.

The manipulations were held under a canopy outside. This was from about 9:30 onwards. Always at that time of the day the dusty winds decided to pick up, thus drowning us all in dust whilst lying down, breathing out through 'ssssss' and being 'manipulated' (a very tight and specific set of instructions in order to open up 'space' in the body and to realign the body). I found the work to be the most pleasurable but also the most challenging. To find the flow in the work as well as speed and efficiency. I was always searching for the symbiotic relationship when working with a partner. However, I found with many of the people there - especially the younger ones - that there was more emphasis on critical feedback when being manipulated rather than the surrendering process (as I had experienced at Culture Lab). Therefore I found a certain degree of unbalance; that being all the focus was on the performance of the 'manipulator' and not much discussion on the role of the 'manipulatee'. I feel its imperative for the manipulatee to relax as much as possible and to continually find ways to open up and receive the manipulation.