Theme: Prepare to take flight. We open the portal with a ritual dance journey to ground, connect, and ignite the space. Rather than introducing guidelines through lecture, we move into agreements together — co-creating our sacred container through an embodied process, so what we commit to lives in the body, not just the mind. We close with an introduction to Energetic Architecture: what it truly means to hold space — with presence, attunement, and care — for others in movement.

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Facilitation Skill: Opening and Closing Circle

HOMEPLAY:​

• Experiential

  • Complete your Intro Playlist

  • Begin (or deepen) a daily movement practice — even 5–10 minutes counts

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• Readings

  • Complete the Prep Readings: Sacred Women, Sacred Dance (Intro & Ch. 1); Sweat Your Prayers (p. 2–10)

  • Additional: Root Images of Healing by Ilene Serlin; browse the Dancestors Lineage PDF

Theme: Rooting into the origins of dance as prayer, resistance, and remembrance. We explore how the body carries the memory of those who came before us — and how honoring lineage is a facilitation practice. We reclaim cultural wisdom, sacred archetypes, and the understanding of the body as ceremony. This session asks: whose shoulders are we standing on, and how do we carry that forward with integrity?
 

Facilitation Skill: Honoring lineage through embodied practice 

HOMEPLAY:

• 🌀 EXPERIENTIAL

  • Add a conscious invocation to your personal dance sessions this week — a breath, a bow, a prayer, a word in honor of your sacred dancestors. Notice what shifts when you enter the dance with intention rather than just pressing play.

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• 🌿 DANCESTORS RESEARCH

  • Watch as many of the Sacred Dance videos (shared here) as you feel called to watch.

  • Then research one sacred dancer, lineage, or tradition that called to you today. Let yourself be drawn — no need to be academic. You might watch a video, read a paragraph, or simply sit with a name that moved you. Bring something back to share next week.

  • And — your full Mariposa Dancestors document is waiting for you here. These are the women whose shoulders we stand on. Spend some time with them this week. Let yourself be moved.

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• 📖 READINGS:

  • Descent to the Goddess — Introduction + Chapter 1

    • (preparation for next week’s class!

    • Bonus Readings:

      • Sacred Woman, Sacred Dance — The Priestess Danced

      • Ilene Serlin: Root Images of Healing

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• 🎧 PLAYLIST

  • For next week, create a 30-minute playlist of what you understand to be the ecstatic dance wave. Please submit by end of day Tuesday, June 23.

  • Name this playlist: Your Name (Playlist #2) – Ecstatic Dance Wave

    • And please update your Playlist #1 title to the correct format: Your Name (Playlist #1) – Playlist Theme

    • Going forward, all playlists follow this format 🎵

Theme: Ritual structures, death/rebirth cycles, and mythic maps that guide emotional alchemy. The primary framework here is not the linear Hero's Journey but the Butterfly Metamorphosis — a cyclical, non-linear, deeply feminine model for change. We explore the Heroine's Journey as a spiral, not a straight line: transformation as dissolution and re-emergence, not conquest. These maps become tools we carry into facilitation — helping us recognize where our dancers are in their own process.

 

Facilitation Skill: The Wave & The Body Parts (5Rhythms)

HOMEPLAY:

🌀 EXPERIENTIAL
Dance to Gabrielle Roth’s full 5Rhythms wave this week here.

Notice which rhythm you love and which is hardest to access. 

📖 READINGS
Sweat Your Prayers (Ch. 2) The Practice

🎵 PLAYLIST(S)
Create a 30min playlist inspired by our maps of metamorphosis — a death/rebirth journey – something that moves through dissolution and emergence.

• Name it: Your Name (Playlist #3) – [Your Title]

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Also: join the Collaborative Playlists — must click within 7 days!

Theme: How do music and movement become gateways into the unconscious for deep healing and transformation? This session goes beyond playlist organization into the art of somatic music curation — how to read a group's energy in real time and respond with sound. We explore tempo, rhythm, genre, and silence as facilitation tools. We practice deep listening. And we discover that not playing music — intentional silence and stillness — can be as transformative as any track in your library.

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Facilitation Skill: Using Music to Guide Energy; The Power of Silence as a Somatic Tool

HOMEPLAY:

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📽️ BONUS (Pre-Recorded): Spotify Setup & Library Organization (how to build folders, use crossfade, and organize your library — watch this before or after class)

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HOMEPLAY:

• Music

  • Create a chakra-inspired or emotional-arc playlist using somatic intention — ask yourself: what does each track do to the nervous system?

• Listening Practice

  • Dance with your eyes closed to one of your playlists. Notice how your body responds to each transition — and especially to moments of silence between tracks.

• Exploration

  • Spend time with one new musical genre that feels unfamiliar. Let it move you.

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