Base Move
Duck Walk
Say it: “quack”
Stand with your feet slightly apart, no wider than hip width. With your heels planted firmly on the ground, lift the toes and ball of one foot up and down, alternately lifting and lowering.
Focus first on lowering your foot and slapping the ground, as if splashing water in a puddle. Next, focus on lifting your foot, as if pulling sticky gum off the ground.
Play with both of these energy dynamics. Read More→
Archive for Nia Technique
Base Move
Rock Around The Clock
Say it: “wow”
Standing with your feet hip-width apart, rock around the outside edges of both feet, moving in a circular motion from the front to the side, to the back and to the opposite side. Reverse directions.
Move from the ground up using the strength of your feet and the mobility of your ankles to create small rolling actions that mimic a hula-hoop. Read More→
Base Move
Open Stance
Say it: “align”
Standing in place, align your feet in the parallel position, hip-width apart. Keep your feet, ankles, knees and hip joints relaxed and spring-loaded. To sustain upright balance, slip into the posture of at-ease and ready, sensing your posture as if falling up towards the sky. When practicing Open Stance, sense the inner and outer arches of your feet connected to the earth; this will help you to avoid collapsing inward or falling outward. Use your core and upper extremities to support you in moving down and up and vice versa. As you lower, point your tailbone backwards, generating the movement from the balls of your hip joints. As you rise, press your feet into the ground. Read More→ |
Danced Opal this morning with a focus on Abdominals. It was actually an Abs Class. Students looked terrified, but after looking at an image of the four distinct groups of ab muscles (transverse abdominal, the internal obliques, the external obliques, and the abdominus rectus) and a brief discussion about what each group does, both in terms of movement for movement sake (ex: “moves the spine laterally”) and in terms of functional movement (ex: standing up from sitting or shoveling snow”). The tension eased. Then, the whole routine sort of fell into place with a pelvis, chest, head focus. Opal wins the prize (nominated by me) for routine with the biggest aerobic bang for the buck. I forgot how intense Opal is. Read More→
STANCES
1. Closed Stance
2. Open Stance
3. “A” Stance
4. Riding (Sumo or Horse) Stance
5. Bow Stance
6. Cat (One-legged) Stance
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