Welcome to Suhaila Unveiled, the official e-newsletter for Suhaila Salimpour, the Suhaila Salimpour School of Dance, and Suhaila Productions.

Greetings!

I hope that this New Year has been full of inspiration so far.  With each new beginning we take the time to reflect.  Within these moments always comes so much “stuff”.  The studio has great energy right now.  The weeklong workshop was amazing.  Not only did we have one of the most positive and supportive groups of women, but we were so honored to have Margaret Cho in the workshop as well.  It was steamy, sweaty, and fast paced.  Everyone survived and we also have a new list of level 1 and 2 certified sisters.  I am so proud!

The “Suhaila Solo” show is coming up with honored guest dancer Margaret Cho.  Along with guest artists: Rashid, Tiffany Bisconer, and the little Ms. Isabella Antoinette Salimpour-Khoury, with master violinist Fathi Al Jarrah.  These shows are my favorite. Being able to dance to a live Arabic band lead by Fathi is something special these days.  It makes me think of the decade I did two shows a night 6 nights a week to a live Arabic band. 

Editorial by Suhaila

I hadn’t seen my cousin since grade school.  We were very close when we were kids, but time had passed and if it weren’t for the death of my grandmother we would not have been in the same room at the same time.  It wasn’t that we didn’t love each other, but our lives had really grown apart.  While my father was alive we played together, but when he died each year brought us further and further apart.  And then, of course, I became a “you know what” (belly dancer) and from that point on, her father (my uncle) really didn’t want her being influenced by me at all.  I mean you never know what I might do to her.  I could have taught her how to undulate and even worse, she might have enjoyed it.

We were very close in age and it was 1991.  I had heard rumors that she and I looked alike and I couldn’t wait to see her again.  I always felt that she had so much potential and I was daydreaming of all the secret bonds we made as children.  Hiding in the closet away from our family we would look at “teen-magazine” and the original Star Wars had just came out and she thought that the guy who played Luke was so cute.  I was more of a Chachi on Happy Days kind of girl, but for my cousin, the blond, blue-eyed boy was just far enough away from looking like her father as she wanted.  I totally understood her perspective.  So we use to look through the magazine in the darkness of my closet hiding in the house away from family members with one flashlight and daydream of the boys we would date when we got older.  We would lock pinkies and promise each other that no matter what our family said, we would marry whom we loved and wanted and not whom the family wanted us to marry.  

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Body Mirror

by Tiffany Bisconer

I didn’t always feel connected to my body.  For a good portion of my life before Suhaila, my body was more of a tool to get me to where I wanted to be.  I used my body as protection, for manual labor, I dived into sports to funnel my aggression through my movements and I used my body to travel, cross ground and move forward with my goals.  It never occurred to me that my body held the answers and a path to gain a greater understanding of myself.  Through my years of struggling to survive, I’ve pierced, tattooed and burned imprints into my body to leave marks of where I’ve been and what I’ve lived through.  My body was a canvas of memories.  I remember getting my first tattoo, when I was underage and had run away from my dysfunctional household.  I felt like rebelling against everything unjust and standing up for what I believed in.  As I sat in the tattoo chair in this seedy underground tattoo parlor I thought that no matter what, this marking on my body would represent me and what I believed in at this moment in time.  Which now I realize was such rebellious romanticism, but at the time it was my attempt to punch back!   In the name of art, anger and the desire to express, I’ve used my body as a totem pole for my voice, but I didn’t connect the pieces of my body, mind and spirit until I found Suhaila and began to dance.

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The Fire of the Goddess

The Fire of the Goddess: Transformation and Empowerment through Dance.

                                By Laura L. Pauly, Ph.D.

     The Fire of the Goddess- that’s what belly dancing is for me. Belly dancing is, in its’ deepest sense, a way of connecting to the Divine.  In that crucible, spirit is felt, destiny is known and healing occurs on physical and emotional levels.  The Dance, in its’ roots is known as an activity practiced by women among women as a method of expressing emotion, sharing life and healing the body or preparing it for childbirth. Belly dancing is The Dance of Life. No wonder, then, that when dancing The Dance, great emotion often comes to the surface.

     Life and the body have their own innate and natural movement toward healing. If we align ourselves with Life and the highest and best possibilities it has to offer in any situation, true healing can occur.

     In belly dancing we are moving our bodies, often in new ways. We are stimulating all the nerves along our spine, massaging our internal organs and glands, rousing our energy centers (chakras) and awakening our consciousness.

     Our life experiences, both emotional and physical, are stored in our bodies. This is especially true with traumatic memories. Much like the rings of a tree trunk, our experience becomes part of our physical expression.  The experience of who we are and what we have experienced takes on a physical reality.

     Suhaila’s Format is particularly intense and has the capability of challenging us individually in personal ways, not only physically but emotionally.  When we are practicing the muscle movements, we are pushing our body to move in unfamiliar ways. Limitation often comes to the surface.  Limitation may be experienced in a physical way such as a difficulty doing a particular movement.

     Limitation can surface in an emotional way as well. It may appear as fear related to our bodies, or dancing, or it may be seemingly unrelated. Often when a traumatic memory, pain, or fear, comes to the surface of our consciousness, tears come to our eyes. This is an opportunity for healing and transformation.  It is not some thing to be ashamed of or embarrassed about.  Tears serve a cathartic purpose. In fact, tears cried out of emotion differ in their chemical structure from tears cried from peeling an onion. Tears of emotion contain more protein.  Furthermore, as our Soul expands in emotional growth it often causes the body to weep as it is adjusting.

     This potential for experiencing and transforming our fears, pains, and limitations may occur because we have stimulated the part in our body where the limitation or memory is held.   Another explanation is that because we focus so intensely on the physical movement in Suhaila’s Format, emotion from the subconscious can come forward without our blocking or moderating it.  In a sense, we are more open. We are out of our routine and linear ways of thinking and functioning.

     What comes up as limitation varies by individual. Most often, it is the weakness that most needs healing that surfaces. Dancers are often very physically oriented people. Some one who focuses on the physical may feel more confident about her/himself physically. In general, s/he may find emotional issues harder to address. Emotional issues then may be the limitations that surface more readily for this type of individual while practicing Suhaila’s Format.

     Conversely as a psychologist and some one who doesn’t like to sweat, I am more focused emotionally and spiritually.  Hence, my weaknesses are more physically oriented. This is especially true since I have had a number of physically traumatic experiences. The most difficult involved an overdose of an anti-malaria drug.  In preparation for going on a safari in East Africa, I was supposed to have taken a preventative preparation for malaria. Instead, I was mistakenly given the dosage for treating malaria. I was lucky to live through it. However, it left me with brain damage, a “blown out” balance system (according to the specialist), immune system damage, and a host of unusual and chronic health problems.  I am happy to say that I have healed myself of a large portion of the difficulties using various alternative healing methods. Presently, Suhaila’s Format of belly dancing is helping me to confront and release further limitations I have stored in my physical body.

     During an intense warm-up, tears came to my eyes and I identified the fear of sensing pain in my physical body. As the tears rolled down my face, I kept moving physically. In my own mind, I spoke to myself lovingly and encouraged My Self to let go of the fear. I focused on breathing deeply. I imagined with every exhalation that I was releasing the fear from my body and my life. I felt my body relax and go deeper into the position I was working on. Gradually, I am building stamina, in spite of past limitations.

     Another time while drilling figure 8s with pas de bourres, the tears came up again. I recognized a fear that I was going to tip over, fall down and hurt myself. Even though, there is some potential physical reality to my fear, since my balance system is damaged, I still worked to release the fear. Both in class and at home since, I have tried to isolate the fear, be in touch with it emotionally, breathe deeply into it as I practice the movement, and talk to myself internally about releasing it. Again, I have felt the fear letting go and I know that I am getting stronger.

     When confronted with our limitations, we can use them as growth opportunities. Rather than shutting down, try to identify the fear in words and allow it. Allow the tears. Keep dancing and breathe deeply. Speak to yourself lovingly about releasing the fear and limitation. This will, in effect, help release it from your body, mind, and life experience.

     Every time in our lives that we release fear on any level, we grow in strength. We grow in love. We empower ourselves. With repeated practice of addressing and releasing limitation, we heal ourselves physically and emotionally.  We transform our lives. 

     Suhaila is fond of saying to her students, “I know you are here because you want to change your life.” In fact, shortly before meeting Suhaila, I had prayed fervently to “Heal my body and change my life.”   Suhaila’s Format of The Dance is the groundwork of an art-form. It can also be an opportunity for personal empowerment and transformation. Use it well!

*** Dr. Pauly is a licensed psychologist in private practice at Inner Resources, Inc.  She received her bachelor and doctorate degrees from Marqueite University and a master's degree from Loyota University of Chicago.  Dr. Pauly specializes in treating depression, anxiety and relationship issues.  She is dedicated to helping clients achieve the life satisfaction they desire by changing long-standing problematic issues through releasing past pain and establishing permanent positive emotional behavioral habit patterns. ***

November 21, 2005

Expressed permission is given for printing in Suhaila’s newsletter.