Moving Through: How Dance Became My Path to Resilience

The Power of Not Talking

I'm not someone who likes to discuss problems when I'm in the thick of them. When something is truly difficult, talking about it feels like making it more public, expanding it, giving it more focus and energy. I already spend enough mental energy processing internally—I don't need to compound that with external analysis.

When I'm going through something truly difficult, the last thing I want to do is talk about it. When I talk about it, I expand it. I give it more of my focus, and I whine and complain. I already do enough of that internally. Instead of talking about problems, I'd rather resolve them. And for that, I need to not talk about them and preserve the energy that I have, pushing it into action instead. This feels right and reduces rather than increases my anxiety.

Movement as Medicine

So when I was drowning in stress and didn't know how else to survive it, I found my answer in movement. I didn't start organizing ecstatic dance events because I loved the concept or felt drawn to the community. I created them as a way to move through what I couldn't speak.

I don't drink. I can't stand being around drunk people or the music that pounds through clubs and house parties. The thought of navigating drugs and the social chaos that comes with typical nightlife felt overwhelming rather than liberating. So I created something else entirely—a space where I could move with whatever was alive in my body without restriction, without judgment, without having to conform to any behavioral structure that exists when you "go out."

I wanted a place where I could be slow when I needed to be slow, fast when I needed speed, where I could scream or roll on the floor if that's what the feeling demanded. Where I could simply release whatever had built up inside me without explanation or performance.

These weren't events born from joy or celebration. They emerged from exhaustion, from not knowing, from being scared and isolated and choosing creation over collapse. Instead of falling into the overwhelm, I decided to build something sacred—a space for authentic movement and wordless connection with others.

The best gatherings happened in the most unlikely places: deep in the woods at night, under trees during the day, in friends' studios, even in weather conditions that would typically keep people indoors. There was something powerful about these raw, unpolished spaces that allowed for the kind of honesty I was seeking.

Whenever I felt lost or anxious, I would dance. I would move. I would gather others to move with me. It didn't matter what each person was processing—we could simply exist in one space without sharing our stories, without talking, moving with whatever was present in that moment.

The Island: Testing Ground for Action Over Words

This approach—preserving energy and channeling it directly into action rather than expanding problems through discussion—became essential when I moved to an island where I knew no one and didn't speak the language. I found myself caught between communities, never quite fitting into the Russian community, the Portuguese community, or the transient expat world. Everything had to be built from scratch: finding housing, fighting for it, managing immigration papers, bringing family, finding builders, renovating. It was a journey I couldn't share with anyone because the moment I tried, it became more complicated than when I handled it alone.

Therapists told me I was "doing too much" or "caring too much," but that was simply the reality I was navigating. So it was dancing that carried me through. Not as a way to resolve the challenges, but as a way to expand my capacity to be with them.

This is the power of nonverbal discharge—expanding the capacity to be with things rather than trying to resolve them. When I face fear directly, letting it shake, letting it dance, letting it move however it wants while staying fully present with it, it becomes less frightening. I develop intimacy with the difficult feelings, and my capacity grows. This isn't about logical analysis or verbal processing. Most fear is illogical anyway.

The effects of these dance sessions would last for days, filling me with hope and energy to continue. And I wasn't alone in needing this. The island is full of people feeling displaced, disconnected, unrooted. The world is full of such people—even those who have lived in the same place for years sometimes feel this disconnection, wondering if they're doing the right thing, wondering if they're okay when they certainly don't feel okay.

That's okay too. But when we find movement, when we reconnect with something we're meant to do as humans, we discover ways not just to get through, but to thrive.

Sacred Spaces for Wordless Healing

The dance spaces I create honor this understanding. They're places to move with experience without having to explain it, analyze it, or turn it into a story. Just pure embodied action and release. A return to something more primal and honest than our usual social interactions allow.

This approach has become central to my work as well. I use many non-verbal techniques and practices to access deeper wisdom and process things much more effectively than traditional talking methods allow. There's something profound that happens when we bypass the analytical mind and work directly with the body's intelligence—a different kind of knowing emerges, one that's often more accurate and healing than what we can reach through words alone.

In a world that often insists we talk through our problems, I've found profound healing in the wisdom of the body, in wordless connection, in the expansion of capacity rather than the resolution of difficulty. Sometimes the most powerful thing we can do is move together in silence, letting our bodies discharge what our minds cannot untangle.

This is what I continue to create: sacred spaces for authentic movement, for being with whatever is present without explanation. Spaces where displaced souls can find each other not through shared stories, but through shared presence. Where we remember that before language, before logic, there is the body's ancient knowledge of how to move through what seems impossible.