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Womb Dance

Big bellies sway and swing. New mothers reach and rock. Young women open and offer. We are wild women dancing.

There are no formal dance steps or techniques. There is no right or wrong. There is only the rhythm, the breath, the body.

We begin the class with walking. "Feel the floor under your feet. Breath. Feel the ground. Feel your connection to the womb of mother earth," chants our guide Melissa.

At first, we feel self-conscious, and move stiffly. Slowly, we allow our awareness to spill down into our elbows. Like liquid, soft and fluid. Appreciating our amazing hands. Breathing into our heart faces.

I am here, five months pregnant with my second child. Dancing the Womb Dance is one of the only times I can be present to this child. My almost-two-year-old toddler fills my days. I wonder how I am going to be present to either of them. How can I divide myself or do I have to? Is there another way to be there for everybody?

We befriend and explore the different energies of birth. By grounding and connecting with all our body parts, we learn to stay alive to the present so that birth can happen. Our dance works with the physical and emotional body through movement.

Melissa starts the music after we have walked and "feel ourselves begin to arrive."

The first rhythm is the rhythm of flowing. The music is gentle, like a lullaby. We practice being both the mother and the child. This is the rhythm of early labor, beginnings, foreplay, the infancy cycle of life. Rocking ourselves. Explore the energy of the egg, learning how to ground and contain. I close my eyes as I undulate to my own rhythms. It is soothing and I feel like I could stay here forever, swaying with my baby.

The music changes. The energy changes- moves into staccato, the second rhythm. The childhood cycle. Active labor. Setting boundaries. Practicing being clear. The father is the teacher. We begin to focus in birth. Our movements are sharp. Elbows angle. We make edges. The beat is stronger, like African drumming. At first, I don't want the music to change; I am lost to the tranquil moment with my unborn child. But like in birth, the movement comes from my body, not my mind.

My breath comes harder, faster as I move into the third rhythm- the rhythm of chaos. This is transition in birth, orgasm, the cycle of adolescence, surrender. I try to stay connected and grounded as we give ourselves to the spirit. Birth. I bounce and shake. I feel like a fertility goddess with a huge belly and large pointed breasts.

All self-consciousness has given way to the moment of movement. I'm in trance, filled with the rhythm of my dance. When the egg and sperm have united, when the baby is born, when something new has been created, there is a release. We are empty and light. The music slows down. I remember the power of my son's birth, the passion and fire of us together. I make a silent prayer that this one will be perfect too. That it will be calm and powerful.

The fourth rhythm is the rhythm of receiving. The maturity cycle of life. When we're mothers, flowing in the juices of all we've let go of and all we've created. The women smile and sway. After we give birth, there is so much room for that which will carry us through the months and years ahead. Allow our joy to fill us, to feed us. Tears flower from my eyes as I fill with the spirit of the Great Mother and the miracle of birth. I am honored to witness it again.

My own dance becomes fluid, connected and very sweet. I am rocking myself and feel like something greater than myself is rocking me. I hope I can remember this feeling when it's late at night, and I'm holding my new baby. I want to feel the support I feel in this moment, that I too am being rocked. I want to hold it in my body and not my mind.

The fifth rhythm is stillness. Our movements are quiet, inward. This is old age in the cycle of life. We are empty. We are full. Awaiting the next wave in the cycle of creation. The music stops.

We come together in a circle of pregnant women. This is a moving practice. Spirit in matter. We are models for other women of what it is to be beautiful, awake, playful, grounded.

I hold my belly, my baby and know I am in practice. I am the Great Mother and I am magnificent.

Printed in The Spirit of Pregnancy: An Interactive Anthology for Your Journey to Motherhood (Contemporary Books, 2000)