Hosted at Expression Dance and Wellness, the following is a special guest course from guest teacher Justina Kamiel Grayman, PhD of Raw Movement. Justina Kamiel Grayman, Ph.D. is an artist and community psychology PhD who studies practices and processes for designing and building beautiful communities of deep freedom, truth, and connection.  She holds a BA in Psychology from Stanford University and a PhD in Psychology and Social Intervention from New York University. She has taught psychology courses at New York University, Walden University, and Manhattan School of Music – and performed domestically/internationally in contemporary and postmodern dance companies.

Raw Movement For The Current Times: Making Space for Grief, Loss, Suffering, Conflict, and Transition (Open To All Women/Femmes). In this course, we respond to our personal and collective experiences of disconnection, grief, loss, death, suffering, conflict, tension, unknown, and transition. In this course, we ask: How do we co-create spaces of deep connection, home, family, emotional safety through collective (movement) practice? How do we make space for our grief and suffering? By collective (movement) practice, we mean the collective practice of moving physical energy using movement, art, and design to create the energetic conditions necessary for deep connection to be possible. Through grounding, moving, and deeply connecting collective movement practice (within a playful, celebratory, and informal space), we experiment with co-creating a space of deep connection, home, family, emotional safety with each other, while contributing our own unique knowledge, skills, and tools to experiment with co-creating a space of deep connection. Justina will teach the group about often overlooked origins of chronic overwhelm, grief, and disconnection. Justina will then lead the group through learning, sharing, and experimenting with individual and collective (movement) practices that give access to deep connection to our rawest selves, our personal history, our personal ancestry, our bodies’ needs, each other, our communities, nature, universe, and future we are creating – our whole physical world. Justina will draw on understandings of group psychology, community psychology, group norms, social settings, interpersonal interactions, and relationship building to lead the group in collaboratively inquiring about what is in the way of developing a space of home, family, emotional safety, deep connection. Understanding the role of systems of conditioning and disconnection (capitalism, racism, heterosexism, etc.) and how that may show up in the group (power dynamics, harm, conflict) and our own patterns of connection and disconnection is a critical part of the Raw Movement process.

What Participants Will Learn: Participants will learn often overlooked origins of chronic overwhelm, grief, and disconnection. Participants will learn specific individual and collective (movement) practices (somatic practices, expressive movement practices, artistic practices, conversation practices, rituals) that can be used to respond to grief, loss, and suffering. Participants will learn how raw expression – and in particular, raw movements, can make space for our grief, loss, and suffering. Through the course, participants will experientially discover how to create a space for deep connection and raw expression that responds to their experiences of grief, loss, death, suffering, conflict, and tension. Through experimenting with co-creating a space of deep connection that responds to their grief, loss, and suffering, participants will deeply explore their own needs and stressors, disclosures, patterns of connection and disconnection, etc.  They will gain experience with creating a space that meets their own needs. They will gain experience with expressing their raw selves and telling the truth. If desired, they will begin exploring embodied, historical, and scientific knowledge of their ancestral and collective lineages of collective (movement) practice. If desired, they will begin exploring how to create and teach collective (movement) practice (along with the science and history of said practices) for the purpose of creating spaces of deep connection. Participants will gain skills in creating/co-creating spaces (relationships, homes, families, organizations, institutions) that respond to their grief, loss, and suffering.

Who Can Attend: All Women/Femmes (no dance or somatics experience necessary)

Frequency: Weekly

Dates: Tentatively Saturdays 12-2:30pm, Seven sessions, Oct 19 – December 14 (excluding Oct. 26, Nov. 23, Nov. 30).

Location: Expression Dance and Wellness in Cortlandt Manor, NY

Format: First session is an introductory interactive lecture and reception, the next sessions are lectures combined with somatic/movement practice and creation, and the final session is a closing reception and celebration.

Sessions: Register for the first session (interactive lecture + reception) only or all sessions.

Pricing: Sliding scale, with scholarships available for those with financial need (email your request and need statement to justina@rawmovement.org). All sessions: $2400-3200. Session one: $175 for session one. 

Host: Justina Kamiel Grayman, PhD of Raw Movement.

Justina’s Bio: www.justinagrayman.com/about

More About Justina:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8UKU1zOFic/?igsh=MXA2b29mbXY3Y2hvNA==

About Raw Movement: www.rawmovement.org

How to Register: E-mail justina@rawmovement.org by September 25th to converse about your needs (including any access needs or needs you have to feel most safe and at ease), desires, and interests. If you’d like to participate, request to participate by October 1st at this link. If your request is approved, you’ll be given the link to register/pay.