Posts Tagged ‘dance exercise’
Posted by terrepruitt on May 15, 2012
You know I started this blog to share things with you. I wanted to share about Nia, exercises, things I think are healthy, and stuff I learn. I don’t think I had thought about posting recipes, but I probably didn’t think I would limit myself from doing so. It is funny that food posts get the most views and even more fun spark the most conversations. (I love the bloggey conversations.) We love our food, huh? It is universal. Everyone eats. Not everyone works out, not everyone dances, not everyone goes to exercise classes, and not everyone does Nia, but everyone eats. Even though we all eat different things it is still something that we all have in common.
As you might have noticed, when I try a new recipe, or just try making something I sometimes like to share. Even if the recipe still needs some adjustments I have to start somewhere. I like to post my recipes because I find myself using my blog when I am going to make something. I can even be at the store and get the idea that I want to make a certain recipe then I think, “Shoot I don’t know what it is in . . . . ahhhh, but I posted it on my blog!” So I use my blog at the store to grocery shop sometimes. Here is a recipe of something that I made that I need to work on.
I haven’t always liked hummus, but once I started eating it. I really liked it. There is a brand that my husband found that is really good. It is smooth and creamy. We used to eat it often. But it has Canola Oil in it. I prefer not to eat Canola oil. I have always wanted to make my own hummus so I thought not eating our favorite brand would inspire me. It did not. My issue was tahini. I don’t think of tahini. So when I go to the store I am not thinking, “Oh yeah, I need tahini.” I know you can make hummus without it. I believe my friend makes hummus all the time and she never used tahini. I haven’t tasted her hummus that I can remember so I don’t know if it is good without tahini or not.
The other day I was online and I actually bought tahini. I decided on wanted to finally make some hummus. There are a lot of recipes out there for hummus so I took some ideas from several of them. I need to work on it.
I used:
2 cups canned garbanzo beans (chickpeas), drained
3 teaspoons liquid from the beans
1/3 cup tahini
1/3 cup lemon juice
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 tablespoon garlic flavored olive oil
I put everything in the blender and blended until smooth.
I prefer my hummus a little more smooth and actually creamy, but the blender was making odd noises so I didn’t want to push it too far.
First of all I think it is too salty. Next time I am going to use less salt and less tahini. I am also going to use less lemon juice. I am also going to use fresh garlic. I used some we have from a jar.
Not too bad for my first try, but not so great. But sometimes I just need to get in there and do it — make the recipe — so I can see it is easy to do so then I can play with it and make adjustments.
Do you like hummus? Do you make your own?
Posted in "Recipes", Food | Tagged: Canola Oil, chickpeas, creamy hummus, dance exercise, dance exercise class, Garbanzo beans, garlic oil, healthy recipes, hummus, Nia, Nia Classes, Nia workout, olive oil, tahini | 6 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on May 3, 2012
Nia has a different closed stance than some other dances and exercises I know. In Pilates the stance is heels touching and toes apart. I’ve heard it called a Pilates V. The Pilates V is done in more positions than standing. Sometimes there are exercises done while on the reformer where we will place our feet in Pilates V. It is nice to have positions that are specific. It helps a lot. I as a teacher can just say, “Closed stance.” and the Nia students will know what that means. Instead of forming a V as in the Pilates stance we form more of a rectangle. A basic closed stance is simple. It is stable. Nia’s closed stance is the side of the big toes touching and heels apart. It is as if all four corners of a rectangle are in contact with the edge of the foot. This allows for a very stable base. In the basic closed stance the arms hang. The back is straight, we are standing tall, lengthening the spine. Knees are relaxed as well was the feet. Weight is balanced evenly on both feet. Simple closed stance.
Closed stance is one of the six stances in the Nia 52 Moves. There is Closed Stance, Open Stance, A Stance, Sumo (or Riding) Stance, Bow Stance, and Cat Stance. I believe that in its basic form closed stance is the easiest. But when other elements are added that might not hold true.
We can practice our agility by walking quickly then stopping in closed stance. We might choose to be in closed stance while we allow just our arms to be agile . . . moving around in a starting and stopping fashion. We could just let our closed stance be stable as our arms are mobile. We could do an entire body dance . . . close stance dance. For some this is a challenge, even though our feet are formed into a rectangle and the idea is of a stable base it is still a practice in balance to have your feet secured to the earth while the rest of your body moves around. As I said, what we do with a close stance might not be so simple.
Practicing walking and stopping in closed stance is a good check to make certain you are not landing in “toes in“. The heels shouldn’t be that far apart as if you are doing toes in. Yet the toes should be touching. Coming from other stances to closed is good for conditioning the legs. Moving from Sumo to closed, or from at to closed is something to practice. Again we don’t want our heels to land too far apart making us pigeon toed.
I know of several routines that have us going through the stances. We start out in closed, then go to open stance, then go to A stance, then go to sumo. In some routines we work back through the stances, but in some we do move right into closed from sumo. I can’t think of one where we go from closed to sumo, but I bet there is one and I just can’t put my finger on it. Nia loves to mix up the moves to get the most out of the workout.
Can you sense the stability in the Nia Closed Stance?
Posted in 52 Moves (of Nia), Nia | Tagged: A Stance, Bow Stance, Cat Stance, closed stance, dance exercise, dance positions, Nia, Nia Dance, Nia Moves, Nia participants, Nia Teacher, Nia workout, Nia's 52 Moves, open stance, Pilates, Pilates reformer, Pilates V, Riding Stance, Sumo Stance, workout | 2 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on May 1, 2012
At this point you might have noticed that I only have a post for 9 of the 52 Moves of Nia. I am going to work on that. I have a Nia friend who is posting about the 52 Moves of Nia on her blog and she has inspired me to continue on. I have the list of the moves on my website. I link the blog post from there so people on my site can click to see a description and possibly a picture. With only 9 post I only have 9 links. This is ten and moving forward.
Nia is a unique cardio dance exercise that combines nine movement forms into a fun and energizing workout. Nia has moves we call the 52 Moves. Many of them are common to other dances. I am posting here about Toes In, Out, and Parallel. I know I have seen these moves in other dances if not done together at least done separately.
To do the move as one move you start with your feet parallel to each other. They can be hip (joint) width apart. Then turn your toes in to face each other. Turn them in as far as you comfortably can. Then swivel your feet out so the toes are pointing in opposite directions. Again, only do it as far as you can — comfortably.
This is the whole move. There is a routine where we are in A Stance and I have the participants dance toes in then toes out. Which I consider a lot of fun. You can play with this move by trying to walk with toes facing in, then with toes facing out.
I like to play with the move by doing one foot toes in and out. Sometimes just letting one foot do a dance all of its own; in, out, in, out, tapping my toe to the ground with each twist of my leg. I also like to do this move with varying stances. My instructions here say to start in open stance, but it can easily be done in A Stance (as I mentioned I do in my Nia class). You’ll notice that different muscles are used when you change the width of your stance.
Moving the feet in this manner allows for all the bones in the leg to rotate which gets the thigh bones moving in the hip socket. Movement is a way to keep the joints health. Movement helps fluid into the joints. I say “juicy joints.” We move to have juicy joints.
In addition to helping the hip joint this move helps keep the ankles mobile and the knees flexible.
With healthy hip joints, ankle joints, and knee joints the enables walking and moving in general to be done with ease. So even though this is one of the moves we use in our dance exercise routines that does not mean the use of it is limited to that.
You can decide to walk with toes in for a bit during your day, then with toes out. While standing you can stand with toes in, then out, then parallel. It is an easy exercise to play with and incorporate into your day. And it really does help with the health of your joints.
Are you gonna do it? On your trip from your desk to the coffee pot? While you are going about your day with the kids? Which on in your favorite, in or out?
Posted in 52 Moves (of Nia), Nia | Tagged: 52 Moves of Nia, ankle joints, cardio dance exercise, dance exercise, Dance Workout, energizing workout, hip joint, juicy joints, knee joints, Nia, Nia friend, Nia routines, Nine Movement Forms, Toes In, Toes Out, Toes Parallel | 2 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on April 28, 2012
When I first discovered Nia I bought The Nia Technique Book to see if I would be able to do it. I don’t mean do it as in do the moves and participate in a class, I mean do it as in “get into it”, as in understand it. It sounded a bit “woo-woo” to me. Listening to your body, voices of the body, energy this, moving energy that. I wasn’t sure I could sync it up with my beliefs. But as I studied it more I realized that it is based on science. It involves human kinetics. Most of the moves, although called the 52 Nia moves are quite common and are seen in many other types of exercises and workouts. The ones that I consider unique are probably part of some other dance I am not familiar with. And the “woo-woo” part, well, I realized that it is woo-woo – at least that is how many people think of certain things like energy, chakras, mind-body, and body-mind practices. I mean look at yoga, when I was young that was one of the “woo-wooest” things around and now people have embraced it. There are so many types of yoga it is difficult to keep track. For some they just ignore the woo-woo while others embrace it because they realize it makes sense. I mean cultures have been using “woo-woo” stuff for centuries. There is meditation, herbs, chanting, drumming — all types of other things that some people think of woo-woo. The woo-woo must not be too far off base though because it seems to work. Recently my posts have been about healing sounds and making sounds, this post is about the vowel sounds related to the chakras and I am sure to some people it sounds a little, or maybe even a lot, “woo-woo”. But I like to imagine that if you are reading this you are somewhat open to new things — even woo-woo things. So you might be willing to try the healing sounds or even the vowel sounds of the chakras.
The vowel sounds related to the chakras are as follows:
CROWN CHAKRA: EEE as in “me”
BROW/THIRD EYE CHAKRA: AAA* as in “say”
THROAT CHAKRA: EYE as in “my”
HEART CHAKRA: AH as in “ma”
SOLAR PLEXUS CHAKRA: OH as in “go”
PELVIC CHAKRA: OOO as in “you”
ROOT CHAKRA: UH as in “cup”
The idea is to say these sounds in a specific note. If you have a keyboard or a phone with an app that has a keyboard or an app that can give you examples of the notes it might help you. Or you might be musical and know what the notes sound like.
EEE is to be made in the B note
AAA is to be made in the A note
EYE is to be made in the G note
AH is to be made in the F note
OH is to be made in the E note
OOO is to be made in the D note
And UH is to be made in the C note
These sounds are to help open and heal the chakras. Or to keep them balanced, all depends on your needs and your practice.
As with everything there is a wealth of information out there on how to “do” the vowels. The commonalities I am seeing is to sit comfortable with a lengthened spine. Be relaxed. Use a normal breath. Repeat each sound seven times.
I have used these sounds in my Nia classes when we are using a chakra as a focus. I am going to take this list and use the vowels sounds just as I did the healing sounds. The focus can be the chakra vowel sounds and we can create an intent from there. Yay! I love thinking of things to use as focuses in my classes. I also think that sitting down to make these sounds as a specific exercise is a good idea. What do you think about chakra vowels? Might you try the exercise?
*Many places note this as “AYE” but to me that is AYE, as in what a pirate says. So I noted it as AAA, like Fonzie would say. 🙂
Posted in Chakras, Nia, Sounding | Tagged: Chakra, chakra energy, chakra vowel sounds, chanting, crown chakra, dance class, dance exercise, Dance Workout, exercise class, Fonzie, Healing Sounds, heart chakra, mind-body workout, Nia, Nia class, Nia Moves, pelvic chakra, root chakra, solar plexus chakra, The Nia Technique book, third eye chakra, throat chakra, unique workout, workout class, Yoga | 9 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on March 10, 2012
I have posted about Nia FreeDance before. Nia FreeDance is meant to encourage creativity. In Nia routines sometimes we have entire songs that are FreeDance. Not all routines have an entire FreeDance song, but all routines have at least one part as FreeDance. The one part could be that our feet have choreography and our arms and hands are free to move. The creativity is released. As the 4th Principle of the Nia White Belt it can also be used as a tool to help a Nia teacher learn a routine and/or explore his or her practice. The principle has 8 stages. The third stage of FreeDance is Feelings and Emotions with a catch phrase of: Pretend, Fake It, Act As If. This is the stage where you pick an emotion and you act it out. This is not the same as stage 4 where you draw on the real you and you act out a story you have experienced, this stage is pretend.
The idea of stage 3 of Nia FreeDance is to pick an emotion, a feeling and then act it out. Pretend you are feeling that emotion at that moment. This would be practice or play outside of a class setting where you are doing a routine. So when using this tool as a way to grow and create you aren’t even expected to dance. The exercise is to pick an emotion act it out for a bit, then pick another emotion. Acting and explaining the feeling with your body in an exaggerated way. If it helps create a story in order to fake that emotion. It can be somewhat fun because normally when you are angry you probably would not throw yourself down on the floor and kick and scream, but when we are pretending to be angry and acting “as if” you can. You can throw an angry punch. You can run and jump for joy. You can do anything you would like and since it probably wouldn’t be something you would be “allowed” to do in society it tends to spur creativity. And this creativity gets your body moving in news ways. It gets your heart pumping. It gets your blood moving. It gets your joints juicy.
I used this stage not too long ago as the focus of a few of my Nia Classes and it turned out to be very interesting. So within the class setting we actually danced our pretend feelings and emotions. We continued on with the routine we were doing at the time, but we added our “act as if”. So it altered our movements a bit. We allowed ourselves to follow the emotion so as we were dancing steps and hand movements might have been changed, but we still danced. As I said it was interesting because my class did not want to act the “negative emotions”. Some had a difficult time with some of the ones we deem as “negative” or ones that go against one’s normal self. We danced: keeping a secret, letting a secret go, happy, loopy, light, jealous, worry, love, angry, masculine, annoyed, bashful, brave, calm, childlike, guilty, fearless, and more. We tend to assign negative and positive, but they just are . . .I think that we can look at an emotion and or a feeling and it can be neither, but as we live with it it could become one or the other. If we let it affect us in a negative way, then maybe it can be perceived as a negative emotion?
The Embody and Share portion of the Nia White Belt Manual states: “Emotions are energetic responses to our experiences. We must learn to deal with our emotions to keep ourselves free and unblocked.” So my thought process is, that if an emotion “blocks” us or causes us stress then we consider it negative.
People didn’t like the emotions they felt were negative. There was a tendency to not pick them from the list I had displayed. But I think they are good for exploring movement. So it’s fun to play with them all. Remembering it is pretend, we are faking being (whatever the emotion is that we chose), we are pretending.
Well, what do you think? I invite you to make a list of emotions and feelings, then put on some music. Pick an emotion/feeling from your list and move to it. Stay with it until you are ready to move on and then pick another one from your list. Do this for a few songs. You might be surprised at your movements. You will probably be able to create ways to move that you didn’t realize. When you are not thinking of your movements it allows your body to release and —- ahhhh! —- movement creativity. Go ahead, you can do it. Let us know how it goes!
Posted in FreeDance, Nia | Tagged: 8 stages, Act As If, angry, creativity, dance exercise, Fake It, freedance, jealousy, love, masculine, movement creativity, negative emotion, Nia choreography, Nia Classes, Nia FreeDance, Nia Practice, Nia routines, Nia teachers, Nia White Belt Manual, Nia White Belt Principle #4, Pretend, Stage 3, worry | Leave a Comment »
Posted by terrepruitt on February 21, 2012
Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) per the U.S. National Library of Medicine is “episodes of depression that occur at a certain time of the year, usually during winter.” Interestingly, “Like other forms of depression, it occurs more often in women than in men.” According to Wiki “Although experts were initially skeptical, this condition is now recognized as a common disorder”. I remember when it was declared a “real” disorder. It really sounds as if this type of disorder can become very serious. There are general symptoms that are common when someone is depressed; difficulty sleeping, difficulty waking, sleeping too much, not sleeping, over eating, not eating, gaining weight, losing weight, not socializing, lack of energy, difficulty concentrating, and so on. It seems as if any depression, if left untreated and it continues, could become serious. This type of depression is no different.
I was surprised to see that it is treated somewhat the same way as other depression with both drugs and therapy. Since it is caused by lack of sunlight I hadn’t thought of using medication or talking about it to help it. But I guess that if you are depressed and antidepressants make you not depressed they would work no matter what the cause. And talk therapy helps with all types of depression too. The Mayo Clinic states the causes for SAD to be possibly your body’s rhythm being “off” due to the lack of light, so your body doesn’t know when to sleep and when to be awake, the serotonin levels being low, this is the chemical in the brain that affects your mood, so low levels could be a cause of depression, then there is melatonin levels which regulates sleep so this hormone can be off balance and affect one’s mood.
With that said, I would think that doing things to help make certain your clock stays regular would help. Make certain you keep to a strict bedtime and rising time in the morning. Also eating foods that can increase levels of serotonin might help. Good foods to eat include bananas, papayas, walnuts, and dates. (Mmmm, sounds like a recipe for a smoothie!)
I found the following list on: Muscle-Health-Fitness.com
1) Free Range Turkey
2) Flaxseed/ Flaxseed oil
3) Buckwheat
4) Wild Fish and Sea food
5) Whey protein
6) Bananas
7) High quality Eggs
8) Sour Cherries
9) Free Range Beef
10) Dark Chocolate
According to Livestrong foods that boost your melatonin are rice, barley, bananas and tomatoes. Melatonin is also found in tart cherries, sunflower seeds, almonds, and red radishes. Which again, if low levels of this hormone are thought to play a role in SAD, then increasing the levels would seem to be a logical step.
The thing I see most is light therapy. But it doesn’t work for everyone. It needs to be a bright light, one that is like the sun. I found a variety of lights on Amazon ranging from $60.00 to $600.00. With this type of therapy you sit in front of the light for a prescribed amount of time per day.
Another way to fight depression is to exercise. Exercise is always going to help because it increases your endorphins. The endorphins create a positive feeling in the body. Feeling positive helps with depression. For me dancing is both a great exercise and a great way to get happy. That is one reason why I love Nia because it really does make me happy. But, of course there is all types of exercise to help get those endorphins up. So anything that you will actually do . . . is GREAT!
I think SAD is much more widely accepted as an actual disorder than it once was. There are so many things and ways that we are educated and allowed to see how people live and feel. We probably all know at least one person living in an area where they might be susceptible to SAD. Even if you don’t feel you have felt depression because of the weather, maybe you have things you do that make you happy and get you out of a funk. What are they? What do you do that help make you happy? Share with us here and maybe they can help someone who is SAD.
Posted in Misc | Tagged: chemical in the brain, dance exercise, depressed, depression, endorphins, exercise, Mayo Clinic, melatonin, Nia, Nia Dance, Nia exercise, S.A.D., SAD, Seasonal Affective Disorder, serotonin | 12 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on February 2, 2012
In a post in which I spoke about learning a Nia Routine I said we need to know it perfectly. I would like to explain. First of all I have written before about how when I am learning a Nia routine there comes a point where I just can’t learn any more by myself and I have to take it to class. Always fascinates me how I can spend weeks working on learning it then in one hour in class I learn more than all the time I had spent on it previously. Dance exercise is like that. Teaching something is always different learning, it is a different level. Anyway I had recently said we have to know a routine perfect and what I mean by that is the better we know the music and the choreography, the closer to perfect we can get it, the better. I can do a routine without flaw in my living room then when faced with trucks driving by, kids screaming at the school, people laughing in the lobby I can get distracted. If I don’t know my music perfectly, if I don’t know the choreography perfectly then I will obviously mess up. But when I know it “perfectly” then I can not do it right, but still dance and lead the routine fine. I can mess up without saying, “Oops!” If I know where I am and what is coming I can keep going. Maybe I missed my cue to change movement, but when I know the music I can decide if I just want to stay with the move we are on or go to the next one. If I decide to go, do I want to cut the amount of times short because I was late or do the correct amount because it too fits perfectly with the music? When I KNOW it perfectly, I am free to play and really let the dance of Nia show. I can be perfect in my imperfection.
I might not teach the routine exactly as it is taught on the DVD, but I know what I am doing different and I know where I am going with the music. We teach tight, but loose. I know the moves, I execute them correctly, I do the choreography exactly as the DVD — when I can :-), but, when I mess up I am loose enough to keep going. I am loose enough to see my students enjoying one particular combination of steps, so I can elect to stay and let them enjoy their movements. I know my routine tight enough that when my earring falls off and I get a bit distracted, I can keep going AND expertly step over and around it as it lays on the dance floor. I am loose enough to be able to change the choreography by having to HOP over the fallen jewelry instead of exectuing the normal step. I am loose enough to have fun but tight enough that even when I mess up, I might be the only one that knows. It could be that there are students in class who know the routine well enough that they recognize I am not doing the choreographed move, but they can keep following and dancing because I am tight enough to be able to lead and dance in the now.
Because Nia is about dancing in the moment and having fun we are allowed a lot of freedom. I say this often because Nia allows for people to move in their own body’s way and that is an important part of Nia. But I also like to remind people that Nia IS choreographed. The moves fit the music well and there are proper and safe ways to do them. I like to express the fact that Nia is not just a room full of bodies flaling about. We are all encouraged to be perfect in our imperfection. Our bodies might not move exaclty as they are designed, but we can move with awareness. We can move with purpose. That is how I teach. I like it best when I know the routine so well that I can play and be perfect in my imperfection.
Posted in Nia | Tagged: dance awareness, dance class, dance exercise, dance floor, dance routine, exercise class, Nia choerography, Nia Dance, Nia DVD, Nia Music, Nia routine, Nia Teacher, perfect in imperfection, tight but loose | 6 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on January 14, 2012
Nia, the dance exercise that I teach, is a great cardio workout. Classes are fun and full of energy. To become a Nia teacher one must take the White Belt Intensive. It is 40+ hours of intense learning, discovery, play, dance, reading, listening, moving, sitting, and so much more. A person that is just interesting in learning more about Nia as a practice may also take the intensive. One does not have to have the intention of teaching to participate in an intensive. In the Nia White Belt there are 13 Principles. These principles are what teachers and practitioner use to expand their Nia practice. Working and playing with the principles actually help bodies to move “better”. Nia is a body centered exercise so these principles actually help us move our bodies. The fourth Nia White Belt principle is FreeDance, this principle has eight stages. The list of the eight stages is in my post Nia Class – Levels 1, 2, 3 – FreeDance Stage 8. The fifth stage is Authentic Movement – Change.
Nia is “about” many things. One thing Nia is about is Authentic movement. Our dance is not a performance. It is not meant to be pretty. It is meant to allow us to move in our own body’s way. The idea is that we will move in our own body’s’ way and we will move as we need to move. With freedom and authenticity we will be working our bodies as they each individually need to be worked. Yes, we do have specific steps in a kata or song. But everyone’s body does the steps maybe a little differently — to their own body’s ability. With practice the body will be able to do the steps and the moves in the Body’s Way, moving the way the body was actually designed to move.
With authentic movement we are letting the body move to the music in its own way. We don’t think of how to move it, we just let it sense the music and it moves. If one is practicing the Nia White Belt Principle #4, stage 5, then the authentic movement is done for two bars, two measures of how we count our music. After two bars change the movement. Do this for each song. The idea is that after a few songs the body will have gone through all of its “normal” movements. You will have danced out all of your movement tendencies. You will have danced all of your bodies patterns and your body will seek new moves. Your body will do things it does not usually do. You might be one that often moves your hips a lot, but after a few songs and continually changing the way you move your hips you might realize that you are out of hip moves, so your body plants your feet and you end up kicking up one leg at a time. Maybe kicking is not part of your typical dance move repertoire. Maybe once your legs start kicking your arms start punching. And this was not thought out or planned it just seemed natural. Leg kick, arm punch.
So the idea is to exhaust the normal and journey into new territory. If you have never done anything like this I want to warn you, you might be a little sore the next day. If you are a booty shaker and you change to a “how-low-can-you-go-er” you will feel it the next morning. If you always keep both feet on the ground and you start kicking or even just doing knee lifts to be different, your body will remind you the next day that you did something different.
If you let your body just dance to the music and switch it up, your body will give you great feed back on how you have never moved your foot/arm/head/butt/ankle/knee/whatever-you-moved-that-was-new the next day. You will go to move foot/arm/head/butt/ankle/knee/whatever-you-moved-that-was-new and probably sense it. This information will help you learn your movement tendencies and you can learn what new moves might help you improve your body’s movements.
Try it! Put on some music and dance with Authentic Movement, then change. Keep doing this through at least five songs and see where you end up. See what new moves your body comes up with. Ready? Go!
Posted in FreeDance, Nia | Tagged: 13 White Belt Principles, Authentic Movement, cardio workout, dance class, dance exercise, dance performance, dance practice, freedance, FreeDance Stage 8, kata, Nia, Nia class, Nia Dance, Nia energy, Nia Practice, Nia student, Nia Teacher, Nia White Belt Principle #4, White Belt Intensive | Leave a Comment »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 31, 2011
Not all of my posts on my list of Year End Review Of Terre’s 2011 Important Posts are Nia posts, but some of them are, Here are the remaining four of nine that I thought were important enough to re-share. This is the second half of my Year End Review Post. When I wrote it as one post, it just seemed too long so I split it up. Thanks for checking in. As with the first half, I am just going to give a little summary so you can have the main point right here and you don’t have to go to the original post. But if you WANT to go to the original post (and comment even) please do! I am listing these in order of when they were posted.
I think of this post Muscle Weighs More Than Fat as being something we all need to be reminded of. Muscle DOES NOT weigh more than fat. The saying that muscle weighs more is one of those things that a lot of us say, but it is not correct. A pound of muscle weighs as much as a pound of fat. A pound of anything cannot weigh more than a pound of something else. A pound of muscle will take up a lot less room than a pound of fat as you will see in the picture on this post if you click over. 😉
If you are interested in a dance class that is pretty, a class that produces a performance then Nia is probably not what you are looking for. Nia Might Not Be Pretty — To Some. Nia is about authentic movement. Nia is about moving the body the way it was designed to be moved. Not everyBODY can move the way it was designed. There might be injuries, defects, tightness, or just plain ol’ non-use involved so it might not be pretty as we learn to move. But it is beautiful. This post reminds you that it is what it is and what it is not is a performance. A Nia class is freedom of movement, something to be enjoyed from the angle of the participant and not someone watching.
I have a post about listening with love, but the title is Let Love Be Your Ears. Ya know sometimes titles need to intrigue a potential reader, I was hoping that is what this title was. But the post is about listening with love. We all have heard and some of us might try to live by the old “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.” But LISTENING with love is different. Not that common of a “golden rule”. We are not always taught we need to love ourselves, so we might not listen as if people are talking to us with love and not accusations and criticisms. This might be something we have to practice. Also listening with love can include giving the person talking a lot of “benefit of the doubt”. Trying to see where they might be coming from.
Another post is about dance being exercise. It is a reminder that you can have fun and get exercise at the same time. Nia is just that!
So that is the last four on my list of posts I think really could use repeating. I know I picked a few because I need to work on some of them/it myself. I hope that you enjoyed either the summary or the posts themselves. I thank you very much for taking the time to read this. If you have been reading my blog and you recognize some of these I thank you. I really appreciate you taking the time to read. If you take the time to read and comment, I am really grateful and I very much appreciate it.
And, of course, I wish you a very happy and safe New Year’s Eve. I wish you many, many, many opportunities to embrace happiness and experience joy in 2012. Happy New Year.
Posted in Exercise and Working Out, Misc, Muscles, Nia | Tagged: 2012, 30 minute meals, dance exercise, fat is light, Happy New Year, listen with love, muscle is heavy, New Year's Eve, Nia, Nia balance, Nia class, Nia exercise, Nia freedom, Nia is for everybody, Nia Movement, Nia participant, Nia posts, Nia Practice, posts about Nia, ten minute exercise, the body's way, Year End Review | 2 Comments »
Posted by terrepruitt on December 29, 2011
Many bloggers are posting end of the year posts. Some posts are the best, some posts are their favorites, everyone has a different take on it. Some are a review of the year, either in posts or pictures. I thought about doing a post about my favorites, but I was afraid they would all be my Nia posts. As I was going through my posts from the last year I came up with an eclectic bunch . . . . just like my post. I can’t say they are my favorites, but I can say they are ones that I want to point out again. I actually found twenty-three posts that I wanted to re-share. TWENTY-THREE! But that is way too many to summarize and share. I narrowed it down to nine. These nine are ones I think are the most important of the ones I’ve posted this past year. I still think nine is a lot so I am going to do this year in review in two parts. I am just going to give a little summary so you can have the main point right here and you don’t have to go to the original post. But if you WANT to go to the original post (and comment even) please do! I am listing these in order of when they were posted.
One of the most important things I have posted about is Balance. The post is called Nia Balance and I was sharing about how balance was challenging because of my injured toe, but the main point of the post is that balance is really important and that our Nia routines are full of opportunities in which we can practice our balance. Since balance is so important you can practice it throughout your day without really changing the way you do things too much. Balance is so important, especially as we age.
It’s Out There is my post about how great Nia is! Ha, ha! Well it is a little bit about Nia, but a lot about the fact that there are many, many, many other movement forms out there. There are so many different forms of movements that there really has to be something for everyone. Nia is for everyBODY as it was created to move the body in the body’s way, but it is not for everyone. There is something out there for everyone! If you look you can find a class for you!
I posted about Feeling Vs. Sensing. Feeling is emotion. Feelings are how you FEEL. Sensing is what your body does. You FEEL happy. Your body senses heat. You FEEL sad. Your body senses cold. Knowing the difference can help you give your body and/or your emotional self, your spirit the workout it needs.
I made up a list of ten exercises that can be done in ten minutes. There is actually a lot of different ways you can do the list of ten exercises, but the idea was to get a full body workout in ten minutes. The hope was that the ten in ten would be an inspiration and a catalyst for actually doing more.
This past week I had company and they were here through the dinner hour. I didn’t know that they would be here that long so I didn’t have anything planned for dinner that would feed all four of us, but I still wanted to feed my husband when they left. So about the time they were talking about leaving I went into the kitchen. I was in the kitchen all of seven minutes. I washed the rice, turned on the rice maker, chopped the end off the asparagus, rinsed them, put them in a pan then put them in the oven, and dumped the marinated chicken in a pan and put it in the oven. I then set the timer for 20 minutes at which time dinner would be ready. I achieved a 30 minutes meal. All because when I froze the chicken I made a sauce for it at the same time. So when I took it out to defrost it was already marinating or doing so as it defrosted. So it really took seven minutes for me to make dinner. My friends didn’t even miss me because I was only gone seven minutes. This post is about Shopping Step to help Dinner Prep. After shopping before you freeze the meat make your marinade right inside the bag. It has really helped me get dinner ready much faster! Love it!
So this is five on my list out of nine post I think really could use repeating. I hope you check back Saturday to see the rest of the list. I thank you very much for taking the time to read this. If all of these or some of these are “repeats” to you, then I really thank you. Thank you so much for being here. I really appreciate you reading and if you are a commenter . . . I appreciate you even more!!! See you back here on Saturday for the rest of the review of my Year End Review!
Posted in Food, Misc, Nia | Tagged: 30 minute meals, dance exercise, fat is light, listen with love, muscle is heavy, Nia, Nia balance, Nia class, Nia exercise, Nia freedom, Nia is for everybody, Nia Movement, Nia participant, Nia posts, Nia Practice, posts about Nia, ten minute exercise, the body's way, Year End Review | 4 Comments »
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