Need more joy in your life? Let Your Yoga Dance is joy embodied! It celebrates the dancer in every body. It connects mind, body, and spirit while promoting strength, flexibility, and positive mental health – a healthy, happy you! In a Let Your Yoga Dance class, we use yoga and self-expressive dance to systematically work through every inch of the body. We use movement to work through physical, emotional, psychological, and creative blockages. Get your groove on and your heart pumping to inspiring music while strengthening and lengthening your muscles. Yogadance encourages inner exploration and self-expression. Find freedom in your body and unleash your creativity. No yoga or dance experience is necessary! All abilities and every body welcome. Yogadance can also be done seated and lying down.
WHAT DO WE DO IN CLASS?
My teacher Megha Nancy Buttenheim, founder of Let Your Yoga Dance, beautifully describes a Yogadance class:
“Yogadance is a chakra dance explosion. Seven energy centers provide the basis for this dance of yoga. Through inspiring music, we feel the grounding force of the first earthen chakra in our feet, legs, and tailbones. We spiral up through the senses to the sacrum and pelvis, our second chakra, dancing the pleasurable. We travel still farther, experiencing the third center of power, strength and solar energy. We are unconquerable in our warrior selves. In the center of the heart, we dance healing and loving kindness out to the world. We then blast into the fifth chakra with sweaty intensity, streaming across the room with unbridled bliss. Now we quiet down into the dance meditation of the sixth energy center, gently inviting our wild expressions back home to our cores. We gift back to ourselves all that we have given out throughout our lives. We find the unvoiced expression of our bodies, minds and spirits. In the seventh chakra, we move more slowly still into meditation and deep relaxation. We feel the pulse of our hearts, the bliss of our spirits, and the grounding support of mother earth beneath us. We conclude by sitting still together in a sacred circle. Refreshed, rejunenated, at home in the self. Profoundly new.”
WHAT KINDS OF MUSIC WILL YOU HEAR?
You will experience uplifting music from across genres, ranging from the quiet and contemplative, to rowdy and revolutionary, to pumping party jams. Different types of music encourage us to explore different types of movement. You’ll be sure to hear some old favourites and be introduced to new ones. Suggestions are always welcome!
Sample Songs
Centre by Alysha Brilla
Evolution by Cinematic Orchestra
Offering by Ravi Shankar and Philip Glass
Tightrope by Janelle Monae
It’s My Way by Buffy Sainte Marie
Walkabout by the Red Hot Chili Peppers
Better When I’m Dancin’ by Meghan Trainor
Straight to Memphis by Club des Belugas
My Style by the Black Eyed Peas
Cello Gonzales by Chilly Gonzales
Throes by Half Moon Run
I Wish I Was the Moon by Neko Case
In the Beginning by K’naan
Lose Control by Missy Elliot
Wanna Be Startin’ Something’ by Michael Jackson
Uprising by Muse
Love Today by MIKA
We Are People by Snatam Kaur
Say Hey (I Love You) by Michael Franti and Spearhead
Lose Yourself to Dance by Daft Punk
Can’t Stop the Feeling by Justin Timberlake
Never Give Up by Sia
This Is Me by Keala Settle and The Greatest Showman Ensemble
Shankara Shiva by Krista Luna Ray
He Ma Durgha by Donna deLory
Cello Suite No. 6 by Bach
affirmation III by Prince
Ascension by Steven Halpern