"You know it's a dance when Harmony shows up."
-Dan Zemelman; Jazz composer, musician & Ecstatic Dance organizer; San Rafael CA
Inspiring you to live a free, authentic life
of deep connection and aliveness
WHAT CLIENTS SAY ABOUT DANCE COACHING
I recently experienced four days of intensive movement coaching from Harmony Gates.
Harmony has been teaching body awareness and free-style movement for over 20 years. Through her Zoom Daytime Dance Breaks and podcast, ‘Road Trip to Fairfax’, I became aware of the depth of her knowledge and her ability to communicate it in a way I could understand. I also saw the potential for addressing some of the limitations that I had been dealing with during the past five years of my free-style dance experience.
I have been doing Ecstatic and Five Rhythm Dance since a few months after my wife of 36 years passed five years ago. As a bodyworker for the past 30 years, I knew that movement was an essential part of the grieving process. I threw myself into solo dancing with abandon. As I developed stamina and began to take notice of the bodies whirling around me on the floor, I felt compelled to join them. It was at this point that I became aware of major limitations. For one, people did not continue moving with me for long. And for another, I began colliding with partners. Fortunately, no one was seriously injured.
I did not know what to do about it, until I met Harmony.
With patience, Harmony used physical manipulation gleaned from her study of the Feldenkrais Method to effect subtle changes in my movement. She used her own form of contact massage on the floor to prepare my body for her major goal for me: to move me from flying around like a loose cannon, to a fully grounded state while dancing. She affected this by giving me clear images to employ while moving.
She helped me integrate the work by dancing with me in large group dances. I have continued this integration process by furthger live group dancing, and continuing to dance with her via Zoom. In the live dances I have noticed that partners are staying with me much longer, and I have had no collisions, and I am reaching heights of enjoyment beyond anything in the past. I am full of gratitude for what I experienced with Harmony. I can whole heartedly recommend her coaching to anyone.
-Joel Curry- MSW, CMT, Owner Pathways to Health therapeutic pain relief center, Nevada City, Ca pathwaysauburn.com
Harmony is a magical teacher. She teaches without words. But her language is more powerful and more effective than words.
Here is an example one of many, many, many lessons that she taught me through embodied movement.
One day I was telling her about feeling a bit vulnerable about entering new groups and being sensitive to the dynamics and how I would show up; what will happen, should I ever?.. some hesitation.
Harmony simply invited me to stand up. She said, "stand up please and hold my hand and close your eyes."
So I did. I held her hand. I closed my eyes. I became aware of soft music playing in the background. She said, "just follow me." She started walking backwards forwards, to the side; changing the direction very gently, sometimes swaying. She invited me to follow her lead.
In the beginning it was difficult for me. I was not even aware of the difficulties, but she was, and she would facilitate, by asking me to relax my shoulders, my arms, my grip, my step, the way I touch the surface of the floor, the way I move and react to her cues.
I was becoming more and more relaxed and it took just few few moments before I felt a wonderful feeling that was new to me. I realized that I was entering the zone where I completely trusted her. I was in tune with her. And I could follow her lead without thinking, without judging. And it felt wonderful. I'd never felt this before. This was the first time. It felt like a revelation in my body. There was joy emanating and permeating my body and coming from the center of me. It felt like a warm, gentle sun inside my stomach, and resulted in a giggly kind of sensation. I felt like a child.
And then I realized, at the level of my body, that trusting this way, is so giving and nourishing. This embodied experience changed my relationship to the world.
That lesson was a catalyst for a shift in me on a huge level. It allowed me to see how to relate to the world with less control, or how to give up control when it's needed. It showed me this balance of when I should give and when I should receive; and when I can trust, and how to trust, and how to recognize when to trust. It's very complex and profound. And yet, the lesson itself seemed so simple and brief. In my interaction with Harmony, it took only a few minutes to land this.
That experience happened a few years ago. And since then, I can say the the lesson is still very vivid in my memory and so profound that it continues to guide me.
-Elena Gold- Dancer, Art Therapist, Retreat Producer
Yesterday was wonderful. The environment we created, that you held, was really helpful and supportive to some areas of myself that had been hiding, or not present and disconnected, ever since a trauma that occurred in my relationship with my partner, as I was driving up here a month or two ago.
So, after dance, the energy we worked with dancing together created the connection 'strategy' for me to integrate back into my relationship. It helped me be able to connect this part of myself. Able to express and be heard and to speak powerfully. I was able to integrate this disconnected part back into myself. And this was very supportive to me and to my relationship. So I love how that occurred. Thank you.
I look forward to continuing to work together. I'm so grateful for our dance partnership play-ship; for these healing dances that happen.
-Kevin Slocum- Chiropractor/Owner Harmony Center for Whole Being
I went to Harmony to learn to dance, but what I learned is how to connect to my body and to have a spiritual and fun time
-Taj- Dancer
You've opened up a whole new world for me.
-Sheila Reuben- LMFT (after our first session)
I have thought a lot about the liquid contact
my body has integrated it
and in retrospect I understand more
what you were trying to enlighten me with
in the water. You were teaching a third degree black belt
a deepening into yielded power
that isn't a tumble weed
or "floating by”.
You also taught me
on a cellular level
what I knew intellectually;
that I am sensual by nature
and withholding that
so as not to make others uncomfortable
is not serving any of us except to create
deeper forms of bondage
You taught me that I can explore the expansion
of my sexuality and desire
with out being obliged to be outright sexual;
That each moment is a choice
to show up and
I can show up
with yes
maybe
not now
and any combination
and or rearranged
and changed choice
-Grace-
I felt drawn to you
because it seemed
you were someone
who would want to dance
without there needing to be
any meaning behind the moment
and two human beings
expressing themselves through it
-Grace-
Harmony has been teaching body awareness and free-style movement for over 20 years. Through her Zoom Daytime Dance Breaks and podcast, ‘Road Trip to Fairfax’, I became aware of the depth of her knowledge and her ability to communicate it in a way I could understand. I also saw the potential for addressing some of the limitations that I had been dealing with during the past five years of my free-style dance experience.
I have been doing Ecstatic and Five Rhythm Dance since a few months after my wife of 36 years passed five years ago. As a bodyworker for the past 30 years, I knew that movement was an essential part of the grieving process. I threw myself into solo dancing with abandon. As I developed stamina and began to take notice of the bodies whirling around me on the floor, I felt compelled to join them. It was at this point that I became aware of major limitations. For one, people did not continue moving with me for long. And for another, I began colliding with partners. Fortunately, no one was seriously injured.
I did not know what to do about it, until I met Harmony.
With patience, Harmony used physical manipulation gleaned from her study of the Feldenkrais Method to effect subtle changes in my movement. She used her own form of contact massage on the floor to prepare my body for her major goal for me: to move me from flying around like a loose cannon, to a fully grounded state while dancing. She affected this by giving me clear images to employ while moving.
She helped me integrate the work by dancing with me in large group dances. I have continued this integration process by furthger live group dancing, and continuing to dance with her via Zoom. In the live dances I have noticed that partners are staying with me much longer, and I have had no collisions, and I am reaching heights of enjoyment beyond anything in the past. I am full of gratitude for what I experienced with Harmony. I can whole heartedly recommend her coaching to anyone.
-Joel Curry- MSW, CMT, Owner Pathways to Health therapeutic pain relief center, Nevada City, Ca pathwaysauburn.com
Harmony is a magical teacher. She teaches without words. But her language is more powerful and more effective than words.
Here is an example one of many, many, many lessons that she taught me through embodied movement.
One day I was telling her about feeling a bit vulnerable about entering new groups and being sensitive to the dynamics and how I would show up; what will happen, should I ever?.. some hesitation.
Harmony simply invited me to stand up. She said, "stand up please and hold my hand and close your eyes."
So I did. I held her hand. I closed my eyes. I became aware of soft music playing in the background. She said, "just follow me." She started walking backwards forwards, to the side; changing the direction very gently, sometimes swaying. She invited me to follow her lead.
In the beginning it was difficult for me. I was not even aware of the difficulties, but she was, and she would facilitate, by asking me to relax my shoulders, my arms, my grip, my step, the way I touch the surface of the floor, the way I move and react to her cues.
I was becoming more and more relaxed and it took just few few moments before I felt a wonderful feeling that was new to me. I realized that I was entering the zone where I completely trusted her. I was in tune with her. And I could follow her lead without thinking, without judging. And it felt wonderful. I'd never felt this before. This was the first time. It felt like a revelation in my body. There was joy emanating and permeating my body and coming from the center of me. It felt like a warm, gentle sun inside my stomach, and resulted in a giggly kind of sensation. I felt like a child.
And then I realized, at the level of my body, that trusting this way, is so giving and nourishing. This embodied experience changed my relationship to the world.
That lesson was a catalyst for a shift in me on a huge level. It allowed me to see how to relate to the world with less control, or how to give up control when it's needed. It showed me this balance of when I should give and when I should receive; and when I can trust, and how to trust, and how to recognize when to trust. It's very complex and profound. And yet, the lesson itself seemed so simple and brief. In my interaction with Harmony, it took only a few minutes to land this.
That experience happened a few years ago. And since then, I can say the the lesson is still very vivid in my memory and so profound that it continues to guide me.
-Elena Gold- Dancer, Art Therapist, Retreat Producer
Yesterday was wonderful. The environment we created, that you held, was really helpful and supportive to some areas of myself that had been hiding, or not present and disconnected, ever since a trauma that occurred in my relationship with my partner, as I was driving up here a month or two ago.
So, after dance, the energy we worked with dancing together created the connection 'strategy' for me to integrate back into my relationship. It helped me be able to connect this part of myself. Able to express and be heard and to speak powerfully. I was able to integrate this disconnected part back into myself. And this was very supportive to me and to my relationship. So I love how that occurred. Thank you.
I look forward to continuing to work together. I'm so grateful for our dance partnership play-ship; for these healing dances that happen.
-Kevin Slocum- Chiropractor/Owner Harmony Center for Whole Being
I went to Harmony to learn to dance, but what I learned is how to connect to my body and to have a spiritual and fun time
-Taj- Dancer
You've opened up a whole new world for me.
-Sheila Reuben- LMFT (after our first session)
I have thought a lot about the liquid contact
my body has integrated it
and in retrospect I understand more
what you were trying to enlighten me with
in the water. You were teaching a third degree black belt
a deepening into yielded power
that isn't a tumble weed
or "floating by”.
You also taught me
on a cellular level
what I knew intellectually;
that I am sensual by nature
and withholding that
so as not to make others uncomfortable
is not serving any of us except to create
deeper forms of bondage
You taught me that I can explore the expansion
of my sexuality and desire
with out being obliged to be outright sexual;
That each moment is a choice
to show up and
I can show up
with yes
maybe
not now
and any combination
and or rearranged
and changed choice
-Grace-
I felt drawn to you
because it seemed
you were someone
who would want to dance
without there needing to be
any meaning behind the moment
and two human beings
expressing themselves through it
-Grace-
Transform the way you live and the way you relate
Learn more satisfying ways of relating to yourself and others
through awareness, attunement, and authentic connection
A body-centered approach
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