Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Dancing to the Symphony of Stars

I believe that dance must be as old a practice as is our human existence. Dancing is an innate ability of us humans. I personally feel that dancing is not just what is portrayed by popular media, but there is so much more beauty and depth to it.



People who feel awkward when dancing should find solace in the fact that they are actually just self conscious of their body image, of what people may think or maybe their soul dances to a different tune to that of other people. In order to understand this better, lets compare dance to art. Art can be of two types, abstract which other people may not understand properly but which is nonetheless the creative expression of an artist. Or it can be highly mastered art, where you can paint portraits with near perfect resemblance to the subject, a painting which everyone can understand and appreciate. This can be compared to the second extreme of dancing, with highly coordinated steps following the beat, which is an amazing and fun way of dancing in itself. However I shall not limit dancing to definitions and explanations. There is SO much more to it than limiting to explaining it using mere words.




The above video contains a beautiful poem by Rumi, with the background of Iranian music. The poem also delves deeper into the multidimensional activity that is dance, treating it as a way to bring us closer to Allah. Although I have tremendous amount of respect for Maulana Jalaluddin Rumi, and love his poetry, the dervish way of dancing shown in the video doesn't appeal much to me. Everyone is different. However Rumi's view and perception of dancing is beautiful, and he has managed to capture the essence of dance in his magnificent poetry.

'I dance to a silent tune. I am the Symphony of the stars.' Rumi.

Life is not straight forward, sometimes we have difficult times and sometimes we get lucky and things get smoother for a while. Dancing is something that accompanies us throughout our life, not just in happy times as portrayed by popular media. Rumi puts it best: 'Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass, but learning how to dance in the rain.'

God Bless.

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