29 april 2020 Caroline van de Ven

Maybe you picked it up from Facebook or SoulRebel’s newsletter or from the 5Rhythms talking drums that corona knocked me off my feet almost two months ago…

It happened while I was teaching; one of the dancers who came to greet me with a warm hug leaned back, looked me in the face with concern and asked ‘are you alright?’

He saw it, before I had realised it… I hadn’t been able to sleep the night before, so I had been feeling a kind of hung over all day and exactly at the moment he spoke to me I realised that my not feeling well was not because of not sleeping, not sleeping was because of falling ill.

Instantly I felt my legs disappear under me. There was a whole world going on in that very moment, not being able to stand on my feet anymore, a moment of bewilderment and disbelieve… with all my will power I was not able to keep my feet…

So, surrendering was kind of the first lesson… admitting that I am not in control. In the weeks that followed I was not in control. Afterwards the whole process reminded me of giving birth, my body taking over, the only thing to be done just letting it happen and stay fluid. But that’s afterwards…

Bit by bit I surrendered to being ill, at first I kept on following my peers developing 5Rhythms zoom and live stream activities, feeling the urge to do the same myself as soon as possible, but soon corona really kicked in and started punching me around severely and in the midst of all this there was no fluidity at all. With high fevers and gasping for breath I lost sense of the world around me, progressively I also lost sense of connection, with myself, with my heart, my soul, my essence and even with my body that worked so damn hard for me… brings up tears writing this…

It was such an intense process, I am a horrible patient… before really giving up I got so angry, I was like a bear disturbed in its hibernation, like a cat in a corner lashing out… before I gave up… what a dance to surrender to powerlessness and trust…

It’s just now, writing this that I realise it has been a dance, it even has been a wave… what else… and I am in a next wave already… the healing has begun… which brings a grateful smile… while there were days that I truly felt no connection with 5Rhythms at all anymore and assumed my dancing days were over… now it’s open, we’ll see… first things first… get back on my feet again, gain strength, build up fitness… there’s space, there’s trust, there’s time…

Caroline van de Ven

Caroline van de Ven is 5Ritmes® docent en lid van de 5Rhythms Teachers Association (5RTA). Zij werd opgeleid door Jonathan Horan, zoon van Gabrielle Roth, de moeder van de 5 Ritmes®. Voorheen werkte Caroline als fysiotherapeut, klassiek homeopaat en beeldend kunstenaar. Tevens is zij geschoold in Gestalttherapie, lichaamsgerichte therapie, wetenschappelijk medisch onderzoek en diverse dansvormen (klassiek, beat- & jazzballet). Ook deed zij een opleiding Rouwverwerking om mensen in de dans te kunnen begeleiden bij verlies (verlies van een geliefde door overlijden, maar ook verlies van gezondheid, werk, relatie, etc.). Momenteel geeft en organiseert zij 5 Ritmes® lessen, workshops en lezingen. Daarnaast assisteert zij collega’s bij hun workshops in binnen- en buitenland. Haar thuisbasis is in Beek-Ubbergen, vlakbij Nijmegen; van daaruit reist zij graag, ze geeft ook les in Zuid-Limburg en incidenteel in Keulen en Düsseldorf in Duitsland en in Linz in Oostenrijk. Het dansen van de 5 Ritmes®, bewegend mediteren, is haar leefstijl geworden.
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