Category Archives: improvisation life

Mar15

horses helping horses

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DSC01839

Here is some new information from our website about how I am working with horses, riders, and equine-centered organizations.

Horses Helping Horses is a program that uses performance and educational programming to raise awareness about compassionate, mindful equine practices rooted in the shared language of movement and touch. Paula Josa-Jones/Performance Works works with equine-centered organizations of all kinds to develop compassionate outreach programming that expresses the heart of the horse. Working with equine partners as both teachers and performers, we offer a wide range of programming options, including:

If you are interested in any of these possibilities, please Contact Paula.  

You can also make a DONATION to support this work — Your contribution helps us to make this work available to more equine-centered organizations.  Thank you!

 

 

 

Feb26

riding: the horses, the river

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IMG_3032Sanne, ridden by Brandi Rivera

I just posted a new page on my website, called THE HORSES.  I wanted to share a bit more information about my equine collaborators, Capprichio, Amadeo and Sanne. All three have worked with me in performances, and all three are my co-therapists in my Somatic Experiencing/equine therapy practice.  Each one is so unique, so clear in what they bring to a session or a dance.

As I wrote the page, I wondered, is this confusing?  I am sending out appeals for the INDIEGOGO campaign for RIVER/BODY, the dance that I am creating in the Housatonic River this summer.  Then I am posting about my equine work.  Soon I will be telling you about some solo performances coming up this summer, and announcing a book talk or a podcast.

I don’t feel the separation among these, but more and more feel the flow of connection among them and the way that they intersect and support each other. I can feel  how one led inevitably and naturally to the next, and then back again.

Many years ago I was privileged to take a 10-day Delicious Movement Workshop training with Eiko & Koma.  It changed forever the way I experience and understand movement.  During the workshop, Eiko said that she does not commute from her work to her daily life.  I realized that I did a lot of commuting and compartmentalizing, and separating.  In saying that, she helped me to find the deeper rhythms that underlie all that engages me.

Now, as I am expanding my private work, and entering the waters of a new dance, I am listening for the connections.  What is it to enter and hold the river of the horses’s movement and body within the banks of my own? How can I ride and be ridden by the river?  How can I support others’ capacity to connect with the deeper currents underneath that which seems to separate us?  What is this common body that we share?

DSC03869 dancer Amy Wynn in the Housatonic

 

Jan31

inspired conversations

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I had the pleasure of speaking to Amy Schuber for her PODCAST, Inspired Conversations.

We talked about some of the following:

  • Embodiment as a conscious flowing awareness of inner and outer experiencing.
  • Orienting to pleasure and how horses can help us
  • Inter-species communication through the shared language of movement and touch
  • Consciously moving toward greater expansion and flow in our lives
  • Gaining access to more of our creative selves
  • How we can open to the unexpected, and have a more improvisational, playful relationship to life
  • How our relationships (human and equine) are about reciprocity: the balance between giving and receiving

I hope that you enjoy listening.  Don’t hesitate to contact me with the email link below if you have questions or would like to schedule a session in my studio, at the stable or via Skype.