Meditative Dancing and 'Flow'

This presentation is be a theory-based semi-workshop exploring “meditative dance” and the ‘flow’ state. The presentation begins with an introduction to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s theory on ‘flow,’ and its relationship with meditative practices. It then moves on to explain how this connection relates to the field of dance, by introducing different movement practices which ground themselves on theoretical paradigms paralleling the aforementioned concept of meditative ‘flow.’ It then proposes a descriptive definition of “meditative dance,” which is an extracted essence shared between the previously mentioned movement practices and the act of meditation. After outlining the current research plans,the presenter invited all audience members into the space to explore some simple movement tasks as they contemplate on the essence and effect of “meditative dance.