MINDFUL PRACTICE IN THE CREATIVE SPACE: HEALING ARTS, MUSIC, WRITING, AND COMMUNICATION

​

18/05/2020 - 13h30 – 14h30 https://meet.google.com/fce-eurk-bde

​

The work will be presented in English

​

Synopsis: The participants are faculty at Queensborough Community College, City University of New York. They practice mindfulness and movement in their daily lives and offer practices within their formal learning communities. A hub supports a shared intention; they aspire to nurture their presence to transform their performance in daily life, to make visible their interdependence, and to cultivate care in their communities. This hub brings greater visibility and access to mindfulness within their campus community. They offer these contemplative ‘listening’ practices to restore awareness and equanimity during this trauma, grief, and confusion times. 

​

Coordinator: Heather Huggins - Assistant Professor at City University of New York - Queensborough Community College. She is a social arts facilitator with ImaginAction, and an advanced practitioner of Social Presencing Theater (SPT) at the Presencing Institute. She apprenticed with movement innovator Andrei Droznin, graduating from the Shchukin Institute at the Vakhtangov Theatre in Moscow, Russia. She is also a certified hatha yoga teacher and a graduate of the Interdependence Project’s yearlong mindfulness teacher training program.

​

Participants: 

Art of Healing: Massage Therapy

Dr. Rezan Akpinar

Mindfulness is the foundation of Healing Arts, which defines health as a balanced state of physical, mental and spiritual self that exists within harmony to the outer world. We are the micro-organisms of the macro, our environment. Balancing these components requires a deep understanding of their interconnectedness and how stagnation created in one component will reflect itself to all other components creating positive feedback loops. Society that requires us to learn while compartmentalizing our lives, can create a dissociation of the body-mind complex, and the world around us. In my classes, awareness of this connection through visualization practices increases student understanding of how our emotions create stagnations within the fascial system, creating restrictions at all levels. Mindfulness plays a role in unwinding, that releases these restrictions which give way to new opportunities, new creations and movement. Remembering that we are the universe, and that change within us is the first step of a thousand-mile journey. 

​

Art of Listening: Music

Dr. Joanne Chang

Music performance is about the art of listening. Cultivating listening skills typically train our students listening to the external musical sounds, lyrics, emotions and many other elements. Because our ears are attracted to all types of sound, the consciousness may be ‘impurified’ (The Surangama Sutra, Master Hsuan Hua, 2009). However, if we can turn that listening skill inwardly and direct the attention to listen to our internal innate gifts (buddha nature), we can connect that to the listening of external music - sound and silence. The more students explore and deepen the mindful listening skill, the more aesthetic views towards their music performance would grow. This builds up the connections from the start of contemplative practice, then applications in the listening and performance training, and hopefully finally results in improved student performance quality and appreciation of the beauty in life.
 

Art of Writing: Movement in Composition 

Professor Alison Cimino 

Presently, I am exploring how movement and body-mind awareness can help composition students during this time of remote learning. By investigating ways to integrate a body-mind connection, I create videos and writing prompts for students who are mainly learning asynchronously. My goal is to integrate mindfulness, somatic movement, and arts integrated learning into my first year English Composition courses. Understanding aspects of the body has been helpful in affirming the need to deepen my own understanding of body-mind awareness. Working with Social Presencing Theater has also offered additional tools in deepening mindfulness practice for students. With each conversation I discover ways to include body-mind awareness to my lessons and consequently reshape my focus towards compassionate teaching and self-care. 
 

Art of Communication: Performance in Everyday Life

Professor Heather Huggins

In my performance and communication courses, I offer mindfulness and movement practices to cultivate our capacity for chaos, so we may work directly with our experience, rather than habitually turning away. I integrate spatial awareness, yoga, Theory U’s Levels of Listening, and Social Presencing Theater (see visuals 1 and 2 and 3). I have begun incorporating my colleagues’ suggestions into my courses and daily life. Joanne and Rezan shared ideas for working with urban living, illuminating the relationship between our inner and outer space through transformative rituals. Alison and I share a passion for arts-based teaching, language, and embodiment; her insights fortify my choices across courses, including integrating resources on poetry of witness.