This post will be a little more informal than my last couple, providing a more intimate view of my own personal discoveries and where I currently stand on my own movement journey. I will use this platform not only as an analytical tool for laying the groundwork and ironing out my ideas, but also just to create footnotes and as a personal timeline.
One of the things I always had trouble with was definitions. I didn’t want to be restricted to a single sport, not only in what I did but also in what I could teach others. I didn’t want to be just someone who lifted weights, a climber, a runner or a gymnast. Not only did I find many disciplines interesting and valuable, but I found that definitions restricted me and my own potential. It created boundaries I didn’t want to cross and I see this in people all the time, largely because I fell victim to it myself: the need to label and define.
“This person is a (insert sport) player”
“Build this body using THIS fitness program!”
“I’m not a runner, I could never do that!”
I got so sick of the idea that people couldn’t do something because it’s “not who they were”. Definitions are a plague that create invisible walls between what we are now and what we can become. Because, above all else, what was present in every moment was me. A body. Behind it all I could count on this thing I always had with me.
Ido Portal was my first introduction to movement, and it blew my mind. It was what I was looking for all along. A perspective on the body I always knew was out there somewhere which I needed to discover. Watching some of his flows and leg work and playing with objects. I asked: What was I looking at? What is this? And for the first time I could confidently say,
IT DIDN’T MATTER!
Ido Portal ← (short video of what I’m referring to)
I didn’t need to label it. It wasn’t anything. It was freedom. This was what I was getting at all along. What I want to show people. An expression of the body that didn’t fit inside any box and didn’t feel like it needed to.
Eventually I discovered “movement culture”, and rather than being a sport or specific discipline, is more of an attitude. An openness to learning and exploration of the body and its capabilities. It allows one to borrow and add to his or her toolbox. To build and create as they see fit. Teachers in this space took inspiration from parkour, dance, martial arts, gymnastics and numerous other disciplines but the foundation was and always should be the individual. In this context, it resides closer to the realm of the spiritual, an internal journey of movement.
A practice that seemed to defy definitions, turned out to be a somewhat develop practice known as Movement Culture. And with it came all the baggage of gurus and aesthetics and verified instagram profiles.
Ironically, a practice which was founded upon the desire to remove labels was in fact labeled, introducing the potential to be limiting in nature and turn into the very thing it opposed. Like any concept, capitalism will slowly creep in and demand rigidity and monetisation. In our world nothing gets by without a package it up and sell it attitude. While I think not all attempts in this Movement Culture space have ill intent, I believe we need to be cautious of how far this concept can be taken before it turns into a hollow version of the principles it once stoop upon.
Overall, what discovering this world did was allow me to call myself a practitioner. Defining myself not as the sport I played, but as the body I played IN, made all the difference. Learning and being terrible at somthing no longer held me back, but was a feeling to be chased. For once, I don’t need to box myself in, the goal now was to taste test everything in the world of movement. And the platter was full.
(TLDR: I learned to be silly and goofy and jump around and laugh and I feel way better doing that so I’m gonna keep doing it)
so good! i love how you don’t restrict yourself to being one thing therefore leaving yourself open to grow in the future and explore every facet of what you enjoy :)