Getting down with the divine: what does a rock concert have in common with ancient African dance traditions? A chance to heal and connect through ecstatic expression

Natural Health, June, 2004 by Eric Hiss

It's a feeling that's totally in the moment, linked by the rhythm of a collective energy. Maybe you felt it at a Grateful Dead concert, as you whirled in a free-form dance that seemed to go on for hours--or in church, when a gospel song made you stomp and jump with the rest of the congregation.

This kind of transcendence--linked to movement and community--can be traced to an ancient society still active just a hop, skip, ocean and desert away, says Bradford P. Keeney, Ph.D., distinguished scholar of cultural studies at Ringing Rocks Foundation, an organization that supports global healing wisdom. Repeated journeys to the vast, untamed Kalahari in Southern Africa have made Keeney both an initiate and expert in the ways of the nomadic people called the Bushmen, whose healing practices center around dance. What Keeney learned from them is the power of dance to distill subtle energies into a tangible force that can heal, purify and potentially take us to higher realms of consciousness.

Around fires flickering across the desert, small clans gather to dance. Part Saturday-night blowout, part church social and part healing ritual, dance in the Bushmen's lives has no limitations and no separation of purpose. They believe that if they don't dance, they will become sick and their group will be negatively affected.

The dancing is sex-differentiated. The women's dance, known as !gwa, revolves around a type of plant by the same name. Pulling energy up from the ground, the women begin to shake first at their feet, and then up through their bodies as the movement intensifies and they tap into energy called n/om, which Keeney compares to kundalini, the Hindu concept of a divine energy released upward in the body through yogic practices.

Shaman men in the tribe move around in a circle, stomping to stir up what they call "nails and arrows" of energy resting in their bellies. When the "nails" get hot, they turn to steam, rise up the sharmans' spines and exit out the tops of their heads. As the steam cools, it becomes "arrows" that fall to the ground and re-enter through the shamans' feet, allowing the energy to continue cycling through them in the same manner.

For the Bushmen, this is ultimately about a healing connection with God, their ancestors and one another. "This is arguably the oldest civilization on the planet, with these dances recorded on petrogiyphs," says Keeney. "There's been a long time for the dance to evolve into such a sophisticated form of healing."

let the drums roll

The Western tendency is to stay still, says Keeney. "When we're ill, we're always told that we need to rest and take medication to calm down, even when we want to get up and move around. Eastern disciplines also try to settle you, to quiet the mind. In Africa, they say, 'Dance out of your mind, get excited, let the drums roll.'"

The two approaches aren't necessarily in opposition. If you dance until you can't move anymore, you're in the same state of mind you can achieve with meditation, Keeney notes.

The Bushmen cycle through states of ecstatic excitation, exhaustion and deep relaxation, all of which can faciliate visions. This may happen two or three times per night, with the healing cycle transitioning several times from a peak of arousal to a plateau of stillness.

Aroused states remain taboo in the West. "We think of jumping, shaking bodies from Africa or the African diaspora as people going mad or being in an evil possession state," says Keeney. "We have to get over that. It's natural. Every human body, when freed to move to these rhythms, can trigger automatisms [actions not controlled by the will] to benefit the health and psyche."

Rock concerts, gospel services, raves or Brazil's Carnaval invite us to the threshold of ecstatic expression, but it's up to us to see how far we want to take it. At our roots, we are all tribal people, and dancing for healing and community connects us to our fundamental nature.

"We always feel that we've got to be cool, to move a certain way, to look beautiful when we dance," Keeney says. "Forget that. If it grabs you, let it move you."

"Community is one of our core, and all healthy communities have music, dancing and ways of creating rhythm together," says Kenya S. Masala, director of the Source Consulting Group in Austin, Texas, which facilitates community-building using drumming and rhythm-based activities. "When we're creating rhythm, we create a sense of connection; we're sharing without words."

get the experience

For more information about healing dances, there are two references available through the Ringing Rocks Foundation (ringingrocks.org), both edited by Bradford P. Keeney, Ph.D.: Kalahari Bushman Healers, which comes with a CD, and Ropes to God: Experiencing the Bushman Spiritual Universe, which has a DVD.

You can get a sense of ecstatic expression by dancing to hypnotic, tribal rhythms you enjoy. Find CDs of music from Africa at africanmusichub.com, or from all over the world at music-mosaic.com.

Many health clubs offer African dance classes, some accompanied by drummers. One such chain is Crunch; see crunch.com for locations.