Present: Art of living questions for Biodanza practitioners

Art of living questions

Inviting questions to help make your life a masterpiece

Introduction

Your own life is the most important work of art that you will ever create. It is your life´s work. Sometimes we tend to forget that. We live our life a bit dull, mediocre, lethargic, normal, and maintaining. But your life is not just something. There´s no one like you, nobody can play your leading part the way you can. Nobody has your special combination of talent, inspiration, flair, wisdom, adventurousness and love the way you have. Your life is the poem you write, the painting you paint, the song you sing, de movie you direct, the dance you dance for the world to receive as a gift. And it´s your work of art if you give it your attention or if you don´t. So why not put in all your inspiration and soul into it? The world yearns for your masterpiece, otherwise you wouldn’t exist.

For these inspiration cards I was inspired by the art of living and wisdom of Rolando Toro the South American creator of Biodanza. A method for human integration and art of living that uses music, movement, contact and experiencing. When you already practice this method the cards can help you to enrich your life. Have you never heard of Biodanza, than these cards can inspire you to lead a lush, loving, creative, soulful life? (And maybe, find out about Biodanza and try it for yourself?)

Your life and the masterpiece it is, is to beautiful not to be true. Make your life come true, day after day. I support you! Saskia de Bruin

See the light in the other
Enlight what is still dark
In the other and in yourself
Rolando Toro (founder of Biodanza)

Light reveals you....

The Questions

Ask yourself as often as possible: how can it get any better than this? Don´t think up an answer. Let the answer appear naturally. Sometimes life gives you the answer. Listen carefully.

Whenever you move, make something, work, love someone, or think something up, ask yourself: how can this be lighter, more fun, gentler, freer, more spacious or more loving? Life itself and your body will definitely react with an answer. It is your job to open a space by asking the question. The answer will appear naturally through the opening you created by asking the question.

Choose one question everyday. Write about it, think about it, or dance with it. Here they are: 

Nature is sacred and precious. How can you give more attention and awareness to that notion? How can you cherish and look after life in yourself and in everything that surrounds you?

We are wonders of nature. We are nature ourselves, just as all of life around us. How can you experience that oneness of man and nature more? Perhaps you need more silence calmness or reflection?

Have you ever experienced something numinous or sacred in nature? Can you create more possibilities for such experiences? How?

Have you ever felt really one with the whole? With life, the Universe, the cosmos, or whatever you name it? How did this affect you? What do you need to experience this oneness more often?

Life was never mended to be a struggle. Life is lush, juicy, lively, enjoyable, joyful, and funny. Look at nature. How can you make your life more juicy and succulent?

Have you ever experienced great pleasure or ecstasy? How and when? Are you allowed to experience joy and ecstasy? How can you give yourself more permission to enjoy yourself and your life intensely?

Have you ever danced so wonderful that you forgot yourself and were totally into the music, the movement, the dance? What do you need to dance more often and to find more pleasure in dancing freely?

Have you ever considered yourself as free, wild, and untamed? No? What tamed you? What do you need to become your wild and free natural self again?

The original meaning of the word enthusiasm is “fulfilled with God”, inspired, lively, thrilled, exuberant and motivated. How is it with your enthusiasm? Do you feel impassioned enough in your life? How can you make more room for enthusiasm in your life?

Sensuality. Do you know it, do you feel it, can you be it, is it allowed? Being sensual means experience pleasure and enjoy thing with all your senses. Do you enjoy tasting, smelling, feeling, hearing, seeing? Are you allowed to have lusts and to fulfill them? Can you give yourself even more permission?

If you want life to be a party, you have to put up the garlands yourself. Do you decorate and garnish life, yourself and others enough? What can you do today to make your life more festive?

We all have basic natural instincts. Instincts to love, to eat, to enjoy, having sex, to sleep, to travel. Do you trust your instincts? What do you need to trust them even more?

Touching and being touched is a deep need for every living creature. Without touch we slowly begin to die. Is there enough contact and touch in your life? How can you give more attention to touching and being touched? How can you give more permission for the need to be touched in yourself and others?

Music, song, poetry and art have magic powers. They can touch your soul en change something deep and essential in yourself. Have you ever experienced something like that? How can you open up more for that possibility? And how can you develop your own magic power?

Music is a language that we all can understand and that can transform us. Is there music that has this affect on you? Can you yourself make music or sing? Can you make some space for the power and beauty of music today?

Music and poetry can move you deeply. They can help you overcome difficulties. Have you ever experienced this? Which music and poetry has helped you? How can you open up more for the tender force of this art?

Music can help you to relax, to move, to feel, to make contact, to enjoy, to surrender. Can you find music today that has this effect on you? Can you listen to it and receive the effect?

Learning to love is the most importance lesson in this life. Learning to love is the most importance lesson in this life.  Love is all that counts.  What can you do today to bring more love into this world? In yourself as well as all around you.

Gentleness, where have you found it, felt it, seen it, gave it? Today look for gentleness. Look carefully and find gentleness in the most unlikely places. When there´s none, bring it there yourself.

Mercifulness is showing compassion for people who have a hard time. It is something else than rescuing, giving advice, cheering up, trivialize or condoning. It is feeling sympathy en give something that the other really needs. Can you expand your compassion today?

Respect is reverence. Can you feel reverence for people who are socially weaker? How can you show this reverence in your life? Are you capable of giving to life from unpretentiousness and humbleness?

Love is all we need. Every person you meet has love to give and has a need for love. How is your ability to love? How can you grow your heart bit wider and bigger today?

To differentiate is to make distinctions. There is differentiated love (the love for a particular person) and there is undifferentiated love (love for people in general, without distinctions). Do you know both kinds of love? Can you expand your ability for both kinds of love? What do you need to do so?

There are a couple of very important questions in your life: Who are you? What do you want to do? With whom do you want to be? Where do you want to live? Do you know your own answers to these questions? Can you take a small step in that direction today?

Instead of investigating your unhappiness, your flaws, your damages and your imperfections, you can also boost the vital, healthy part in yourself. You can feed, encourage, expand, protect and give space to that healthy part. Go and find your little pilot light and give it more fuel. What does it need?

Eco-factors are factors that surround and affect your well-being and welfare. There are positive and negative eco-factors. (Culture, people, religion, weather, sounds, smells, atmosphere, etc) What kind of factors surrounds you? What in your environment supports you and what doesn´t? How can you surround yourself more often with positive eco-factors? How can you be a positive eco-factor for others?

There are 5 important potential human qualities: vitality, affectivity, creativity, sexuality, transcendence. You can use and develop them or ignore and neglect them. Which quality do you recognize in yourself? Which one is new for you? Which quality needs more exploration?

Vitality is health, lust for life, being able to move with strength, energy, liveliness. Do you experience enough vitality? How do you take care of your own vitality? What can you do to reinforce and support your vitality?

Affectivity is contact, connection, love, friendship, solidarity, tenderness, the ability to encounter other people, respect and deep cordiality. Do you experience enough affectivity? How do you take care of your own affectivity? What can you do to reinforce and support your affectivity?

Creativity is expression, fantasy, renewal, spontaneity, growth, innovation, healthy change, create something inventiveness. Do you experience enough creativity? How do you take care of your own creativity? What can you do to reinforce and support your creativity?

Sexuality is enjoying, pleasure, delight, fun, desire, experience joy with your senses, sexual pleasure, the ability to give and receive, sensuality, attraction and reproduction. Do you experience enough sexuality? How do you take care of your own sexuality? What can you do to reinforce and support your sexuality?

Transcendence is your connection with nature, feeling part of the whole, your union with all living things, expanded consciousness, transcend your ego and integration with humanity, nature and the universe. Do you experience enough transcendence? How do you take care of your own transcendence? What can you do to reinforce and support your transcendence?

Pleasure is essential in life. When pleasure is difficult for you, you have a huge problem. What can you do today to train your pleasure muscles? How can you enjoy daily pleasures much more? Which senses can you involve more to experience pleasure?

A beautiful sentence of Anna Terruwe is this: “You have the permission to be the way you are, to become who you already are, but cannot yet be. You can become yourself in your own way and in your own time”. What do you need to really say this to yourself? What would it mean when you could?

Are you a person of earth? Do you recognize these qualities? Being in the here and now, firmness, realism, the concrete, the primitive, the base, being home, presence, matter, cohesion, being centered, being able to offer security and certainty, being able to support, envelopment, deep connection to the self. How can you bring more earth in your life?

Are you a person of fire? Do you recognize these qualities? Warmth, impulse to action, expression, play, passion, enthusiasm, determination, strength, intensity, deep longing, action, focus, potency, assertiveness, courage, healthy aggression. How can you bring more fire in your life?

Are you a person of air? Do you recognize these qualities? Expansion, inspiration, harmony, spirit, freedom and liberation, lightness, dreams, sensitivity, romance, breath, wisdom, travelling, softness, sweetness, the voice, fluid movements, the mind, tenderness, delicacy. How can you bring more air in your life?

Are you a person of water? Do you recognize these qualities? Relaxation, dissolving, enjoying, fluency, elegance, purity, pleasure, delight, melting, merging, letting go of control, surrender, the inner, receptivity, bodily sensitivity, uniting, adjustment, adaptation, being able to fill up emptiness, emotions, sensuality, continuity. How can you bring more water in your life?

Yin is the counter force of Yang. You can consider it as the feminine, receptiveness, the moon, inspiration, the earth, silence, tranquility, breathing in, to receive, inwards, inside, surrender. Do you recognize these qualities in yourself? How could you cultivate your Yin? Yin power needs trust, do you have that?

Yang is the counter force of Yin. You can consider it as the male, pervasiveness, the sun, heaven, movement, action, breathing out, creation, outwards, outside, the will. Do you recognize these qualities in yourself? How could you cultivate your Yang? Yang power needs courage, do you have that?

Do you know this experience: being totally in the now, blend into the thing you do, experience the moment fully, not “doing” but “being”, being in a flow, feeling intensely alive? Some call this Floe, Erlebnis or Vivencia. You cannot force this possibility only make it possible. How can you create more chances for this vivacity?

Do you want to feel more alive? Then today ask these questions a couple of times: How am I in this moment? How do I feel in this moment?  How is my breathing? Can I acknowledge these sensations, without analyzing or trying to understand? Can I give “what is” permission to exist? Feeling is more important than thinking!

How would it be, if you were the right hand of love? How could you know that you´re not? In what ways can you bring love visible, palpable, tangible, concrete, clear, explicit, creative, personal and playful in the world? What can you do at this moment? Micro love is as valuable as micro love!

The attitude of not judging consists of: awareness, postponing judgment, perceiving with interest, being curious, not labeling, not divide into good and bad, not judging your judgments. Can you practice this attitude today by giving it extra attention?

The attitude of patience consists of: accept that things need time to unfold, giving space to yourself and others, don´t force anything, being open for every moment. Can you practice this attitude today by giving it extra attention?

The attitude of openness consists of: watching with fresh eyes, looking as if you see everything for the first time, experience the richness of every moment, daring to be a beginner, watching without expectations and opinions, experience every moment as unique, knowing that each moment is perfect for beginning, letting go of what you “know”. Can you practice this attitude today by giving it extra attention?

The attitude of trusting consists of: developing faith in your own feelings, wisdom and goodness, listening to your body and soul, be yourself, being open to the inside. Can you practice this attitude today by giving it extra attention?

The attitude of not striving consists of: doing nothing else but being yourself, less effort and more being, giving attention to “what is” instead of striving for a goal or results, see and accept things as they are. Can you practice this attitude today by giving it extra attention?

The attitude of acceptance consists of: seeing things as they are in this moment, reconcile with what is, relaxing by letting go of resistance and forcing and wrestling, not the same as resigning, it’s acknowledging, observing and living each moment, focusing your attention to the present. Can you practice this attitude today by giving it extra attention?

The attitude of letting go consists of: not attaching, leaving things as they are,  holding nothing, not pushing things away, observing your attachments so mindfully that it alters in letting go,  paying attention, something you do each night when you fall asleep. Can you practice this attitude today by giving it extra attention?

Being really fully present, in yourself, with others, in activity, in contact, in nature is a quality that needs practice. Ask yourself every hour this question: “how present am I in this moment? Expand your presence this way.

Everything that is genuine whispers to you. Your soul, your heart, love, inspiration, wisdom, nature, insights. To hear the whispering you need silence. Are you silent enough? Or do you run from it? Sometimes you can enter into silence more easily with beautiful music, a poem, nature, movement, writing, contact. Can you open yourself for silence today en listen carefully inside?

Being available is the most beautiful present you can ever give someone. Are you available for yourself and the people around you? What is in the way? How can you expand your availability?

***** You can print these questions, use them, share them. But please put the name of this blog with them. 

With love Saskia de Bruin