Aligned with fear, aligned with life and death

I work with midwives and social workers. So every week I have several clients coming to sessions paralyzed or in shock, because in their daily lives they have to deal with very difficult and sometimes life-threatening situations. Often, they are frozen in their bodies, with an expression of fear in their faces, not breathing well. I see two ways they have learned to deal with fear: either they get stuck in their initial reaction to fear and freeze, or they avoid feeling that they are intensely afraid. In both cases, their thinking, talking, moving and action is limited. Their profession, however, requires action; they need to be able to help the people who need it. My job is primarily to show them a new way of dealing with fear so they have all their abilities available for these critical moments that require it. Fear is an experience most of us […]

Daring to be real on stage – Bodywork for actors

A good actor is good at being real. I love the theater, because I enjoy watching the actors. A good play in my opinion is not depending on the text or the aesthetic components, but most of all on the physicality and the liveliness of the actors. I like listening to complicated thoughts on stage, if I can feel that the actor is actually thinking them in that very moment. And I love watching movements, if I can feel that they are filled with meaning. Detecting the emotional relationships between the characters on stage, if the actors are daring to allow those emotions to be there in that moment, is an amazing experience. Being real is what makes a good actor. I teach people to be real, how to be themselves without fighting against it. In general, physical therapy is a wonderful learning tool for actors, because their bodies are […]