These are Siva's times...

Photo: Geoffrey Dunn

Siva is the movement of these days. He is the enigmatic union of mental and embodied consciousness as the language of this state of being which is dance.

Siva to me is a very personal practice. He has been in my consciousness ever since I was aware, which is not unusual as my life has been that of dance. However Siva has been more than just the usual deity of dance. I have sensed in Him a consciousness that keeps me company through my very human fallibilities. Because Siva is often fallible Himself.

The Goddesses can be intimidating in their ferocious chaos, but Siva’s chaos is intimate. As His ancient ancestor Rudra suggests, the struggle of the flow between separation and union, is at once human and Divine. Rudra is the great howler, whose cry pierces the ancient night. That cry is our cry for union, celebrated as a Deity. Siva suggests that to have this cry or yearning within us is the divine state of being. It is not about “solving” the cry, but simply dancing its full wildness and beauty.

I have found in my practice of Siva a deep sense of acceptance of my frailties. I feel that it’s okay to ebb and flow, to weep, to destroy the universe through dance and to also celebrate it through dance. There is no hierarchy here—simply a spaciousness that can hold all of these sensations as Siva’s dance.

When I dance Siva I feel He holds the ocean of my consciousness with the greatest of compassion. Siva puts the passion in compassion—this is His dance. He reminds us that to embody the Divine is to be passionate, intimate, intense and aesthetic. It is not a practice of withdrawal and austerity. What appears austere to our minds is the intensity of intimate attention—the truth that the movement of the universe is deep within us and not light years away.

As the eternal desire for the Goddess and the union with the Goddess in the same body, Siva is the heartbeat of Reality as dance. He emerges in these times to invite us to be visceral in our divinity, to dance our pleasure and to celebrate the beauty that Earth/Goddess so generously continues to hold even in the midst of chaos.