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hoop thoughts evolving

i hadn't hoooped much in the past month because I saw it as a really one-dimensional practice as opposed to poi, which are naturally multi-planar and dynamic.

then i saw Hadria Beth's video with my daughter, and we were INSPIRED, and i thought, OK, time to upgrade my skillz. but i also stubbornly wanted the skills to evolve naturally from the core gyrations, as opposed to "studying a trick and trying to emulate it through trial and error." so i put on some good music and every time i wanted to get up and spin, i forced myself to grab a hoop (and go counterclock) instead.



the first thing i realised is: poi has quick recovery from "bops"... hoop recoveries suck, cause the thang drops all the way to the ground. here are the things i thought i could naturally pick up with the practice still being "fun" without too much technical intrusion:

1. hooping to the rhytmn -- this is proving far more difficult than i could imagine. the dang hoop has a mind of its own!

2. clock to counterclock and back again, smooth direction changes

3. DONE - pirouette in same direction as the hoop, so that the relationship between hoop and hooper stays static (the hoop "sticks" to your body in this mode, its pure centrifigal force that keeps it on your body.

4. control the hoop's altitude on the body, i.e. upper chest, belly, lower hips, etc.

5. hoop while running (thanks for the AWESOME visual, carolyn!)

6. hoop while standing on one leg (this direct from my tree yoga practice, see below)

finally, i have foresworn shirts for hooping. the sticktion of hoop to flesh is unparalelled (well, i haven't tried latex yet...)... AND, i LOVE the feeling of that hoop rubbing on my (perpetually sore and cracked) ribs through thin layer of flesh.... better than many massages i'd had!

Yoga 101 - Flow Yoga

I did my first formal yoga class today.

It was great! A full two hours of "flow yoga", which is basically constant movement through the asanas (poses), even when the legs are in a stable base, generally we are moving our hands and torsos in rhytmuc motion syncced with breathing. It was so so so natural... it was also curious that I was one of only 3 men in the class. At times I was shaking with the exertion, and I knew it was good when I lost hearing in my left ear due to bloodflow / oxygen issues. Thats what happens when I get into extreme workout positions, but rarely happens in the gym because of the 1 minute set breaks. I really really enjoyed it and also was pleasantly surprised at how well both my book training and my two burn classes had prepared me for this. The corpse pose at the end rocked my world, i completely relaxed and went into lala land. It was so quiet. Of interest is that many of my free thoughts wandered around Disney and the future of Epcot. I came back into consciousness mere seconds before the soft voice of the instructor came through. Perfect.

Sandy, our teacher, had asked us to set intention with a mudra at the beginning of practice. We then came back to visit that intention again at the end of class and were asked to look at how it might have changed or been manifested. Mine +definitely+ changed. I felt so much more grounded and ready for compassion and green 4th chakra by the end, I felt stable.

She said about 2/3 way through practice that yoga isn't about twisting your body into pretzels, its about learning to stand strong on two feet. I LOVE that thought! That is why I practice.

PS - Tree pose ROCKS!

brains in hands

watching scales of poi, one of the most profound things i heard nick say (and there are many), is that many poi routines are similar to the meditation of "patting your belly while rubbing your head" (or vice versa).

Particularly I have been interested in starting each hand going in a different direction (i.e. same time, opposite direction), and then stalling both simultaneously and smoothly, then performing a double reverse immediately post stall. A stall, however, requires a great deal of feedback between the hand and the poi tension, to pull it off while maintaining perfect string tension... in fact, i often feel my whole body reacting to the stall, stretching and moving to let that ball find its "place", so to do it in two different directions at once presents a good solid challenge, and new learning space, for my body and my brain.

Fun! :)

6 year old alyson is a master

and i, the apprentice. witness the wisdom:

"let me show you my hoop tricks...
and you can also use poi in this context, oK daddy?"

she's already related the two, with no prompting other than practice. yay, ally!

encouragement

This morning I opened my door to find a note that I had a package from FedEx waiting. Yay! So this afternoon after I picked up the kids from school, I sent Alyson into the office to pick up the package. To my surprise and delight, it was from New Zealand!!! Yes, mere days after my order, Home of Poi has shipped me videos and my first pair of LED sock poi, from all the way other side of the planet. Wow!

Alyson and Max were fascinated by what might be in the package, and when i told them "playtoys", they were giddy with anticipation... so of course what did we do after dinner but turn out all the lights and play play play!

We each took turns performing, and when I was in the middle of my set, Alyson cheered "Daddy you are so good with those you should be up on a stage in front of lots of people!" It melted my heart and gave me such a boost of confidence! I'd only performed once in public before in the middle of That Thing in the Desert, and that had been a mildly embarassing set with many "bonks".

So look out world! I have one fan club member already! :)

my next home

home is where the heart is,

however, in this case,
my new home better have 9 foot cielings, at a minimum

i need some FULL RANGE OF MOTION space!!!

what poi can learn from glowsticking

glowstickers use a tremendous amount of contact, close to contact juggling... the glowsticks move all over their entire body.

glowstickers are coming from a place of ecstasy... they are ALWAYS moving to the rhythmn first and foremost.

glowstickers use a large number of wrap / spiral moves where the cord wraps fast then bounces, direction change, spirals back out

glowstickers have an intuitive sense of "persistence of vision" and use that well in their routines.

glowstickers use physcial lock illusions where they "place" a glowstick in a stationery position on their body, then move both their body and the other stick around this "fixed" object... this is actually a technique straight out of mime.

they move those thangs FAST.

oh, neighbors!

one of the more amusing side effects of being both a poi apprentice and a nocturnal human is when my poi or hoop collide violently with the cieling.

I had always considered being on the ground floor of an apartment to be a lower status arrangement... the view is street level, and when the upstairs neighbors dance or jump (or whatever they do) you can hear the thump thump thump. (of course, its easier to get groceries in the house on ground level, hah!)

How unusual it must be to hear the thump thump thump coming from your *floor*! I grimace and laugh lightly when I bop their floor at 4 in the morning... of course they might not be able to hear it with the bass from my house music goin on too! :)

Dancing with Planes

the most fun and chaos im having presently is the issue of "controlling my planes". sometimes i feel like i OWN them and can place them in whatever relationship i want... at other times they seem to completely have minds of their own and defy my every mental /physical suggestion.. either way it makes me laugh.. in the end i think the poi are in fact manifesting our unconscious desires into the material plane and its good to "play" with them like they have volition of their own... this way the poi dance is a living tapestry woven of our conscious decisions (how do i want to move next, what feels good?) and our unconscious motives (independent of what i want, where do the poi want to be right now?).

i'm also getting a real metaphorical hoot out of the chapter called "theory: moving your planes through space" from scales of poi... i couldn't wait, i bought that thing rapido.

Keeping the Dance Alive

i came up with the solution (consider it preventative medicine)
to stay in dance mode and never get overly obsessed with the technical aspects of the poi (a constant temptation).

1. always keep your feet moving (i.e. move your base, keep it dynamic)
2. hop to the beat! (i.e . generally only have one foot on the ground)
3. smile!
4. play in 3space, i.e. hop up on tables, chairs, beds, stairs, anything that can get your body off plane, adding a third dynamic to the physical equation and a spontaneity to your movement.

with these going, its hard to get lost in the tech. dancing ensues!
oh, of course, you've got to have music playing!!! LOUD!

Chris Bailey provides the perfect example:

poi theory, part i

i've been going crazy with the poi for the past few days, and have come up with some fascinating theories.

first of all, poi is a practice, not a theory. so the great thing is, you can try out a new idea, and get IMMEDIATE results confirming or rejecting it OR saying "try that again and this time breath while you're doing it...
---
1. blindfolded poi. Since you know the length (you can feel the air in your face as the balls whoosh by) and you know the velocity (which is a direct function of 2 things: a) the force you feel pulling on your fingertips, and b) the rotational velocity, i.e. how fast that force is rotating around the axis of your fingertips... THEREFOR, you know the exact position of each poi at any second in time... in fact, the complete beauty of this system is, you also CONTROL the future position of the poi. There is little or no data visuals can give you that your fingertips don't already posess... blindfolded can work.

2. the only rule in poi (for purity's sake), is that the chain / line must remain in full tension at all times. in otherwords, the ball must remain a fixed distance (the length of the fully extended chain) from the axis (where your fingertips grip it) ... only exception being when you decide to wrap it in for a buzzsaw, or do a bounce off the thighs or something intentional... This idea flows perfectly into what I believe is the most fascinating piece of teh whol poi puzzle...

3. stalls RULE!!! and near stalls. There are SO many creative ways to do stalls other than simply as a transition between clockwise and counterclock rotations. The stall is the point of ZERO ENERGY, or PURE GRACE. It is a point of PURE STILLNESS in between one dynamic movement and another. It brings a fascinating possibility into the fray:

4. The continual stall. I am considering the possibility that a full tension (see #2, above) could be maintained by moving ones body around a stationery poi ball, as opposed to rotating the ball around a bodily access. Heavier poi would definitely be a bonus in this experiment... (STOP! Theory runs off to check this experientially) ... OK that was a good thought experiment, just tried it for real... basically it works in low orbits, but trying to do a full "levitating" poi in front of my body with arm pulling around is going to take some serious practice, and SPEED. Basically got to beat gravity on the way down, and modulate force the whole time so that the real "stall" is on the bodily bottom of the arc, and the max "force" is at the bodily apogee (opposite of normal poi, go figure)

POSTNOTE on 4: C has told me that this is called an "isolation"... but i'm not going for an isolation, i'm talking about a full stall with the human body orbiting the fixed poi head. isolations "freeze" the gravitational center if the chain between the poi ball and the fingertips. i'm talking, make your arm go in a large orbital circle, while the poi stays absolutely still in center.

So that's Thoughts On Poi, Part I.

BONUS: a fully tensioned poi path will form perfect "french curves"... i.e. continuous functions that can be expressed as bezier curves (via quadratic equations), with a clean and explicit tangent at each and every point on the path, with zero sharp corners or angles.

coming soon:

* poi as swordplay
* why fingertips rule

future investigations:

* light fire
* partner poi