Rated G
Hooping (a.k.a. hula-hooping or hoop dancing) is one of my favorite and most regular movement practices. If a day goes by when I haven't hooped for at least 30 minutes, I miss it terribly! Sometimes I hoop in front of a movie or while listening to music in my living room. I hoop inside and outside, to music or silence, with others or alone. Sometimes I go up to Weaver Street Market on Sunday mornings or Thursday evenings to hoop (or even just watch the hoop dancers there--another way to enjoy!) I have also hooped at events organized by a local hoop-dance queen, Julia Hartsell (aka Jewels). Watching Julia dance is stunning. She has some videos up on her profile on Tribe.net that I encourage you to watch. But don't let her skill put you off--you don't have to have to look as graceful as she does to enjoy hooping. My only skill is being able to keep the hoop from falling, and yet I love just letting the hoop glide around my middle.
For one thing, hooping is great exercise. After hooping for a year, I have muscles in my abdomen that I can palpate for the first time in my life. Hooping can be an aerobic workout if I do it vigorously enough. Just staying in shape, through any method, is an important part of nurturing sexual energy. We feel sexier when our bodies get to move on a regular basis!
But, for me, hooping can be more than exercise because it is an activity which lends itself so naturally to sexual embodiment practice. A few weeks ago, I wrote that what makes an activity an embodiment practice is "intent" and "focus." Describing my hooping practice is a good place to highlight what I mean. When I hoop in front of the television, my attention is largely focused on what is on the screen. During these times, hooping is physical "exercise"--a very worthwhile thing to do, but different in some fundamental respects from what I call an "embodiment practice." Most of the time, in fact, I hoop as exercise because I choose to focus my attention on watching a movie, talking with friends, or enjoying other hoop dancers when I am out in a group. Hooping as exercise nurtures my sexual self by building energy and facilitating movement in the hip and genital area, or "2nd chakra," the center of sexual and creative energy. Now that I hoop regularly, I have more flow, muscle control, and range of motion in my hips when I dance and have sex. Plus, it is just plain fun.
On the other hand, sometimes I do "practice embodiment" with my hoop; I do so when my attention is focused on my body, the hoop and the contact we make together in the movement. That doesn't mean my attention doesn't wander, as it often does. Remember, this is a "practice" not a "perfection." But when my intent is to practice being in my body and my focus is on my body, the movement, and whatever my body is coming into contact with (whether a hoop, the air, the earth, another person, etc.) then I am practicing embodiment.
At this point, I have never actually taken a class--I just bought my hoop and play on my own. But classes and opportunities for hooping in community abound. You can hoop at the Shakori Hills Music Festival in October or at various hooping events which Julia organizes. If you want a class, Julia teaches at Carolina Fitness in Carrboro and UNC Wellness Center in Chapel Hill. In fact, on Sept 12, 19, 26 the classes at Carolina Fitness are FREE to public. I will be at these, just to see if I might want to start taking classes and improving my skills as well. Hooping around my waist and hips is lots of fun, but I am starting to want to explore a bit more and am finding that I need a bit of help to do so.
Jonathan Baxter also teaches classes at Balanced Movement Studio in Carrboro--one of my favorite places to move.
I encourage folks to purchase hoops made for an adult instead of a cheap kid's hula-hoop at Walmart. Hoops made for adults are heavier and larger which make them MUCH easier to use--in fact, the bigger and heavier the hoop, the easier it will be to keep it moving when you first begin. It is definitely worth the $25-35 investment to get one that is well made and that fits your body. Mine even has water inside the hoop to add weight, and I enjoy hearing the flow of the water as I move. I ordered mine from Spiral in Carrboro, and I am very pleased with the quality. You can also email Juila (at hoopflow@gmail.com) to be added to her mailing list or to order one of her lovely hoops.
Go hoop and have fun!!!
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Hooping (a.k.a. hula-hooping or hoop dancing) is one of my favorite and most regular movement practices. If a day goes by when I haven't hooped for at least 30 minutes, I miss it terribly! Sometimes I hoop in front of a movie or while listening to music in my living room. I hoop inside and outside, to music or silence, with others or alone. Sometimes I go up to Weaver Street Market on Sunday mornings or Thursday evenings to hoop (or even just watch the hoop dancers there--another way to enjoy!) I have also hooped at events organized by a local hoop-dance queen, Julia Hartsell (aka Jewels). Watching Julia dance is stunning. She has some videos up on her profile on Tribe.net that I encourage you to watch. But don't let her skill put you off--you don't have to have to look as graceful as she does to enjoy hooping. My only skill is being able to keep the hoop from falling, and yet I love just letting the hoop glide around my middle.
For one thing, hooping is great exercise. After hooping for a year, I have muscles in my abdomen that I can palpate for the first time in my life. Hooping can be an aerobic workout if I do it vigorously enough. Just staying in shape, through any method, is an important part of nurturing sexual energy. We feel sexier when our bodies get to move on a regular basis!
But, for me, hooping can be more than exercise because it is an activity which lends itself so naturally to sexual embodiment practice. A few weeks ago, I wrote that what makes an activity an embodiment practice is "intent" and "focus." Describing my hooping practice is a good place to highlight what I mean. When I hoop in front of the television, my attention is largely focused on what is on the screen. During these times, hooping is physical "exercise"--a very worthwhile thing to do, but different in some fundamental respects from what I call an "embodiment practice." Most of the time, in fact, I hoop as exercise because I choose to focus my attention on watching a movie, talking with friends, or enjoying other hoop dancers when I am out in a group. Hooping as exercise nurtures my sexual self by building energy and facilitating movement in the hip and genital area, or "2nd chakra," the center of sexual and creative energy. Now that I hoop regularly, I have more flow, muscle control, and range of motion in my hips when I dance and have sex. Plus, it is just plain fun.
On the other hand, sometimes I do "practice embodiment" with my hoop; I do so when my attention is focused on my body, the hoop and the contact we make together in the movement. That doesn't mean my attention doesn't wander, as it often does. Remember, this is a "practice" not a "perfection." But when my intent is to practice being in my body and my focus is on my body, the movement, and whatever my body is coming into contact with (whether a hoop, the air, the earth, another person, etc.) then I am practicing embodiment.
At this point, I have never actually taken a class--I just bought my hoop and play on my own. But classes and opportunities for hooping in community abound. You can hoop at the Shakori Hills Music Festival in October or at various hooping events which Julia organizes. If you want a class, Julia teaches at Carolina Fitness in Carrboro and UNC Wellness Center in Chapel Hill. In fact, on Sept 12, 19, 26 the classes at Carolina Fitness are FREE to public. I will be at these, just to see if I might want to start taking classes and improving my skills as well. Hooping around my waist and hips is lots of fun, but I am starting to want to explore a bit more and am finding that I need a bit of help to do so.
Jonathan Baxter also teaches classes at Balanced Movement Studio in Carrboro--one of my favorite places to move.
I encourage folks to purchase hoops made for an adult instead of a cheap kid's hula-hoop at Walmart. Hoops made for adults are heavier and larger which make them MUCH easier to use--in fact, the bigger and heavier the hoop, the easier it will be to keep it moving when you first begin. It is definitely worth the $25-35 investment to get one that is well made and that fits your body. Mine even has water inside the hoop to add weight, and I enjoy hearing the flow of the water as I move. I ordered mine from Spiral in Carrboro, and I am very pleased with the quality. You can also email Juila (at hoopflow@gmail.com) to be added to her mailing list or to order one of her lovely hoops.
Go hoop and have fun!!!
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3 comments:
Beautifully written Amy. Thank you so much for blogging about hooping. I appreciate your complements and attempt to spread the hoop bliss.
Just recently, I decided to spend a practice solely hooping around my waist with a bigger hoop than I generally use these days. It felt sooo delicious. It's amazing how much energy gets stirred up in the 2nd chakra from core hooping. The seemingly subtle differences of keeping the feet apart or together make tremendous differences in the energetic experience. The closer they are together, the more the hips have to circle creating an even greater rush of energy through the entire region.
There are, for sure, many ways that hooping may enhance one's sex life and make a hooper feel very sexy. In fact, hooping gets quite sexualized in various circles of the hoop community. However, there are also times that hooping both creates & *fulfills* a sexual desire for me. Because I spend quite a lot of creative and physical energy in my hoops, I can feel quite satisfied at times after hooping. (A past boyfriend used to get jealous of my hoop practice;- ) There is a bliss that can be achieved from hooping that is quite magical and incredibly sensual. I always go back to my academic study of mystics who are depicted in or describe states of religious ecstasy in sexualized terms. I can't seem to predict or control them, but there are moments, "jewels" of hoop bliss, that are so tickling and amazing that, when graced by them, sex pales. Not that hooping takes the place of sex, but it offers a way to feel good and sexually charged and nourished for and by oneself.
Hope to see you in class. I'm a little worried about the gym too. But it's a nice room when you're protected in your hoop zone. We'll see how the crowd is and perhaps move to another location if the fitness vibe too distracting.
There is a bliss that can be achieved from hooping that is quite magical and incredibly sensual...I can't seem to predict or control them, but there are moments, "jewels" of hoop bliss, that are so tickling and amazing...
I have not had this experience with hooping specifically, but I relate to what you are talking about here. It is what I call "flow," when I am so completely embodied that time, space and thought seem to become irrelevant. This happens most easily for me doing Continuum Movement, often while dancing, having sex, and creating goal-less art. As a "thinker," it always feels like "grace"--another connection to the mystics--to become so immersed in what I am doing that I "get out of my head." At those times, somatic cliches come in handy; I am "fully present," "in the moment," "in my body," and "grounded and centered."
I recently came across the word "autotelic," and it is another good way to describe what I mean by "the flow." An autotelic activity is one in which the value of the activity is contained in the activity itself, rather than in any goal being achieved by the activity. I feel satisfied simply in doing the activity itself--"the flow."
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