Nia Technique came into my life at the end of the 1990’s while I was in my 30’s. I taught for 1 year then stopped. For 20 years I danced with Nia off & on depending on if I could find classes in different places I lived. And now, I’ve returned home to Nia at almost 60 years old.

When I first first landed in Debbie & Carlos’ classes (the founders), I felt healthy, strong, active, and in a phase of stretching my capacity for happiness. I’d been sober for almost a decade and had quit smoking just a year or two prior. Stress and running on adrenaline with a pretty Yang disposition, emotionally intense & guarded, had been that 30’s expression, with a growing connection to a relationship with God/Source, was where Nia found me.

The draw for me was magnetic to this movement/dance practice. The music created deeper emotional access, the Yin movements slowly softened my armor and many times bringing me to tears in class. Simultaneously, the Yang of martial arts enabled me a new kind of relationship to my fire & grounded my power, not anger. My little girl, whom I was very uncomfortable with, found spaces to come out and play in the free dance segments. These free dance segments during those first few classes left me not knowing what to do, nor how to move without someone telling me. Those initial free-movement experiences had me wanting to run for the hills. But I didn’t. Free dance eventually opened me opened me up into a 5 Rhythms Ecstatic Dance Practice at the same studio. I was freeing up!

Though at first there were some challenging moments in my Nia classes, my heart that was becoming softer, kept calling me back. The expansion of my energy field introduced me to a levity, freedom, & happiness that was brand new to me. My Spirit soared & I deepened more into my body with safety and an inner support that I’d never really known before. I connected to my journey of Soul presence through what for me, has always been a magical system of health & wellness, Nia.

As you may be able to see, for me at this time of life, I knew Nia as a deeply transformational experience. I had no idea how it was happening. I didn’t know the depth that went into the intentions or choreography that made up the classes.

For me Nia was an emotional, spiritual, & healing journey, that had little to do with the physical workout that Nia is! Sure, I loved the conditioning and the strength in my body. I wanted to keep getting healthier and feeling better. My Yang lit up when I got to practice kicks, blocks, and punches. And the surfacing vulnerability of my Yin, felt relief, release, & peace as I learned to soften my muscles and joints, hips & spine, and to feel sensations of watery fluidity pulsing through me.

And, the more I showed up & grew in self-comfort, so much fun was being had … playing, dancing, moving, & exploring who I was through movement.

I was transforming. This year long journey led me to train for in the first level White Belt, to teach Nia for a brief time. I was in love!

Fast forward 20+ years. I realized over the years that we all have different motivations and reasons for working out, beginning our healing practices, tending to our personal needs, listening to our needs for health & vitality, and we come to whatever practice that is right for us, receiving exactly what we need.

Back in the day, I rarely thought about the physical realm of Nia, since I clearly was in need of something else. I knew that I was being led & guided through my personal journey and Nia was a doorway into my spiritual evolution, which it may or may not be for another individual.

Yet, Nia addresses Mind/Body/Emotion/Spirit, a sense of wholeness & coming home to oneself. This is a very common experience, regardless of whatever draws us initially to a health & wellness workout.

Now, at almost 60, I’m landing in the potency of what Nia brings physically. Nia wasn’t/isn’t linear, repetitive, movements, only. We spiral, circle, reach in all directions, move up & down, lengthen & rotate the bones, which supports the muscles, joint, & tissues in remaining supple & strong. This makes Nia an amazing compliment to most all other forms of exercise.

It’s much clearer now to feel the benefits of this practice in my level of strength, joints, mobility, flexibility, agility, reflexivity. The structural alignment modalities that are interwoven into routines as dance/movement, bring so much fun, even as we are creating new self-healing and repatterning in the body. These things were already a lived experience in my past, but not consciously. Yes, they improved as a byproduct of ‘working out,’ however, I didn’t tend to them at that time.

The physical potency of Nia is what really lights me up now at this stage of life! Knowing that the movement patterns & sequences are not only supporting my co-ordination, or my reflexes, but so much more. The choreography is designed to support all of our systems to function optimally.

I know that my brain is increasing in neuroplasticity and that my nervous system is receiving regulation. I can value now, that when we “Look here! … Look there!…Look up! Look down!” we’re getting support for brain function, stress reduction, and posture. In conjunction, we’re increasing brain-eye function, inner ear stimulation, as well as increasing visual processing.

We are doing far more than ‘just dancing’ or working out!

Nia is a beautiful holistic workout for our health & wellbeing, through all stages of life. And, it is also a transformational path for those whose heart & soul may calling out for deeper embodiment.

Living in love with Nia, invites me to live deeper in love with Life & myself.

I’m thrilled when I hear feed back about what benefits they experience after they dance. And, it’s becoming evident in those who have been returning students over last 6 months, the benefits they are having physically, mentally, & emotionally.

I love that they are feeling the love, for whatever Nia is bestowing on them & what they are feeling aligned to step into it as a practice. I love & am honored to be able to share a space for everyone to create their own relationship with Nia as a practice.

Whatever you practice, whatever form of embodiment & connection, may it bring you flourishing & thriving in your life!

You’re invited to join us at The Yoga Room for Nia in Tulsa ~ On -line classes coming soon!

With Love,

Lotus