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Enthusiastic Fiery Engagement
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“When you’ve lived entire decades in survival mode, it’s hard to know who you really are.
Your ways of coping become how you see yourself.
We can find ourselves in a constant state of hyper vigilance, feeling anxious and wanting to control circumstances, people, or things.
If this sounds familiar, it might lead you to believe you’re controlling and anxious.
Or if you find yourself shut down and guarded, you might tell yourself that you’re standoffish, uncaring, or cold (maybe others have described you this way).
...if you’re living in activated or shutdown nervous system states for too long, you can conflate the sensations in your body, the burdens you carry, and your coping mechanisms with your personality.
But you are not the burdens you’re carrying.
When you’ve carried them long enough, though, you might believe they’re who you are.
I invite you to ask yourself:
- Who would I be if I weren’t carrying the messages I’ve internalized from the outside world?
- What does my liberation look and feel like?
- What would I be doing differently if I felt safe?”
- Natalie Y. Gutiérrez, LMFT,
Author of The Pain We Carry: Healing from Complex PTSD for People of Color
Thursday, October 20, 2022
 I am so thankful to Natalie Y. Gutierrez for writing this book excerpted above and to New Harbinger Publications for publishing it. Released on October 1st, I preordered it and have been reading it slowly. It’s filled with so much supportive wisdom, guided mindfulness practices and journaling/reflection prompts. Most of all, it’s gentle while not compromising depth.
I have learned most of the material shared in the book in my somatic therapy training (SomaSoul) through the Leven Institute for Expressive Movement. My teachers in the program are wonderful and I have learned a ton from them and from my fellow trainees.
Like many somatic programs, it is a largely white-bodied community of students. While I can relate to many of their life experiences, this particular book centers and brings to life my personal experiences as a person of color/culture (shoutout to Resmaa Menakem for the term person of culture) devoted to working, as a somatic therapist and educator, with other people of color/culture. It prioritizes my cultural lens and for that I am profoundly grateful. I feel seen, understood, and supported. It will be a central book in my therapy practice. This is the book I've needed and wanted for a very long time. I highly recommend it!
More reflections on the book will come in the months to come. For now, it's enough to hold the book in my hand and feel the merging between two languages I love - somatic therapy and cultural identity.
Afro Latin and Cafe Con Libros are hosting a virtual conversation between Natalie Gutierrez and Tasha Hunter on Tuesday, November 1, 2022 at 7:00PM Eastern. Via Crowdcast.
Register: https://www.crowdcast.io/e/pain-we-carry/register
 This is a shorter newsletter :) We are busy getting ready to leave early next week for Florida where we will be celebrating my mother-in-law's 85 birthday. Many of you know and danced with Winni, my mother-in-law, when she lived in Seattle. She was known for her sweetness, grace, creativity, bright smile, colorful scarves, and exquisite style. Oh and the desserts she'd make!! We are excited to celebrate her existence and shower her with adoration, affection and love. I am forever grateful to Winni for showing me a mothering style that is soft, soothing and gentle. She's been the yin to the powerful yang, fierce and protective energy of my own mother. Hooray for having both expressions as my teachers.
Photo above right: Winni at her birthday Nia class at the Dance Space (Greenwood, Seattle) in 2013.
 I am excited for class this weekend! This Sunday I will be sharing the body of work that our Wednesday Embodied Movement Explorations for Body Wisdom and Wellness has been playing with for the month of October. We've been dancing with the tarot cards of the Fool and the four Pages of the minor arcana. In our first class we explored the Page of Swords (Air) and its desire to learn playfully through intellectual inquisitiveness. In our second class we explored the Page of Cups (Water) and its desire to learn playfully through imagination and emotional exploration. This past week, in our third class, we explored the Page of Pentacles (Earth) and its desire to learn playfully through tactile exploration. This Sunday, we are engaging with the Page of Wands (Fire) and its desire to learn playfully through enthusiastic fiery engagement. The Page of Wands is one of my favorite ways to learn - full contact, impulsive, instinctive, inspired, passionate and endlessly creative and exploratory. Who's in? Let's Play!
Image above right: Page of Wands from the Light Seer's Tarot
Classes in the week ahead - Sunday October 23 at 10:00AM PDT and Wednesday November 2 at 9AM PDT.
 No classes on Wednesday, October 26 and Sunday, October 30.
As I mentioned above, we will be in Florida and return home on November 1st.
Join me for class when they resume on Wednesday, November 2 and then on Sunday, November 6 (daylight savings ends).
While I am away, feel free to contact me to rent a previously recorded class:
Deeply grateful for this community,
Jennifer
Schedule Going Forward:
- Somos Luceros on Sundays at 10AM PDT
- Embodied Movement Explorations in Body Wisdom & Wellness on Wednesdays at 9AM PDT
- ArcanaDance - next workshop TBA
Somos Luceros
 Somos Luceros is a somatic dance practice designed to illuminate the wisdom of your body and cultivate deep embodiment of archetypal qualities that offer lightness, depth and joy. The dance moves are simple and guided by the language of storytelling, opening new chapters in our bodies where we can see and feel our most luminous potential. Release the stories in your body that weigh you down and reclaim your light. In Spanish, Somos means “we are” and Luceros means “bringers of light” or “bright stars.” This name honors my father, my paternal indigenous ancestors in South America, my heritage, and our collective oldest ancestor, the stars. We are dancing bodies of light.
With immense gratitude for your continued support,
Jennifer
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Somos Luceros – Dancing Play: An Embodied Exploration of The Fool & Page of Wands (via Zoom)
Date: Sunday, October 23, 2022 at 10:00AM PDT
Time Zones: 10:00AM PDT | 11:00AM MDT | 12:00PM CDT | 1:00PM EDT
Pay what you can in exchange for the class experience ($5-$25)
Register for class:
https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZMlceisqjkrGdDHoOmGyhNOyiChsvAg_yBN
Join us for Dancing Play: An Embodied Exploration of The Fool & Page of Wands
 The theme for the month of October is Play!
In the tarot, the Fool is the archetype of the seeker and teaches us the art of wonder, exploration, and play.
The four Pages (Air/Swords, Earth/Pentacles, Water/Cups, and Fire/Wands) are the learners, seekers, and students of their suit/element.
In this class we are bringing together the Fool and the Page of Wands (fire).
The qualities we will explore are playfulness, wonder, exploration, discovery, sprouting into action guided by fiery enthusiasm, encountering creative sparks and infusing them with energy and gusto!
Feel free to grab a magic wand, a wooden spoon, drumstick, craft wire pipe cleaners, or pompoms and use it for class!
The dance moves are simple and guided by the language of storytelling. You are invited to receive the choreography, bring it into your body and make it your own.
Somos Luceros is a somatic dance practice designed to illuminate the wisdom of your body and cultivate deep embodiment of archetypal qualities that offer lightness, depth and joy. The dance moves are simple and guided by the language of storytelling, opening new chapters in our bodies where we can see and feel our most luminous potential. Release the stories in your body that weigh you down and reclaim your light. In Spanish, Somos means “we are” and Luceros means “bringers of light” or “bright stars.” This name honors my father, my paternal indigenous ancestors in South America, my heritage, and our collective oldest ancestor, the stars. We are dancing bodies of light.
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the class/meeting.
Pay what you can in exchange for the class experience:
Embodied Movement Explorations for Body Wisdom and Wellness (via Zoom) - NEW TIME - 9AM PDT!
Date: Wednesday, November 2, 2022
(Reminder: No class on October 26, 2022)
Time Zones: 9AM PDT, 10AM MDT, 11AM CDT, 12PM EDT
Class is one hour
Pay what you can in exchange for the class experience ($5-$25)
Register for class:
https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0tdOugqzMuG92bx0Fm4-I8lJrXQQxQb1if
Join us for Embodied Movement Explorations for Body Wisdom and Wellness
 Body wisdom is being aware of and attuned to what our body needs to feel well. This somatic intelligence and tending can be accessed and cultivated in many ways.
Every week we will explore a variety of somatic movement practices that include somatic dance, yoga, QiGong, archetypal expression (mainly tarot), and other modalities that emphasize mindfulness and that guide self-knowing.
Classes for the months of November and December will focus on Exploring Expressions of Power.
All classes will be crafted using dance movement repertoires from Shake Your Soul (Leven Institute).
The dance movement repertoires we will embody and explore allow us to feel the power of the major fluids systems of the body: synovial, intercellular, arterial blood, venous, and cerebrospinal fluid.
Power is energy and the fluid systems in our bodies provide us with different qualities of energy that allow us to express our power in a variety of ways. In this series, the Shake Your Soul repertoires will aid us in “trying on” relaxed power, fluid power, rooted power, resilient power, and attuned power.
Class dates: November 2, 26 and 23 and December 7 and 14.
*No class on Wednesday, November 9 and no classes December 21 and 28.
In this class we center the experience of living, feeling, sensing and moving in our bodies. We learn practices to know ourselves more deeply, cultivate joy, restore from stress, explore creative self-expression, and ways to nourish the various systems (fluid, muscular, skeletal, organ, nervous, and cellular) of our body.
Come to move your body, develop a deeper appreciation for the intelligence and wisdom of your body, and to learn practices to be well in mind, body, heart and soul.
Wear comfortable clothes to move in. No shoes required. Feel free to have a yoga mat, blanket or towel for floor-based practices.
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the class/meeting.
Pay what you can in exchange for the class experience:
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Tarot Sessions - Now late November to February 2023
 I am now scheduling into late November and into 2023. Please note that I will not be seeing clients the last two weeks of December and the first week of January.
Feel free to contact me now to get on my calendar :)
These sessions are my lifeblood and I so appreciate your continued support in scheduling appointments and referring your loved ones and friends to me. As you know, I don't advertise. All of my client work has been via referral. For that I am immensely grateful.
To schedule a session, choose the session type at www.jenniferluceroearle.com/tarot-with-me/sessions and email me your questionnaire.
Tarot Consultation Packages
There are several tarot packages to choose from, including options for multiple one hour to two hour sessions throughout a one year window.
Huge thanks to Brooke Lowe Johnson for the photo (top) above!
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Dance with Janice on Saturdays!
For those of you interested in a Saturday 10AM PDT Zoom class, I highly recommend Janice Steinberg's Nia classes! She is one of our beloved Somos Luceros community members and I dance with her whenever I can. I love her classes and know you will too.
This Saturday, October 22 at 10AM PDT, Janice is teaching Laugh. Dance. Love.
To join Janice's Saturday Nia classes (10AM PDT), email her to get on her mailing list. She sends the Zoom link for class via email on the day of class. And like my classes, Janice's classes are donation-based as well.
Email Janice at: janicesteinberg@cox.net
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Mary Lenox's Poetry
Following is the poem, Onward, that Mary wrote and shared with us after class this past Sunday, October 16. This spoke to me of hope and a willingness to greet the unknown. Thank you, Mary <3.
Onward
Before the break of the day
Darkness slowly recedes as
Sweet sleep says goodbye
I Awaken to a morning
Of dense gray haze
Clothed in a shroud of gloom
Sparse whiteness
Resting at horizon
Reveals scant light
Veiled sunrise
Glows through the misty atmosphere
Echoing the promise of rain
October autumn
Marches onward into the mystery of change
So do I!
©2016 Mary F. Lenox
Revised 2022
San Diego, CA
To join Mary's email list: mflenox69@gmail.com
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Woman Who Inspired Pixar's Mama Coco Dies at 109 | E! News
Remembering María Salud Ramírez Caballero, rumored to have inspired the 2017 Pixar film "Coco." A ceramic potter, she left this world on October 16 after 109 years of life. Farewell Mama Coco/Abuelita <3
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