The practice of the Discipline of Authentic Movement offers a developmental pathway that is an impeccably reliable guide through personal healing and the evolution of individual consciousness. It also offers, within the group format, an opportunity for the exploration of belonging and participation, through direct experience of one’s own unique and irreplaceable value within the collective body of the group (and wider human community). Beyond this, there is the mystery of embodied presence, and access to realms of energetic phenomenon (mystical states) that can safely occur when our embodied awareness opens into a wider spectrum of experience. As we become more fully present in this moment, we may also experience in a direct way our connection with all of existence.
This work offers a subtle yet powerful therapeutic approach that supports personal development, facilitating both a grounded and expansive sense of self. It is useful training for therapists, dancers, somatic practitioners, educators, and others who wish to access a bridge between conscious and unconscious realms, and/or to cultivate respectful and compassionate relational interactions. It can be used as a resource for choreographic and other creative/artistic endeavors, such as writing, theater, music, or visual arts. It can be practiced by those with or without dance/movement experience and at any level of physical ability.
The Discipline of Authentic Movement informs and deepens our practice of listening, speaking, moving, and being in the studio and in the world. This contemplative form of inquiry enhances our ability to be awake, compassionate, and responsive, that is, fully engaged in being alive.
RESOURCES
Discipline of Authentic Movement
Learn more about the history and practice of the Discipline of Authentic Movement founded by Janet Adler.
Circles of Four
An international post-graduate level program for the preparation of teachers of the Discipline of Authentic Movement.
Event Archive
Somatics Festival 2019
Celebrating the work of Janet Adler, Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen, Nancy Stark Smith and the 45-year heritage of Contact Quarterly.
Intl. Authentic Movement Day
International celebration honoring Mary Starks Whitehouse on her 110th birthday. Hosted by Nina Kungurova with Bonnie Morrissey + Paula Sager.
Janet Adler 1941 – 2023
Our teacher, mentor, colleague, and dear friend — Janet Adler — left this earth on July 19, 2023. From what we understand, Janet’s last days were often filled with radiance and wonder. Inspired by Janet’s life and love, may we see more clearly from the heart, and move with compassion through our lives.
Below is a beautiful five-minute tribute to her life, created by Berlin filmmaker Jens Wazel. This tribute is excerpted from his new half-hour long homage, “LIGHT | Five Days with Janet Adler”.
– Bonnie Morrissey and Paula Sager, Editors of Intimacy in Emptiness