New Dimensions; Gabrielle Roth; Part 2

<v Michael Toms>Joseph Campbell also spent much time at Esalen. <v Gabrielle Roth>Well, everyone has been there to serve our heroes and to allow them the space <v Gabrielle Roth>to do original research with, uh, you know, with <v Gabrielle Roth>no limits. <v Michael Toms>You know, Gabrielle, I use you've really explored working with the body and in <v Michael Toms>talking about your experience with somebody groups with us, when people call down that <v Michael Toms>just have this picture of people who really are coming to Esalen with <v Michael Toms>the whole media vision of what Esalen is. <v Michael Toms>And could you share a little bit about your experience with that of people getting in <v Michael Toms>touch with with moving their bodies and moving around, how that is <v Michael Toms>and how important it is for all us to do that? <v Gabrielle Roth>It's, uh, the most important thing that we can do for ourselves. <v Gabrielle Roth>It's that the body is run on rhythm. <v Gabrielle Roth>We are about rhythm, basically, and essentially we are each a rhythm. <v Gabrielle Roth>And to bring people in touch with the rhythm is to bring them in touch with their essence <v Gabrielle Roth>and without any dogma, with any beliefs, without any uh,- any

<v Gabrielle Roth>systems. I mean, it's simply is. <v Gabrielle Roth>We are rhythm, we are breathed in and out. <v Gabrielle Roth>We move up and down. We rise. <v Gabrielle Roth>We think we flow. And to- to- um, <v Gabrielle Roth>Also movement is action. <v Gabrielle Roth>Dance is a direct, a very direct language. <v Gabrielle Roth>One- it takes one's totality. <v Gabrielle Roth>One must think and we must feel and do all simultaneously, which is truly what my work is <v Gabrielle Roth>about. It's about unity and uniqueness and bringing these two principles <v Gabrielle Roth>into some simultanous action. <v Gabrielle Roth>And dancers ?inaudible? best. <v Gabrielle Roth>People- I mean I saw this- the disco movement that's crossing <v Gabrielle Roth>the country 10 years ago. <v Gabrielle Roth>In the sense that once people started moving, they <v Gabrielle Roth>didn't want to stop. They didn't want to stop. <v Gabrielle Roth>They didn't want to go back and be therapized anymore. <v Gabrielle Roth>They didn't want to think about it anymore. They wanted to move through it. <v Gabrielle Roth>Once you move through it, it's gone.

<v Gabrielle Roth>You know, we are very tense people. <v Gabrielle Roth>We are very anxious people as a- as a culture. <v Gabrielle Roth>And there is no way to think or talk ourselves out of this. <v Gabrielle Roth>We as modern people need to cathart, and to cathart means to <v Gabrielle Roth>let go, to fall deeply into ourselves and to move <v Gabrielle Roth>our feelings and our thoughts into action. <v Gabrielle Roth>The distance between thought and action is hell. <v Gabrielle Roth>And it breeds confusion and contradiction. <v Gabrielle Roth>And most of us move from a position of contradiction, thinking one thing, <v Gabrielle Roth>feeling another thing, and actually acting out a third so that we come from a split, <v Gabrielle Roth>divided self. And that movement brings all of this together. <v Gabrielle Roth>You can't- A dancing body can't lie. <v Gabrielle Roth>A dancing body cannot lie. <v Gabrielle Roth>It is as close to the truth as each of us will ever get. <v Michael Toms>How does the dancing body reflect the truth or a lie? <v Michael Toms>How does it do that? How do you see that? <v Michael Toms>How does that happen? <v Gabrielle Roth>Well, you can tell me that you feel comfortable and you can tell me all kinds of things. <v Gabrielle Roth>But what I see, you know, I see the truth when you move.

<v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, there's just no way to lie yourself through that when you either move or you <v Gabrielle Roth>don't move. You know, dance is very direct language. <v Gabrielle Roth>It's either yes or no. I mean, there is no space or pretense. <v Gabrielle Roth>So that movement is a very clear mirror of exactly where we are <v Gabrielle Roth>and how free we are. You can tell me that you're free, but, you know, if your bodies all <v Gabrielle Roth>tight and tense and taut and locked up, how am I to believe you? <v Gabrielle Roth>But you see, we've been so far away from the body and from the truth <v Gabrielle Roth>that we- we missed um [long pause] <v Gabrielle Roth>the simplicity of it. <v Gabrielle Roth>Life is very simple. <v Gabrielle Roth>Life is a moving experience. <v Gabrielle Roth>Life moves and changes, and that's its truth. <v Gabrielle Roth>And if we resist that truth. <v Gabrielle Roth>Then, well, you can see the result of that on any street. <v Gabrielle Roth>Walk down any street.

<v Gabrielle Roth>And see, you know, bodies moving around <v Gabrielle Roth>outside of themselves. People moving around outside of their bodies not in touch with, <v Gabrielle Roth>not in contact with with their feet. <v Michael Toms>So moving as a way to work through our resistances. <v Gabrielle Roth>Moving is the only way. <v Gabrielle Roth>[Host: laughter] If I can be so <v Gabrielle Roth>strong about it, moving is the only way. <v Gabrielle Roth>Ultimately, you have to move. <v Gabrielle Roth>Ultimately, you have to move. I just don't believe in transcendence. <v Gabrielle Roth>I'm real, not on transformation. <v Gabrielle Roth>And that's action, alchemical action. <v Gabrielle Roth>You have to transform yourself. You cannot transcend yourself. <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, this is the whole like this is one of the problems that I have found with the <v Gabrielle Roth>influx of Indian philosophy as much as I love it, and as much as I <v Gabrielle Roth>gained from it. I also see there are some traps. <v Gabrielle Roth>It's like I see young people transcending their sexuality before <v Gabrielle Roth>they've even experienced it or transcending their desires. <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, desire is the messenger of the creative spirit.

<v Gabrielle Roth>It tells you, you know, it moves you from within. <v Gabrielle Roth>You don't want to cut that off. You cut yourself off from God. <v Gabrielle Roth>If you cut yourself off from the individual creative spirit, you cut yourself off from <v Gabrielle Roth>your origins, from your originality. <v Gabrielle Roth>You know, so desire. We don't want to remove that. <v Gabrielle Roth>No. You know, so I see things getting a little inside out. <v Gabrielle Roth>I'm not for passive people, you know. <v Gabrielle Roth>I want to see people coming from a deep and strong rooted sense of <v Gabrielle Roth>self. And therefore, in my work, I serve as a catalyst. <v Gabrielle Roth>The teaching is the process and the healer is the participant. <v Speaker>[Song: Sweet Thing by Vann Morrison]

<v Speaker>[Song: Sweet Thing by Van Morrison]

<v Speaker>[Song: Sweet Thing by Van Morrison]

<v Michael Toms>We're talking with Gabrielle Roth. We're kindve just moving with the moment here, which <v Michael Toms>is about the perfect thing to do with Gabrielle. <v Michael Toms>You have some more poetry.

<v Gabrielle Roth>Sure. <v Gabrielle Roth>I'll do some poetry about the subject we just left, body jazz. <v Gabrielle Roth>[poem] My body's a musical instrument and me, I'm a jazz <v Gabrielle Roth>piece. Changing notes, tempos on a dime, <v Gabrielle Roth>heart drumming out my time, breath blowing tones <v Gabrielle Roth>like wind through my bones. <v Gabrielle Roth>Life plays my body up and down the scale. <v Gabrielle Roth>Following the tantric trail, I'm an oldie but goodie tune <v Gabrielle Roth>inside the music room. <v Gabrielle Roth>Sometimes I'm body blue sho bi do bi do bi do. <v Gabrielle Roth>An off beat out of key sigh, born <v Gabrielle Roth>in the aftermath of a high, a boogie woogie beat lost in <v Gabrielle Roth>her own heat. Yeah, I'm a jazz piece seeking release <v Gabrielle Roth>to be a love song, throaty and mellow, singing her guts <v Gabrielle Roth>to the cosmic fellow.

<v Gabrielle Roth>Life plays my body, blowing me like a horn, <v Gabrielle Roth>shaking me like a rattle, beating me like a drum, <v Gabrielle Roth>dancing me toward the one. <v Gabrielle Roth>My body's a musical instrument, hand-made American, one <v Gabrielle Roth>of a kind, a unique piece of the universal mind <v Gabrielle Roth>surrendering to rhythms, rocking within. <v Gabrielle Roth>Not too is the original sin. <v Michael Toms>How did these poems come, Gabrielle? <v Gabrielle Roth>Well, I sat down to write a regular book, like I told you, like, you know. <v Gabrielle Roth>And what happened was just one after another. <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, all in the last year, I think I've written about 200. <v Michael Toms>Like just just several of them come over a period like do you do them all at once? <v Gabrielle Roth>Four or five a day. <v Michael Toms>Four or five a day. <v Gabrielle Roth>Every time I sit down, every time I stop doing something, a poem or a song comes. <v Gabrielle Roth>And I feel that it's in the tradition of the shaman of all cultures. <v Gabrielle Roth>You know, this has always happened. It's like you go through your initiation and at a

<v Gabrielle Roth>certain point in your own initiation, you receive poems and you begin to speak in <v Gabrielle Roth>metaphors, in rhymes and rhythms. <v Gabrielle Roth>And it's only extending like the language that was mine always into <v Gabrielle Roth>more expression. I mean, I've always spoken rhythms in a way. <v Gabrielle Roth>And now it was like actually putting- putting them on that paper. <v Gabrielle Roth>And after the first year when I received poetry, the second year of songs <v Gabrielle Roth>came music one after the other. <v Gabrielle Roth>And they're all about life, they're all about movement, they're all about <v Gabrielle Roth>the seeking path or the way to the Tao, the soul. <v Gabrielle Roth>Of being a woman, being a person, <v Gabrielle Roth>you know. I mean, they're all there. The transformation of my suffering, of my pain, of <v Gabrielle Roth>my joys, of my ecstasies, you know, of my insides. <v Gabrielle Roth>And actually, now that they're all out there, I can really write in paragraphs. <v Gabrielle Roth>[laughter] But it took a long time.

<v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, it's like uh- rhythm runs my show, keeping <v Gabrielle Roth>me on the go. Impulses born in my heart, acting out their part <v Gabrielle Roth>through my hands and feet, pulsing in the beat, surfing my breath. <v Gabrielle Roth>I ride my death. <v Gabrielle Roth>As rhythm runs away into another day, I am circulating in <v Gabrielle Roth>red and white, tiny little streams of light, a trans parent <v Gabrielle Roth>dream. I'm not, as I seem, an ego running around outside <v Gabrielle Roth>my inside looking to be found. <v Gabrielle Roth>[music] Rhythm runs my show. <v Gabrielle Roth>Till, there's nowhere left to go. <v Gabrielle Roth>And I follow myself within rhythms, riding home all <v Gabrielle Roth>alone, a transparent dream. <v Gabrielle Roth>I'm not as I seem. <v Gabrielle Roth>I'm the rhythmic roll of an endless soul. <v Speaker>[Song: Jungle Book by Weather Report] <v Michael Toms>Gabrielle, You- you call yourself a shaman. And that's an interesting term because

<v Michael Toms>usually we hear of shamans in other cultures, but we don't usually find them sitting <v Michael Toms>across the table. <v Gabrielle Roth>Of course, they're far less fascinating if they're sitting across the table. <v Gabrielle Roth>I don't call myself a shaman. I've been, you know, recognized as a shaman. <v Gabrielle Roth>It's simply the way I am. I've been when- I <v Gabrielle Roth>was born into this rather than going somewhere in studying <v Gabrielle Roth>with somebody particular. <v Gabrielle Roth>And it's not an easy road to toe. <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, everybody- nobody wants me to be a shaman. <v Gabrielle Roth>They much rather me be a dance therapist or, you know, they give me lots of little <v Gabrielle Roth>boxes to crawl inside of. But they're all too small. <v Michael Toms>A movement teacher? <v Gabrielle Roth>A movement teacher or, you know, it depends on which facet <v Gabrielle Roth>of me they're looking at at the moment. <v Gabrielle Roth>That's the box they'll create. I did an interview the other day, and I watched the lady <v Gabrielle Roth>go from box to box. <v Gabrielle Roth>But the facts are that I am a shaman, and that my energy is shamanic. <v Gabrielle Roth>You know that the way that I work with people is very shamanic.

<v Gabrielle Roth>I work with the soul, and I always have. <v Gabrielle Roth>I see in cycles and rhythms, and I always have. <v Gabrielle Roth>Everything- <v Michael Toms>And when you say shamanic, you're taling about- you're working with the intuitive, the <v Michael Toms>deeper side, not- not so much out of the head, but out of the feeling, of the heart. <v Gabrielle Roth>Yeah, I don't work from the intellect. I work from my heart and from my intuitions and <v Gabrielle Roth>from my imagination and my inspirations. <v Gabrielle Roth>And that I'm working with the soul as opposed to I mean, that's what- If somebody is <v Gabrielle Roth>sick, I look to see if they're sick in the physical body primarily, you know, if you <v Gabrielle Roth>break your arm. Or if you're sick in the soul, and my culture is sick in the soul <v Gabrielle Roth>right now. So there's a lot of work for me to do. <v Gabrielle Roth>And I'm- I'm doing it at this moment through my poetry, through theater, through <v Gabrielle Roth>song and trying to bring it out through the metaphor, because that's what I'm trying <v Gabrielle Roth>to do. I'm trying to speak heart to heart rather than mind to mind. <v Gabrielle Roth>I'm not interested in being understood. <v Gabrielle Roth>And I mean, that's something I've got I got over wanting to be understood a long <v Gabrielle Roth>time ago. I've had this ener- energy since I was a small child. <v Gabrielle Roth>I think people are afraid of shamans because of shamans are in touch with death.

<v Gabrielle Roth>You're always in touch with death. You know who's dying around you. <v Gabrielle Roth>And you know, when you know, you're just really in touch with death and with the rebirth. <v Gabrielle Roth>Shamans are traditionally wounded healers. <v Gabrielle Roth>They're called the wounded healer. And that means that they've gone through long, <v Gabrielle Roth>deep, dark illnesses and transformed them and healed themselves. <v Gabrielle Roth>And that's where they get their power. <v Gabrielle Roth>And I'm no exception to that. I've had several of my cultural diseases <v Gabrielle Roth>and- and transformed them myself. <v Gabrielle Roth>And it's from that- It's like I'm rooted in a sense of- <v Gabrielle Roth>of how fragile we are. <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, I'm fragile, very fragile. <v Gabrielle Roth>And I know that. And I expect everyone else to be. <v Gabrielle Roth>It's like my power comes from my suffering. <v Gabrielle Roth>It's uh- I'm tuned in to my whole culture on tuned into all of its <v Gabrielle Roth>aspects- to the little people, and the old people, and to all the people who have <v Gabrielle Roth>suffered. Um-

<v Michael Toms>You wrote a- you wrote a poem about the shaman. RIght? <v Gabrielle Roth> Yeah, but I think right before I do that, I rather do another one called, 'I Am the <v Gabrielle Roth>American Dream,' because that's where I'm feeling right now. <v Gabrielle Roth>[poem] I am the American Dream. <v Gabrielle Roth>I'm tired of sleeping with shame. <v Gabrielle Roth>I play the American game. <v Gabrielle Roth>From bottom to top, I never stop to worry or wait as I followed my fate. <v Gabrielle Roth>I am the American dream, dancing a nonstop stream <v Gabrielle Roth>of street consciousness, moving nigger rhythms, singing Jews <v Gabrielle Roth>songs. I am all who have been wronged. <v Gabrielle Roth>I am the abused child and the battered wife, the middle <v Gabrielle Roth>aged fool and the junkie with cool. <v Gabrielle Roth>I am the bent backs and faded dreams. <v Gabrielle Roth>The bag ladies and the aging queens. <v Gabrielle Roth>America. I am all your classes. <v Gabrielle Roth>I pulse in your masses.

<v Gabrielle Roth>I am the punk who sees your funk. <v Gabrielle Roth>The child sniper who shoots for fun. <v Gabrielle Roth>The crazy father who bought the gun. <v Gabrielle Roth>America. I mean, look me in the eye. <v Gabrielle Roth>It's time for you to cry. <v Gabrielle Roth>I am the fish dying in our waters. <v Gabrielle Roth>The father's not loving their daughters and sons on the run <v Gabrielle Roth>and sons on the run from mothers, they come who sing, <v Gabrielle Roth>'what have we done? What have we done?' While they <v Gabrielle Roth>move into the groove of male gulls to sell <v Gabrielle Roth>their soul. <v Gabrielle Roth>America. <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, look me in the eye. <v Gabrielle Roth>It's time for you to cry. <v Gabrielle Roth>When the dolphins dance, then.

<v Gabrielle Roth>They dance our last breath. <v Gabrielle Roth>The message is clear for all can hear. <v Gabrielle Roth>Prophets dying in the sand. <v Gabrielle Roth>Sacrificial lambs on the lamb. <v Gabrielle Roth>Whinged masters of the sea, choosing not to be. <v Gabrielle Roth>Why? <v Gabrielle Roth>We sigh, as a monk lights himself in flames. <v Gabrielle Roth>Who is to blame? <v Gabrielle Roth>Who is to blame? <v Gabrielle Roth>We struggle to claim such acts as insane. <v Gabrielle Roth>The Omen runs deep. <v Gabrielle Roth>Yet we continue to see <v Gabrielle Roth>and pretend not to know what they seek to show. <v Gabrielle Roth>The soul cries, see the body die. <v Gabrielle Roth>The vision is clear.

<v Gabrielle Roth>Our fate is here. <v Gabrielle Roth>When the dolphins dance, <v Gabrielle Roth>they dance our last breath. <v Michael Toms>Gabrielle, where did that one come from? <v Gabrielle Roth>It came from the image of the dolphins and the whales coming up to the <v Gabrielle Roth>shore and dying and with no reason <v Gabrielle Roth>at all. I mean, they weren't able to- Scientists can't find any any reason for <v Gabrielle Roth>all these. They might find a few sick dolphins, <v Gabrielle Roth>but certainly not a whole beach full. <v Gabrielle Roth>And no one has been able to explain this. <v Gabrielle Roth>And I feel that they are trying to speak to us, that they are saying to us, 'Look,

<v Gabrielle Roth>hey, hey, you polluting the water.' <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, they. They're trying to communicate. <v Gabrielle Roth>And if they must die, they die because that's us supremely sensitive they are. <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, the dolphin is my spirit. <v Gabrielle Roth>They are my spirit animal. <v Gabrielle Roth>They are- They speak to me, everything that they do teaches <v Gabrielle Roth>me. They are masters of unity. <v Gabrielle Roth>They are masters of uniqueness. <v Gabrielle Roth>Recently I was at Sea World and I- I- I went through all the barricades and found myself, <v Gabrielle Roth>you know, face to face with the dolphins and one of the trainers. <v Gabrielle Roth>And I- I received the permission to watch him for a while. <v Gabrielle Roth>And he told me that they can't even have his <v Gabrielle Roth>schedule to work with the Dolphins. If you plan anything, they won't play with you <v Gabrielle Roth>anymore. If you're not spontaneous, they're not willing to give you their time. <v Gabrielle Roth>And many more fascinating facts that fit right in with my own work and how I feel <v Gabrielle Roth>about life and how I feel about the interplay of

<v Gabrielle Roth>the forces of unity and uniqueness and how we really need to- to <v Gabrielle Roth>develop both sensitivities at one time. <v Gabrielle Roth>Like dolphins, for example, move in- in groups, you know, and and yet they <v Gabrielle Roth>have no hierarchies. A leader today is not a leader tomorrow. <v Gabrielle Roth>They do what's appropriate, what's necessary. <v Gabrielle Roth>And we need this certainly in this day of of real spiritual <v Gabrielle Roth>fascism where we're willing to follow anybody to death <v Gabrielle Roth>if we have to. <v Gabrielle Roth>This is really important. I can't stress the importance of really <v Gabrielle Roth>discovering the simultaneity of these two forces and principles, the principles <v Gabrielle Roth>of unity and uniqueness. And the dolphins are here to teach us and they're here to speak <v Gabrielle Roth>to us and they're here to tell us what we're doing to the mother ocean. <v Gabrielle Roth>This is our survival. This is the survival of our planet. <v Michael Toms>We need to come back in touch with the earth, of course, through moving and dancing. <v Michael Toms>We can feel much closer connection to being

<v Michael Toms>on the earth. <v Gabrielle Roth>Well, it's like the body, you know. <v Gabrielle Roth>Mine has been a dancing path to the steady beat of the drum mother music, <v Gabrielle Roth>heart beat one letting my visions come come where they're my body. <v Gabrielle Roth>This is an instrument. Without it, there's no other game to play. <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, forget it. This is the basic- the most basic, fundamental reality that we have. <v Gabrielle Roth>No body, no play. <v Gabrielle Roth>You know, you get to be a spirit soon enough. <v Gabrielle Roth>Right now, the problem is can you allow your spirit to be embodied? <v Gabrielle Roth>Yes. This is the important. And this is why these kids are out there dancing every night. <v Gabrielle Roth>They're not dumb. And as they dance deeper into their own realities, <v Gabrielle Roth>they will be less easy to manipulate into these, you know, <v Gabrielle Roth>kind of conformist robotic <v Gabrielle Roth>groups. They just won't go. <v Gabrielle Roth>I mean, once you get in touch with the power of the individual creative spirit, you just <v Gabrielle Roth>don't give it up to just any old person who just happens to have one themselves.

<v Gabrielle Roth>You know, I mean, so it's changing things. <v Gabrielle Roth>Dancing is going to change our planet. <v Michael Toms>We're talking with Gabriel Roth. You're listening to New Dimensions. <v Michael Toms>This is KQED FM in San Francisco.