PoiGeek

If you’ve been struggling with finding your fluidity, we have the answer for you! Check out the new article outlining 5 must have techniques you can use to add more flow to your practice.

If you are new to poi, hoop, staff, fans and other flow arts, and even if you’re an experienced practitioner learning some new tricks, you may wish you had more flow in your practice. To help you out, we’ve assembled a list of a few different things you can focus on to assist you as you are evolving in your flow arts practice.

• First, and perhaps both the simplest and hardest thing to do, breathe more. It is very common for people new to a flow arts practice to hold their breath, especially as they are learning new movements which challenge their body. Focusing on the breath allows you to bring more ease into your body by keeping your physiology in a state of ease, whereas holding your breath can create tension throughout your body, making it harder to move than it might be when you breathe normally.
• If you find it especially hard to breathe normally during specific parts of a pattern you are working with, you’ll want to focus on slowing your experience down so you can relax into the movements more effectively. For example, if you are struggling with the back petal on your left hand when doing a 4 petal side plane flower, you’ll want to put special attention on how you are creating that petal. One effective way of doing this is to exhale during the most difficult portion of the movement. Repeating this practice often helps people slow the movement down, allowing them to notice more and more details of the movement. By noticing more detail, people can then correct their movements with granularity which helps increase flow.
• Regardless of the patterns and sequences you are working with, putting focus on your core and center will allow you to have more control of your body and your poi. As you learn how to manipulate your body with more subtlety, you will be able to extend that control into your poi which will create more precision in your spinning. In addition, a strong connection to your core and center will help you flow through each movement that arises with greater ease.
• As you integrate these tools into your practice, you will naturally be finding your balance, in body, mind and spirit as well as in the movement of the tools that become a flowing extension of your body. This sense of balance will help stabilize your spinning and will subsequently add flow.
• Finally, take a look at how you can create your own experience so that the patterns you are doing are more than just a weave or reel or flower and instead become a work of art created from your specific way of moving with the tools. One effective technique to help create your own experience is to spin to music that really resonates in your being — something that inspires you. The more inspired you are, the better! It can even help to get headphones (remember to hide the cord under your clothing!) and a portable music device small enough to have little impact on your movements. By putting yourself in a bubble of sound, you can help create a separate experience from the rest of the world around you to help create more internal flow.