I made it up! It's to fix some common beginner follower connection problems in lateral, which by now you probably don't have anyways.
Disagree that the mechanistic understanding in unhelpful.
As a person who was starting to give privates in zouk, a thing my students really appreciated was the ability to explain things more mechanistically.
Someone who already UNDERSTANDS what you mean by "grounding" or "leading with your projection" or whatnot only needs to be told those things as a reminder.
Someone who is learning how to do those things will just get confused and frustrated if you keep telling them words that just don't make sense to them yet.
But if you say "Shift your weight slightly forward onto the balls of your feet by leaning forward. Maintain your frame thus pushing slightly towards your follow. Your follow will match this creating a compression. Really think about sending your weight down , driving the ball of your foot into the ground....." Etc.
There are many things that can be learned just by going and doing. But you'll quickly hit a wall.
The kinds of things people go to instructors for are the things that they AREN'T just picking up experientially or through expressive language, and any instructor worth anything will be able to:
I was having difficulty getting followers to do the right kind of downward relaxation of their hands (The main zouk hand connection is neither expansion nor contraction, but a downward relaxation of the follower's arm). It's really hard to explain exactly what muscles are doing what, etc especially because it's dynamic.
A visualization where a hose of heavy running water enters at the top of your head and pours out through the pads of your hands results in a pretty solid frame for lateral. (Picture the water exiting your elbows instead and you'll notice your shoulder blades will move closer together, which we don't want).
Interpersonal abuse (eg parental, partner, etc) has a similar issue. People like to talk as if the abuser is twirling their mustache in their abuse-scheme. And while this is occasionally the case, I claim that MOST abuse is perpetrated by people with a certain level of good intent. They may truly love their partner and be the only one who is there for them when they need it, BUT they lack the requisite skills to be in a healthy relationship.
Sadly this is often due to a mental illness, or a history of trauma, or not getting to practice these skills growing up until there was a huge gulf between where they are and where they need to be.
This makes it extra difficult for the victim, because the abuser is sympathetic and seemingly ACTUALLY TRYING. Trying to get advice from the internet may not help when everyone paints your abuser as a scheming villain and you can tell they're not. They're just broken.
I've really appreciated the media that shows a more realistic picture of abusers as people who love you, but are too fucked up to not hurt you. I think more useful advice would acknowledge this harsh reality
Agreed! Everything that I shared is actually from my Soviet Ukrainian family, who used to just call themselves "Russian" as an easily-understood shorthand for Americans who wouldn't have known where "Ukraine" was back then.
I actually think just about anything Eastern European is good for this.
My Ukrainian dad's easy borscht recipe:
Vegetarian Borscht:
You need:
small cabbage (or half large one), I prefer red cabbage, but green is fine also.
1 can of sliced beets,
onion,
few garlic cloves,
one potato,
2 bay leaves,
salt/paper.
Pour 6-8 cups of water in a pot ( or fill pot up to half) and turn your stove on..
Once water is getting hot- slice onion on small pieces and add to the water, then start slicing cabbage on small pieces (editor's note- You can also use pre-sliced cabbage from a bag) then add to the water, bring it to the boil, reduce heat so it barely boils, add sliced garlic and two or three bay leaves. Check your time- once cabbage is in and water is boiling it will take approx. 40 min to make it done. In a beginning it looks like you have a lot of cabbage but don’t worry – it will cooks down and make more liquids. Now you can work on potato: slice and add, slice and add one carrot. Cover and let it cook. During the last ten minutes open can of beets and add all content including a juce. Bring to the boil again, taste it…add one or two tablespoon of vinegar ( I preferred Apple cider vinegar, but..) if you don’t have vinegar substitute with lemon juce. You are DONE. Takes 40 min from boiling… Serve as is or you can add small spoon of sour cream on a top of the bowl, sprinkle with a dill if you wish
I felt a lot of internal resistance and push back when reading this. I agree that this is NOT WHAT YOU SAID, but I feel like there is already a lot of memery and pressure to let the long term / Mission folks be social free riders and leeches in every other part of their lives and I don't like it. My brain pattern matched this post into that meme space.
Cross-posted from FB:
During the 872 day long Siege of Leningrad, almost a million people died, mostly of starvation. Twelve of those people died while surrounded by food they refused to eat. They were the scientists and staff at the Institute of Plant Study, a seed bank containing the life's work of Nikolai Vavilov.
Vavilov had already starved to death in a Soviet gulag, for holding to Mendelian genetic theory, as opposed to the false-but-government-endorsed Lysenkoism. It wasn't just a principled stand either. Vavilov knew that the truth of genetics could help them feed the country with better crops, while the false theories would fail.
Vavilov's absence left just his workers to guard the seed banks from destruction. They did their best, knowing that the seeds would be instrumental in rebuilding after the war. But the majority of the seeds still rotted, even as they were protected from the starving masses outside their door.
The workers starved rather than eat the seeds, but still most the seeds were lost.
That may make it seem like all a waste, but what did survive proved to be invaluable. Today 80% of Russia's cropland is growing the descendants of the seeds from the Institute. Many millions, maybe even a billion people are alive because of the sacrifices of Vavilov and his workers.
Like many others, I'm currently fasting in honor of Vavilov Day. While it's officially a one day fast, I'm vaguely aiming to make it to Saturday, which would make it my longest fast yet.
It seems like you are assuming historic gender segregation, eg men go out and go hunting together, women stay nearby gathering, etc.
There has been a lot of recent evidence that this isn't so cut and dry, but rather that we were applying our own modern lens while interpreting the past.
Specifically, newer evidence is showing gender parity or near-parity in participation in large game hunting. For example I recall that there were many graves that were assumed male because they were warrior or hunter graves, containing weapons and the like. But when they went back and tested them, something like 30% of them were female.
A handful of sources:
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abd0310
https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2023/07/01/1184749528/men-are-hunters-women-are-gatherers-that-was-the-assumption-a-new-study-upends-i
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/01/science/anthropology-women-hunting.html#:~:text=In cultures where hunting was,to hunting as they aged.