Rob Hayden. Experiencing endings as gifts, and making a practice of that.
I was re-listening the conversation while editing and cleaning the audio for this podcast and immediately it brought back the warmth, vulnerability, and shared empathy that I felt while talking to Rob. I am still deeply touched by the profound humanity he displayed throughout this conversation, by the amazing performing artists that by how, someone that I barely knew personally, I now consider a dear friend who I hope to have the chance to share a tea and a chessboard in not so distant future…In this 9th episode of the 2nd season, we talk with Rob Hayden (USA/BE). Rob was a competitive gymnast for 13 years and in 1989 enrolled in the BFA curriculum for theatre and dance at the University of New Mexico. He joined Ultima Vez in 2002, performing in the creations Blush, Sonic Boom, PUUR, Spiegel and the revivals of What the Body Does Not Remember and In Spite of Wishing and Wanting. Since 2009, he has collaborated as director, choreographer, performer, and composer with various artists from both Belgium and abroad. His own work combines over 20 years of practical and theoretical research and experience into performance, dance, theatre, sound/music, voice and movement. From 10' 09" you can hear what his class will be like in detail. Do not miss the other themes we talked about in this very insightful conversation, mainly towards the end of the conversation where we dig deeper into how endings can be considered gifts.A few quotes from our conversation: “Through online interactions and conversations with different people, it reinforced, for me personally, the need to really stay connected to myself and what is important to me, and to be able to clearly communicated that and articulate it in a way that was reaching the other somehow” “by simply opening the door to myself and to the other to come it, it creates already a complicit between people involved in the conversation…. it gets very simple, very real, very fast”“by failing or making a mistake that’s where the trigger for the solution appears” “by nature of the fact that I started as a gymnast… and did that for 13 years, I began to understand there is a certain aspect of discipline and rigor that is necessary for any creative endeavor or in life in general”“Who are we serving in this practice? is it self-serving? or is it self-gratifying? or there is something more that we can be available for or open to in order to serve. We enter into a relationship with the work where we are serving the work rather than ourselves or somebody else"“I experienced a lot of endings last year, and instead of being swallowed by the weight of it, I started to learn how, very slowly and still working on it, those things as gifts as opportunities for transformation, to recognise the natural order of things and try not to resist it”Join his classes on the w/c 8th of March 2021 as part of the TWV Academyhttps://twvonline.academy/Support the showSupport the show HERE