Susan Palmer's Exquisite Now

Stuff gets done here

recent posts

  • Beyond the dance

    Day 9 of 52 Nia dance challenge

    Today I chose the 40-minute online routine “Passion” with choreographer Kellie Chambers. At the end of the dance, she said: “Take this energy of passion and fuel it into the rest of your day.”

    Which is why you are seeing a batch of home-made ketchup that I canned yesterday after coming home from Nia all jazzed up and ready.

    While I’m a home canner (water bath, not pressure cooker), I hadn’t ever tried ketchup and now I know why. It’s a full day of peeling, gutting, cooking, spicing, simmering and simmering and freaking simmering! But I digress.

    I appreciate how Nia echoes out into the rest of my life, and needed to hear the guidance on letting passion fuel today. I’m in the process of editing a book I wrote a few years ago, but that wasn’t perfect. I abandoned it after a few agents I queried rejected it. But earlier this summer it started muttering in a back corner of my mind and wouldn’t shut up.

    I got it out, read it again and decided that I really do like it. And I saw how it had a thing that could be improved. I created a schedule for the revisions, but I’m midway through them and losing my early momentum. So, thank you Nia. I needed that little boost as I step into the rest of my day.

  • Embodying a skill

    Day 8 of 52 Nia dance challenge

    Today while dancing, I didn’t need to think about moving between fast clock 12-6 to cha cha in a repetition that also involved hand and arm movements. My feet knew what to do. I didn’t have to think about the steps.

    At all.

    This freed my brain to hear and feel the music in a different way. The form was embedded. That gave me freedom.

    This is why committing to a daily practice is so meaningful to me.

  • Learning Bloom

    Day 7 of 52 dance challenge

    The first two songs in Nia’s Bloom routine, Harper Rey’s “Everchanging Outcomes” and Johannes Bornlöf’s “Beauty Lives in Me”, have easily identifiable cues to help me know when the steps and moves are changing. I’ve committed to learning this hourlong routine, and my strategy is to practice two songs and their moves every day, adding two new ones each day until I’ve got them all. I ran through these two songs and the moves twice today, and then jumped over to Express, danced by Debbie Rosas, for a fuller workout.

    I’d love to hear how other Nia dancers commit a routine to memory. All suggestions welcome.

    I’m so ready to get back to dancing in the studio with others!