I felt drawn to belly dance when I saw its name on a big promotional transparent. Instinctively I felt there is something special and deeply feminine in it. A dance for seduction played in the night clubs today, in fact has primitive religious roots. The nowadays version is just a form of subjugation of the female. Still this dance ritual being kept alive and vital transfers intuitively to its dancers the secrets it holds.

Not a dance of seduction for the glare of a male audience, but a female communion with the Mother Goddess is the true nature of Belly Dance.

Depicted 5,000 years ago in a tomb in Saqqara, Egypt, Belly dance reveals its origins in the “the mystery of childbirth”. Even earlier it seems in the Ice 13,000 years ago, someone in Creswell Crags, England, drew a picture of women dancing around. From the first dance communities of women to the present day variation of this female dance expression has traveled the world. It was no set rules and cannot be bound in a limited number of movements. The variations are as infinite as the women and the uniqueness with which their souls speak to them.

To me belly dance is a special spiritual path; followed intuitively it can lead you to the Goddess within. Belly dance has a rhythm, akin to the instinctive rhythms of creation and delivery, a spiritual message which the body tells when you surrender to it.

Just relax and feel the rhythm within, slowly sway with it from your heart and allow the vibration to run through your body and mind and transfer you in a different stay of consciousness. No mind dancing to the rhythm divine of the earth and female primitive nature unleashes a special trance in which we can reconnect with our bodies and the baby within.

Belly dance is a celebration of the growing womb. I feel as supple as a snake, as strong as the Earth and as sure in my power as a primitive force of creation.

I do belly dance at home and alone, where I can express myself fully and investigate it. But it is a dance of a woman community and if you have a chance to go in a group you might feel this very uplifting and rewarding.

Following belly dance instructions is a good idea. It is true we carry the movements within, but the instructor can greatly help the refinement of these instinctive movements and enrich you with new ones.

Belly dance movements are coordinated with breathing, which brings oxygen and energy to every part of the body. The rib cage rotation can stimulate lactation and release tension. The horizontal pelvic rolls tone the pelvic floor muscles, which are essential and childbirth. Strengthening the legs and whole body prepares you in the best way for childbirth in an upright position which is reduces labor immensely and uses gravity in the best way.

Morocco, one of the gurus of Belly Dance, witnessed an original childbirth ritual of belly dance, where the woman squatted above a specially prepared whole in the earth and had a painless easy birth supported by the women community.

Childbirth is strenuous, though not painless, for a woman who has learned to trust her body and has built the stamina to deliver. The vertical movements of the pelvis, which have become second nature in the dance, excite the pelvis, stimulate the uterus and usher the baby through the birthing cannel with ease and grace. The circular movements of the hips make a kind of massage to the baby through the waters while in uterus, and during childbirth help it to rotate in the right position in order to get out. No twisting from a birthing attendant is required; since the synchronicity of birthing mother and baby are perfect and natural the movements come from the depths of the vegetative mind, which carries the memories of the thousands of millions of births the species on earth have given in a natural way with the undulation motions of the primitive brain. Guided from this sure source of intuitive knowledge both mother and baby are in the prefect position at each stage of delivery, in each second, and the most beautiful, painless, natural and ecstatic birth results.

I have found belly dance to be for me a wonderful preparation for birth, building stamina and agility, and at the same time giving me a chance to express myself emotionally, spiritually and physically. It is to me a celebration of womanhood, pregnancy and birth. A way to learn to love my body and the female power within, to learn to trust it, not to resent it and let it be. Belly dance can greatly help to turn to you, accept yourself and learn the beauty of being yourself.

Let's allow our BEST Self to be. Let's not hide it within, but take it out with pride. Let's learn to be ourselves, even though there might be a clash with other people expectations. The woman is still not allowed to be strong. Why? Because the female power is frightening, mysterious, incomprehensible for men. They do not understand it, do not know how to tame it and prefer to own it or let it not be. But the time has come for us to be. This age is an age of rejuvenation of the female power, of the revival of the Goddess. Allow yourself to be true you. Following the guidance of your heart, you start healing the earth. I have experienced this female power of the Mother Goddess which is within each of us, calling it a super psyche of all women or the Woman within, it does not matter. She has a message for each of us. Because it is time to become prominent in the world, to reclaim our place, to fully and fearlessly contribute to the change of consciousness, which will heal the earth.

That is why Parvati Baker says that giving birth naturally we heal the Earth. Because giving birth naturally is a sign that we have got in contact with our deepest self, that we have reclaimed our female power of fertility and creation. Childbirth is an eternal form of spiritual initiation. It is a unique path for women which makes them powerful and awakes them to the limitless possibility.

So let's celebrate our womanhood, our pregnancy and birth, and heal the Earth, reclaiming our power.

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