Dance back to the land

And yet it is so simple:

Our bodies are an extension of the earth

Every cell a divine intelligence of light

Before you start reading, here’s my invitation: if you feel your surroundings no longer feed you, or you have moments of feeling lost in the world, don’t look for a new version of yourself (outside). Listen to the part of you that remembers where you belong (inside). The part of you that already knows the way back - through your body, into what truly matters.

My story is also our story. Many of us feel a strong calling to return to what has been forgotten. And we sense, just as strongly, that the way back does not live in our heads, but in how we move, breathe, and live on our beautiful planet earth.

I don’t know about you, but I went to many dance venues and parties in my life and always felt a deep discomfort when I entered those black boxes we have created for them. Loud music (what are you saying? I cannot hear you!), flashy lights filling the room. Everyone drinking alcohol (because how else can we feel comfortable enough to be vulnerable?). And then not to mention the men constantly around me (sometimes also very comfortable of course lol). My friends even told me I danced too well, so they stopped dancing with me altogether. At some point I just wanted to be invisible on the dance floor.

I remember it as if it was yesterday. I was 18 years old and my friends were going to dance at Café d’Anvers in Antwerp. That same day, my mother took me to a full-day ritual with an American woman who had lived with the Dakota tribe for thirteen years. She had been married to the head chief and had received the blessings of the grandmothers to share their wisdom with the world.

She spoke about the unseen worlds, about respecting our feminine nature - the parts within us that move slower, yet carry so much wisdom. She spoke of the prophecies of ancient tribes. Of how we lost our connection to nature, to tribal life, and how we as a human species became so individualistic that we forgot our innate relationship with all of life.

I was hanging onto every word. She spoke what I had always known. I remembered being a young girl, walking the streets around our home in a small Belgian city, and crying because I missed the old forests and open plains. I couldn’t understand how we were able to cut down so many trees, simply to pour cement over the earth. She is our home - and we treat her like a commodity.

At the end of the day I went up to her and said: “You finally shared what I have always known, but was never taught at school. Thank you for helping me remember this ancient wisdom.” And she replied: “Oh no - did I not teach you anything new?”

That evening I rode my bicycle to Antwerp to meet my friends. But I couldn’t return to my old self. Everything felt off. A dance club in the middle of a prostitution street. So many people lost, wounded, moving through their lives as if no one cared. I could read sadness and loneliness in their eyes.

I also deeply disliked how people constantly came up to me on dance floors to ask how I was doing. I couldn’t hear them, had to shout, and meanwhile I just wanted to dance.

That night I decided to create another way. And started dreaming about spaces where we could gather in silence. Drop the chit-chat mind. Simply dance.

If you’ve ever been to an ecstatic dance, you know what I mean. A dance floor where we express ourselves beyond words. The first time I set foot in the Oakland Sweet’s Ballroom in 2011, I felt an immediate homecoming.

That same year my father had passed away. He had lived many years with schizophrenia and drank himself into death. He could have been the shaman in our city, but instead became the one pushed aside. The one with too many gifts, many wounds - and no container. He was a writer and poet, just like me.

In my grief I travelled to the US. And dance kept me alive. The dance floor became my safe haven - a place to explore parts of myself I had forgotten while caring for my father. I let go of old friendships and found myself in deep healing spaces. For the first time, I felt I had found my tribe.

I continued traveling the world to dance and explore poetry, and in 2014 began bringing ecstatic dance to Belgium. How this path evolved, and how I became the first female ecstatic dance DJ in Europe, is a story I will share another time.

What I can already say is this: it was on a dance floor I had created myself that I met my husband. (What a blessing!) For many years, we lived in a permaculture community - and I was being reconnected back to the land. I received the privilege of free birthing our kids in one of our yurts. The teachings of the dance slowly expanded into every aspect of my life.

During my anthropology studies I had already dove deeper into the healing role of dance in many cultures. Humans have always danced: to give thanks, to ask for healing, to connect with the spirit world, to mark transitions. In our Western society, dance gives us a strong sense of belonging. Not only in our bodies, but also in community.

During the pandemic dance became a way to stay sane in a world running on machinery and fear. We started bringing dance into churches and chapels. And slowly, we brought dance outside again. Back to the land.

If you’ve ever danced outdoors, you know: many worlds come together. The birds, the trees, the animals. Nature talks back. As if we remember that everything is connected through invisible webs - and that we are part of it too. Gravity holding us. Roots anchoring us. So we can fly.

And now, as my own life is moving back to the land (more on that soon), I feel the same call again.

To bring the dance back to the land. And to let the land bring me back to myself.

Because this is where we belong. On our beautiful planet earth.

Here are a few simple ways (feel free to screenshot).

• Go outside every day, even briefly.

• Listen to music with your whole body.

• Gather with people who value presence.

• Touch the land - soil, trees, water, stone.

• Let your body set the pace from time to time.

These are small acts. But they change how we listen and relate to life.