by Banafsheh | Nov 24, 2019 |
5-day Workshop
With Tony Khalife and guest musicians
November 24-29
Esalen Institute
Big Sur, CA
“The whole universe is love’s endless dance.”
– Kabir
Please read slowly, and as you read come in touch with something you are grateful for. Allow the feeling of gratitude to expand inside of you, into every cell, until you feel your wings.
The energy of gratitude is both enlivening and soothing. Let this energy open you to the grace that can live in you and through you for the benefit of all. Gratitude and grace both stem from the Latin root of gratus. Gratitude is about appreciation and extending grace. Whatever you give, you actually fill yourself with. When you extend gratitude, you are filled with grace.
Whirling is the practice of ecstatic gratitude – when you feel genuine thankfulness with such resplendent intensity that you generate a surge of endorphins in your body and slip into a full-scale outbreak of euphoria. In the state of ecstatic gratitude, you are able to navigate harshness and negativity with grace.
Guided by the poetry of Sufi mystics Rumi, Rabia and Kabir, ground your soul and come home to your body with luscious awareness, and rediscover your heart as the seat of the infinite.
Open to all. Banafsheh and Tony will lead a nurturing weave of dance, whirling, chanting, live music, meditation and wisdom teachings.
To Register:
Click here to register!
Questions? Email
26 hrs towards Dance of Oneness® Certification Program
Preparing for a Dance of Oneness® Retreat
More Resources
Dance of Oneness®: Curriculum
Recommended Reading List
by Banafsheh | Sep 13, 2019 |
with Banafsheh and Tony Khalife
7-day Intensive: September 13-20, 2019
Weekend only: September 13-15, 2019
The entire universe belongs to the dancer. If you don’t dance, you won’t know what will come to pass.
-Jesus
Dance invites us to take up space in the world with confidence, conviction and service. It’s exhilarating, joyous, sacred, sensual, transformative, communal, and disruptive. Dance makes us whole and brings us into rhythm with others. Though resilient, adaptable, and flexible, dance also breaks the rules. In dance, polarities unite and birth art. Dance is universal. Dance is freedom. Dance is the hope for our humanity if we accept the invitation to dance our lives.
Experience Banafsheh’s transformational teaching in a fusion of passionate yet peaceful dance to embody Spirit. Explore the secrets of dance technique and philosophy as a conscious vehicle to come in touch with who we TRULY are and can offer in this time of infinite potential and need. Discover how dance and movement can shift, influence and shape consciousness and the environment.
From high-powered guided, and free-style dance to the deep serenity of whirling, and vocal training, take a journey in your inner terrain with Tony Khalife’s blend of Middle Eastern and Indian trance music. Feel your fullest presence in the Here and Now with movement and voice work, luscious and devotion that bring you in touch with your core – peaceful, centered, strong, vibrant, open, free, and in community with others.
7-day Intensive is intermediate level
Weekend Only is open to all/mixed levels
50 hrs towards the 200/400-hr Dance of Oneness® Certification Program
TO REGISTER:
Prices start at $1,588
Early Bird rates available until May 1, 2019
By application only
Click here to fill out the application
Contact Shauna Devlin for more information.
Explore the Path of the Dancer
Learn more about the Intensive
Preparing for a Dance of Oneness® Workshop
More Resources
Dance of Oneness®: Curriculum
Recommended Reading List
By the end of the workshop, I was present in every cell and I enjoyed being a fluid body. I have been in all sorts of classes but in no class whatsoever was there the opportunity to express oneself. To move as one is called to, as one feels like and to explore deeper and deeper one’s own body language and what it says. This workshop allows that.
Gida Hussami, workshop participant, Schweibenalp, Switzerland
The sessions with Banafsheh activate a yummy vibration in my power chakra, the womb space, which feels delicious and self-nurturing. I felt my Dantien grounded and activated as soon as I sat down next to Banafsheh in a sharing circle. Watching Banafsheh perform I feel the ecstasy of her dance physically in my body. Banafsheh’s teaching that I practice regularly take me out of a emotionally dark space into a delicious, blissful connection with myself in my body.
Her teaching is vital to my recovery from “corporate exhaustion. Since finding this amazing spiritual teacher at the beginning of the year, I have dedicated myself seriously to this study.
Tony Khalife was such a powerful addition to Banafsheh’s teaching. His music supported and elevated the experience of her teaching skillfully and magically. Tony led us in vocalizations that gave me a completely new experience of my voice resonating in my body, not squeezed in my throat, even when going up with the tone.
Susanne Bowra, workshop participant, Multiversity, Santa Cruz, CA
by Banafsheh | Aug 12, 2019 |
Week-long Intensive presented by Ubiquity Chartres Academy
August 12-19, 2019
Chartres, France
Join us at Chartres’ holiest time during the Feast of the Assumption of Mary and the adoration of the Black Madonna in procession out in the open for a time for a full immersion in the divine feminine and her union with the divine masculine through deep reflection, joyous celebration, ritual, walking the labyrinth, dance and singing.
This pilgrimage will center us deeply in the heart of Chartres. We will be there on the Feast of the Assumption of Mary (August 15) which honors the Church doctrine, enunciated by the Pope in 1950, that Mary was assumed directly into heaven upon her death and now presides as the Mother of God. Carl Jung believed that this doctrine elevating the feminine into the Godhead marked the most important development in Christian theology in the last 2000 years. This year’s Feast coincides with the full moon. A city that has reverenced the feminine for several thousand years honors the feminine in the deepest of ways. On the Day of the Assumption, the Black Madonna is carried through the streets before being placed in front of the statue of the Assumption of Mary. She is kept in the Choir for one week and then hidden away till the following year.
Parading the Black Madonna recalls the way the Druids in ancient times brought her out of the grotto underneath the granite promontory upon which the cathedral today stands. They honored Mother Earth and the cycles of the seasons through the Black Madonna. Being in Chartres at this one time of the year will both deepen our Memory of ancient rites and activate our souls to a greater reverence for the Mother of God.
It is within this sacred space that we will honor the divine feminine and contemplate how she can most powerfully be present with us today. She has many guises and appears as She wills. The aspect we will explore is new visions of the relationship between the divine feminine and divine masculine, so powerfully depicted in the north (Mary) and south (Christ) rose windows of the cathedral.
There is no issue challenging human society more than how we understand the relationship between the feminine and the masculine in the aftermath of 5,000 years of patriarchy. This mandates in turn a fundamental revisioning of the feminine and the masculine aspects of ourselves. Rising women with Rising men erotically, passionately, dynamically, synergistically and compassionately can powerfully shape the world to come.
There is nowhere this exploration is more appropriate than Chartres, the locus of sacred power of the feminine since time immemorial, and the cathedral that represents the union of the divine feminine and the divine masculine in full splendor.
Daily Program
Each day will include Sacred Practice, an opening Session, presentations on the Divine Feminine and Masculine, a sound bath, sacred dance, immersion in the Cathedral, and personal time for meditation and exploration. Women and men will meet separately and together during the course of our time together. We plan to have one private evening in the cathedral devoted to walking the labyrinth, accompanied by Gregorian chant, and another private evening in the crypt. We will spend time in the cathedral reflecting on the many aspects of Mary and communing with the Black Madonna.
Faculty: Anne Baring (virtually), Apela Colorado, Ruth Cunningham, Jim Garrison, Andrew Harvey, Banafsheh Sayyad.
Ubiquity Chartres Community Webinars – Join the faculty and participants in our monthly webinar on the second Sunday of every month for discussions on the topics included in the intensive. Register for the Webinars here. Watch past Webinars here.
TO REGISTER:
Click here to register!
More info: Email | 702-358-0551
36 hrs towards Dance of Oneness® Certification Program
Preparing for a Dance of Oneness® Retreat
More Resources
Dance of Oneness®: Curriculum
Recommended Reading List
by Banafsheh | Nov 11, 2018 |
5-day workshop with Tony Khalife and Eskandar Alexander
REGISTER NOW!
Calling all lovers of Rumi who believe in the transformative power of dance in a circle of like-hearted people!
Dance is the joy of the soul and the body. The soul’s entry into the body is a dance. Regardless of your work or what you do, your soul wants to dance, touch and kiss the infinite. Trust, let go, and listen to your own divine essence.
Rumi’s vision of sacred passion in action is returning to galvanize our hearts and minds. Dive in and embody his passionate and transformative message and immerse yourself in a sacred field of empowering grace that supports you in living with reverence and light from your deepest passion in the very midst of life.
Sacred dance is not just about feeling blissed out and flying into transcendent light. It’s about uncovering your purpose for being alive and doing the real work of radical embodiment, where you feel yourself as light and matter, male and female, your divine self and shadow, all at once, simply, nakedly, presently, right here, right now as an instrument of love in the world.
Join Banafsheh and musicians Tony Khalife and Eskandar Alexander in a wild, deep and nurturing weave of dance and live music! The workshop includes a performance and ecstatic dance celebration.
Open to all!
Suitable for women and men with little or no background in movement or dance as well as trained dancers, yoga and other movement practitioners. The only pre-requisite is a desire to connect your mind, body and soul through sacred movement.
For a deeper look into the structure of the workshop – click here.
Tuition (+lodging): $675-$5,605
REGISTER NOW!
More info: Email or call 831.667.3000
26 hrs towards Dance of Oneness® Certification Program
Preparing for a Dance of Oneness® Workshop
A guide and a mystic, Banafsheh is an unexpected gift in my life. I have reconnected to the divine around and in me and feel empowered to share this loving with others.
– Kathi Coyle
This is deep soul healing for me. Dancing with Banafsheh and Tony is my spiritual practice. It has opened me to new truths. I love them both so much, they bring such love, joy and light into the world. I love the tenderness and the ability to flow with what is present in the moment even if it is grief. This is pure magic!
– Kira Preston
I was immensely moved! It was fun, meaningful, spiritual and educational! Helped me integrate and invigorate! I feel more ALIVE and grounded in my spirituality. I feel committed and more clear about my personal path in life.
– Deborah Braun
I have a renewed love affair with life!
– Tara Miller
by Banafsheh | Nov 2, 2018 |
Weekend workshop at Menla Retreat Center, Phoenicia, NY
REGISTER NOW!
Listen…listen with your heart… and allow this to lead you into a dance that dissolves your small I, so you can feel Spirit acting through you.
If you long to meditate with movement and feel drawn to truly ground your spirituality in your body and gain practical tools for living a more energized, peaceful and lucidly creative life, this workshop is for you.
Guided by the teachings of Rumi, delve into grounding and centering techniques that awaken your body and re-connect you with the Earth and your core, so you can open your central channel and your heart, and align with Spirit.
This workshop demystifies turning, offering access to Sufi whirling meditation in a few simple steps. This method allows people of all experience levels to turn for a long period with ease. An age-old practice of the legendary Sufi masters Rumi and Shams, the Sama is an inner journey and a direct path to creativity. It dissolves mental chatter into the vast ocean of presence, and you begin to simply be…unchained, free, present, and wildly inspired.
Explore the love poems that poured forth from Rumi as he whirled, and the symbolism and philosophy of the Sama as a complete spiritual path, one of the clearest ways to “embody the transcendent:, which H.H. the Dalai Lama calls, ‘the true meaning of life’.
“Like the ground turning green in a spring wind,
Like birdsong beginning inside the egg,
Like the universe coming into existence,
The lover wakes and whirls
In a dancing joy that kneels down in praise.”
— Rumi
For more information about the structure of the workshop – click here.
This workshop is on the beautiful sacred grounds of Menla Mountain Retreat. Accommodations at the retreat center are available, see the website for details.
Tuition (+lodging): $450-$938
REGISTER NOW!
More info: Email | Call 845.688.6897
10 hrs towards Dance of Oneness® Certification Program
Preparing for a Dance of Oneness® Workshop
We are learning embodied connection to our Divine nature. There have been remarkable shifts into peace for me. The preparation for “whirling” and connecting to our source energy was meticulous and thorough with great attention being given to precision and detail.
Jyoti Louise Bruun, Hollyhock 2017
This practice of oneness, through Dance, with the Beloved that is so alive in the being of you, Banafsheh, has been a total joy! A truly transformational & healing journey deeper into the love within, into the Beloved. Thank you, for the gentleness & humbleness with which you teach. Thank you for touching my heart with such deep beauty and for the reminder that the love comes from within.
Niomi Starspires, Hollyhock 2017
