Awake-One by Johnny Glanville
While travelling through LA last week I took a friends offer to try something completely new by going to an Awake-One class. For those of you who don’t know what that is; it’s a form of body control that through wave-like breathing has you feeling like you’re still in the womb. The class was actually called; The Flow-Learning to move with the intelligence of Love.
Our instructor Cass asked us all to sit close, so close I could smell what the other participants ate for lunch. Then he asked us what we wanted to work on. Hands shot up and people spoke of ailments both physical and mental. Fear, tight hips, and anxiety were just a few of the offerings I heard. I kept my mouth shut, not only did I wish I could just melt into the bamboo walls, but I also had no idea what I wanted help with.
Then he took his shirt off, the ladies in the class didn’t object to that, after which he lay on the ground and demonstrated something that if I hadn’t seen I wouldn’t have believed*. His body was breathing. Not his lungs, his body. I saw ripples run through him like waves on an ocean. Every inch of this man moved, his fingers and toes twirled while his hands, arms and legs and torso began to morph like some photo-shop altered video. His breathing was silent, only the noise of his skin squeaking off the wooden floor could be heard as he demonstrated an act of grace so profound it mesmerized me.
“Its curious movement.” he said. “Like that of a newborn, be creative and imaginative, and instead of thinking with your analytical mind, listen while acting from your playful mind; Then your body will follow along, as you discover what can happen within the flow.” I swallowed hard, my comfort level was low, the lights were dimmed and I felt altogether over my head with this group of hyper-hip gypsy’s. But funnily enough after squirming a bit on the floor I got it, so much so that I stopped thinking completely. For a few moments, none longer than a dime of seconds, I was operating without my mind. My body or organism as Cass had referred to it was acting on its own. If I had to define it in my own words, I would call it full-body-meditative exercise.
Cass acted as though he were an alien inside a human body enjoying the discovery of the organism’s strengths and weaknesses. He describes this as, “Being eternal Spirt inhabiting the body while moving and breathing within the Quatom Flow of Intelignece, Love.” His open-minded and imaginatively cool California approach made him the kind of guy who depending on your disposition you would either dismiss as crazy, or accept as a guide to help you believe in the unbelievable.
Suffice to say The Awake-One approach is a stretch, reserved for free-thinkers only. However, between Santa Monica and Venice Beach, where a lot of fresh spirits tend to congregate, it’s closer to conventional. Ultimately, the class helped me with something I have struggled with for a long time. By making me wholly uncomfortable and breaking down the social and cultural boundaries I have set for myself, I found myself wondering if I, or them, were crazy. It’s a totally terrifying experience when you honestly wonder if perhaps you have lost your mind. But it’s also rewarding, because in the end I found the solution wasn’t in trying to determine which side of crazy street I reside, but in not asking the question in the first place.
By Johnny Glanville