Underbelly: The Art of Slowing Down

*****Underbelly: The Art of Slowing Down is now expanding to NYC! *****

Born in the Bay Area in 2018, Underbelly is a non-verbal, somatic journeying practice immersed in music for a slower body.

It is a response to the loss of slowness and spaciousness in our dominant culture which survives on speed keeping problematic, oppressive, and destructive systems in place at the cost of our well-being and planetary health. It's time to dismantle the hurry and reclaim our slow in a fast and overwhelming world.

We prioritize and center nervous system (co)regulation, emotional digestion, nourishment, boredom, living in the questions, complexity, rest, subtlety, listening, communion, and attuned relationship over modernity’s urgency, linearity, transaction, instant gratification, consumptiveness, and incessant stimulation. It is a practice that doesn't tell or precisely instruct, but gives people permission to step out of ingrained societal conditioning so they can actually be where they are, take their time, go their pace, and follow their organic unfolding through deeper listening and yielding vs. pushing and controlling.
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Here, we exist in truer presence and intimacy with one another giving rise to our somatic and vital intelligence without looking or being "right." Instead of needing to have it all figured out, we embrace the unknowns and rest back into the richness of what is already here, allowing it to guide us. In the age of loneliness, screens and AI, may we continue to incrementally and progressively strengthen the connective tissue of how we relate andnourish the foundational fabric of our humanity. And not just for us, but in service to the greater ecosystem.

***This experience is not performative/postured/appropriated spirituality, nor a movement method, workshop, or ecstatic dance/contact improv jam/cuddle party. It is not a quick fix or the next dopamine hit. It is not guided from certainty or authority. It's a kindred community that values generous collaboration, being in process, energetic sensitivity, self and collective inquiry, nuance, and exploring relational dynamics. Underbelly is a trauma informed space.

***Every Underbelly experience varies depending on what is alive in the group field at that given time:

• Movement forms are welcome (authentic/personal/formless/sensory/somatic movement, movement with others etc).
• Meditative forms are welcome (resting, pausing, stillness, being-ness, witnessing, observing, writing, doing nothing etc).
• Participants may explore being solo.
• Participants may explore being with others in the form of proximal space (connection without physical touch). This gives people time to feel what is energetically alive in the spaces between us so we can stay in our own experience while being with others, explore subtler notes of interaction, and not rush into learned habits.
• Participants may eventually explore consensual physical touch after sustained time in proximal space.
• Music: emotional, soulful, slow, spacious, deep, symphonic, film scores,meditative, ambient, experimental, nature sounds, silent, and live.
• All are welcome. No prior experience or preconceived notions necessary, you'll absorb and discover as you go.​

BEFORE COMING:

1) Read more about the Underbelly practice here
2) Review logistics + code of conduct here
3) See schedule+tickets/ Whatsapp group here

Schedule for the evening:

7pm: arrive

7:20pm: container closes

7:30pm: begin

9:30pm: end

*Please arrive @7pm so your body has time to unwind/settle in! We will close the container promptly @7:20pm.

*Tickets can be purchased ahead of time online or at the door only through Venmo/Paypal/cash. No one turned away for lack of funds, please communicate.