The Brightside: The Creative Movement
WICOMICO Co., Md.- Have you ever wondered what a safe space to dance and get your body moving looks like? Well, one organization in Maryland is answering that in the most unique way. “The Creative Movement’ is giving people of all ages, especially children a way to move their body in an environment that’s changing the way they communicate in their communities.
“When we say dance, people usually have their preconceived notion of what they feel dance is, and I wanted to switch up the game, I wanted to change it a little bit,” says Owner and Director, Staci Alexander.
The Creative Movement is a performance-based company that’s dancing its way through communities with a mission to explore emotions, communicate effectively, and get bodies moving. “We’ll do like a follow me activity and then we’ll do a freestyle activity and then I’ll kind of dive into conscious movements, so a little bit of yoga, a little bit of mind activity, a little bit of speaking affirmations to themselves, breath work, that kind of stuff,” says Alexander.
Two aspects of “The Creative Movement” are performance-based, and also a form of education. Alexander visits schools to share her lessons in classrooms and assemblies. “It’s a beautiful experience to have children and adults in here each week being open to learning something totally out of their wheelhouse 10 or being asked to speak or being asked to speak for the first time publicly, people having to listen to them.”
We’re told Alexander has been a dancer for the majority of her life and says she too struggled with emotions while growing up. Dance was a way to express those emotions, but beyond ballet, jazz, tap, and hip hop, she says she saw the power movement had on effectively exploring emotions to understand them, and in turn – communicate them into positive actions. “They can identify what they feel in the moment, I feel sad, I feel excited, I feel joy, they can tune into that quickly and then hold themselves in that emotion.” She goes on to say, “They still want that acknowledgment, that validation to feel the feelings to find joy, to find happiness, to find connection with other people, and sometimes they forget.”
Getting people out of their minds, and into their bodies is one of the main focuses of creative movement. As Alexander and her company of about 60 members say, putting their “sauce” on it is what makes this collective effort work. “We have a lot of children who have a lot of ideas and I have a lot of adults that also have a lot of ideas.” Alexander adds, “I’ve adapted that and that’s how my business is successful, it’s not just my effort, it’s a huge team effort.”
Alexander says they’ve been able to grow their mission in the last two years in a way she never expected, and the effort between everyone involved shows the positive impacts they can make. “I’m fostering leaders, future leaders, these are children that soon will have positions that affect people, and I see that.” She adds, “You want to do something, you’ve gotta move differently and we have to move differently so this is my tiny way of doing it right now.”
Alexander wants to see others make positive change through movement as well. “Creativity doesn’t always flow, sometimes it’s messy and chaotic and not our best work, and maybe we could have done better but then sometimes it’s just magic, and over here more often than not, it’s magic.”
While Creative Movement is primarily in Wicomico County, Alexander hopes to grow the company and reach more schools looking to be involved.
Their next performance is from the 31st through February 2nd and it’s called ‘Candiliandia.’ The performance will be held at the Wicomico Youth and Civic Center.
For anyone looking to buy tickets or a school looking to get involved, you can check them out on Facebook at “The Creative Movement” or email Thecreativemovement2014@gmail.com.
