Personal Rhythms
Rhythm is a key way to regulate the nervous system. There are several playful paths into the use of rhythm for healing and creative purposes. Here is one Expressive Arts Therapy-based exploration.
My invitation to you:
Explore the regulating power of your own natural rhythms through the following EXA process.
Materials and Supplies:
a large coffee can or another cylindrical container with a flexible, soft plastic lid
Paint, paint pens, and/or collage materials and glue for decorating the outside of the container
Part 1: Set an Intention Related to Personal Rhythms
Write down a few intentions for why you might like to explore your natural sense of rhythm.
I want to regulate…
I want to find the rhythm of…
I want to synchronize myself to…
I want to move to the beat of…
I want to keep time with…
I want to sense into the timing of…
I want to find my pace in…
I want to mark the passing of…
I want to slow/quicken…
Part 2: Movement and Sound Exploration
Find a comfortable stance for doing some easy movement explorations.
Step one: Breath Movements
Begin with letting your breath normalize and deepen, by breathing a comfortable in-breath, and an outbreath that’s a bit longer than that in-breath. Do this for 4-6 breaths, or until you feel your breath is in a nice full place, then you can drop lengthening the outbreath, just let your breath do what it wants to.
Now begin to do a very slow movement exploration:
together with your inbreath, take one step, and at the same time, do one complete movement gesture that starts and ends in stillness. So you might: breathe in, take a step, and lift your arm and drop it again, all together.
pause in stillness at the top of the inbreath in your new position
then take another step, perhaps with the other foot but doesn’t have to be, with another complete movement gesture, this time with the outbreath
then pause in stillness again, and start another gesture on the next inbreath, with another step
Do this for a little while, for perhaps 12 breaths, to get it locked in. Most important is to honor the one step and movement per breath idea, and to really feel this basic rhythm of yours.
Step Two: Subdivide Movements
Now begin to subdivide the beat of each breath, still taking one step with each movement (so one in-breath has more than 1 step+movements). Try different subdivisions out, gradually increasing the number of movements per breath, but always balancing the number of step+movements, like so:
two step+movements on the inbreath, (pause) two step+movements on the outbreath (pause)
three step+movements on the inbreath, three step+movements on the outbreath
four step+movements on the inbreath, four step+movements on the outbreath…
and so on
Just experience this, there isn’t a way to do it right, the benefit is in the trying it on and the exploring of it.
Step Three: Subdivide with A Sound
In this last step, play with making a percussive sound, such as a brush (brushing your palm across your chest to make a soft sound), stomp, clap, or finger snap, over the breath beat. Play with subdivisions as desired. For example:
clap stomp brush brush inbreath, snap stomp brush brush outbreath
You can repeat a specific combination over and over if you like that, or let yourself loose, just playing around with ways to combine sounds over each in and outbreath. The breath is what stays constant and even, representing your personal rhythm.
When you have moved and played enough with sound, it’s time to make yourself a drum.
Part 3: Make a Homemade Drum
Use paint, paint pens, and/or collage to decorate your coffee can drum. You may want to use the quality of line to indicate and capture the felt-sense of what you experienced in the movement exploration. It’s also fine to use symbols. Decide to trust however your visual expression shows up.
Part 4: Find Regulating Rhythms
Get to know your drum. Use your fingers and hands or sticks, or something else?
Start with exploring how many distinct sounds you can make. Is there a difference between striking the center of the drum, the rim, the side, the bottom? What about a fully resonant tone (striking and taking away your hand or beater), versus damping or muting it (striking and stopping the resonation by keeping your hand or beater there after you strike)? What kinds of strikes are the loudest, the clearest, the most soothing, the most energizing? Which sounds feel satisfying or interesting?
Once you have familiarized yourself, play with creating a steady, ongoing rhythm that feels regulating to you today. You might explore:
a beat that follows or evenly subdivides over your breath (similar to the movement exploration)
a breath-like, brushy slow beat
a beat that seems to match your heartbeat: feel your pulse at your neck or wrist, then create a beat that responds to that in some way.
a heart-beat like sound: boom-BOOM, boom-BOOM, boom-BOOM
a beat that subdivides over your steps as you walk at a moderate pace around the room. Such as: one beat per step, two beats per step, three beats per step, or four beats per step, etc.
a beat that feels or sounds like different states of being: joyful, energized, pleased, melancholy
When you have experimented to your satisfaction, a final exploration can be to listen along to a song, and allow yourself to play along, to just allow an existing beat to carry you into a flow state.
Here is a sample song you can try playing along to. By playing along, I mean, discovering rhythms that you enjoy for a while, riding them out until you’re done with them, then letting them go to find others. Use the backing track to give you a supportive container, inside of which you can explore. You could play one simple beat the whole time, or mix it up, trust what feels good for you today.
The song is a bilateral music piece I made recently (inspired by a training in bilateral movement and artmaking I took with Dr. Cathy Malchiodi and Dr. Elizabeth Warson, I recommend!). You will hear components of the music pan to the left and the right if you listen with headphones. That way of mixing music is additionally regulating (works in the same way that EMDR is believed to work, through bilateral stimulation). If you like the effects, you can also hear variations of this and two other bilateral songs here.
Part 5: Reflect
When you’re done playing your drum, take a moment to revisit your intentions for playing with rhythms of regulation today. Notice also any shifts or changes in your state, pleasant or unpleasant.
Was this experience regulating for you? If so, how do you know? If not, or if it was even activating for you, how do you know that? If activated, see if there is something you can do to bring yourself some feelings of safety and peace, such as placing your hands on or at the edges of any areas of sensation, such as your chest, stomach, or head. You may imagine sending a reassuring message from your hands into that activated area, such as “I’m here with you” or “I’ve got you”.
If you are feeling regulated, also see if there is a way that placing your hands on your body, in the center or at the edges of areas of sensation, can solidify, support or extend what you’re feeling that feels good. And again, maybe there is a message from your hands, such as “I love you! I loved playing with you!”. Or something else!
To end, write down in your journal anything you may have discovered today, in your explorations of rhythms of regulation. Here are a few questions that may prompt some writing:
How is my rhythm today, how slow or fast did I seem to want to be? Does that make sense to me?
What nature features did my rhythms remind me of? Slow ocean waves? Raindrops? Something else?
Was there a particular time signature (subdivision of beats) that I liked, such as three percussive sounds per each step, or two movements per breath?
What might my rhythm exploration be telling me today, about the ways I am able to synchronize with, find the right beat (pace) of something? What internal or external rhythmic markers of time’s passing might I want to pay more attention to?
How might the rhythm explorations I had in movement or with the drum answer the intentions I set forth in some way?
Thank you for engaging!
with love,
~HM