(From August 2010 – originally posted as one of Colette’s Divine Alchemy Newsletters)
Finding a Living Ecstasy
…while living with Chronic Illness
I’m going to take a risk here. Forgo my usual exalted and inspiring tone. Expose the most vulnerable parts of the life I have been given - the places of shame, despair, physical unraveling, psychic dismemberment, and loss of faith. I’m talking about the ragged terrain of chronic illness, a silent, ravaging lover that has been my bedmate for over 7 years, at times stripping my formerly Rubenesque frame to its bare bones, and constantly challenging my fortitude, with its shadowy, incessant demands to surrender to a slower rhythm, a narrower life.
The inexorable alchemy of chronic illness has its gifts, to be sure, a grinding down of the ego’s petty agendas, a surrender to life on its own terms, a kind of trust and openness that can only be borne from utter annihilation. It takes a tenacious courage to keep moving forward year after year, in the face of exhausting, expensive healing regimes, some which have helped, others of which have only made me weaker.
All in all, I am in better shape than I was 7 years ago. But…completely well? On my good days, I say with confident bravado, “I’m getting better! I want to give my best to life!” Then, without my permission, like an abduction from Hades into the Underworld, my body takes me down to the place where I can barely function, my brain foggy and scrambled, where even taking care of day-to-day tasks, like shopping for food, cooking meals, and cleaning the house, feels like climbing Mt. Everest. On those days, I judge myself harshly, feeling like a failure because my body refuses to go along with my well-laid plans. In those moments of descent, I often secretly wonder if I deserve to live, because I’m unable to accomplish as much as I would like, my desires and dreams suffocating in the dust.
Recently I watched a documentary about chronic fatigue, in which the filmmaker read a suicide letter from a woman so broken down from her illness, she felt she had no choice but to take her own life. “Today I died from chronic fatigue,” she wrote, adding that she hoped in time doctors would take her illness seriously, so others wouldn’t suffer the way she had. While I would never take my own life, I wept tears of recognition at the silent despair that overcame this woman, a despair that is only too familiar to those whose lives have been dismantled by chronic illness.
Out of a desire to “energize the positive,” only my most intimate family and friends know the truth of the challenges I still face, and no one, no one knows the magnitude of how my heart has been ravaged. Despite my sincere efforts over the years to heal physically, spiritually, emotionally, I haven’t given up hope. Grace carries me home from the Underworld again and again, and I feel infinitely grateful for the love and tangible support I have received over the years…from amazing friends, family, doctors, healers, complete strangers even. You know who you are. I couldn’t have made it through without you.
“Where’s the ecstasy?” you may be wondering. “This is about finding a living ecstasy, isn’t it? “ There are quiet victories, undeniable minor miracles that should be mentioned - like feeling well enough to attend a party with my husband, dancing and enjoying the company of friends. That happens several times a year. Or feeling strong enough physically to take an hour-long hike, or work in the garden for a couple of hours, and not be wiped out afterwards. I don’t take the “good days” for granted, even if they only turn out to be a few good hours. For years my life has been lived in a rather narrow arc, but it has its pleasures – whether it’s strolling in the farmer’s market, savoring the roses in my garden, or bringing beauty to the table for our Shabbat dinner.
Finding a way back into my body in a consistent way has been the greatest challenge. Twenty years ago I was an avid practitioner of Indian Classical dance and Ashtanga yoga, but it’s been many years since I had the sustained energy for those practices. To my utter delight, I have recently found a new practice that is both gentle and dynamic, sensuous and strong, passionate and poetic, healing and enlivening - that over the course of a 5-day workshop at Esalen ushered in an experience of vitality and joy in my body, unknown to me for a decade at least: DANCE OF ONENESS: Living Ecstasy, taught by the exquisite BANAFSHEH SAYYAD, a dancer of unparalleled beauty, wisdom, and a passionate embrace of all that Life holds.
DANCE OF ONENESS is a unique invitation into wholeness, a seamless blending of elements of Persian dance, yoga, qigong, Flamenco, and Sufi ritual. With BANAFSHEH’s fiery recitations of ecstatic Sufi poetry throughout the dance, and TONY KHALIFE’s inspiring music guiding our journeys, we stretched and shook and shimmied and whirled, led deeper and deeper to the expression of our true selves, radiant with aliveness.
I was astonished at how good my body felt, even though we danced for up to 6 hours each day. Yes, at times it was a stretch, but my body kept rising to the occasion, opening to a new fire of abandon within, all the while staying rooted and strong. I credit BANAFSHEH’s sensitivity in the gentle way she guided us into our bodies, the presence she held which was vast enough for anything that wanted to emerge, and an unflinching exuberance for Life which was absolutely infectious! At the end of 5 days my body had changed in ways that surprised me – I felt flexible, strong, passionate, open. Ecstatic! An absolute miracle.
An integral part of our DANCE OF ONENESS experience was the extraordinary musical artistry of TONY KHALIFE. Words cannot capture the magic Tony brings, flawlessly weaving the sound of tablas, dumbek, harmonium, guitar and vocals from many traditions into a musical expression of wholeness unlike any other. And his delightful loving presence and rascally humor never failed to enchant our group. Imagine hearing sudden strains of “White Rabbit” while we were practicing Flamenco moves!
When my husband and I returned from our exuberant experience at Esalen, I was convinced I had crossed a threshold in my healing process, and that the bouts of debilitating fatigue and other symptoms of illness would disappear. To my dismay, the dark lover has not left me completely. But I have been given tools through the DANCE OF ONENESS that help me move back into my body, beckoning me into the dance of Life, continuing to forge new tracks within my being, for a sustained vitality and strength. That’s an ecstasy I can live with.
My infinite love and gratitude to Banafsheh and Tony, and my beloved husband Raphael for making the experience at Esalen possible. I’d travel anywhere on the planet to experience the DANCE OF ONENESS.
Tony Khalife, Colette de Gagnier, Banafsheh Sayyad
To find out more about the amazing work of Banafsheh Sayyad and Tony Khalife,
please visit their websites at
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