Finding my voice

My recent trip to the UK was triggered, as usual, by a course. Not shiatsu, for once, but organised by my shiatsu "god", Bill Palmer, in whom I have such blind faith that I asked few questions before signing up. Bill has often included vocal expression in his workshops and I've enjoyed some magical (and traumatic) moments finding parts of myself usually kept well covered up. Bill had presented this as an opportunity for in-depth work and I was looking forward to a good ol' psychological roughin' up.

Saturday started well – a happy reunion with shiatsu friends from Bill's courses this and in previous years. But already, as we went round the circle to introduce ourselves and set expectations, alarm bells were beginning to ring. People had come to sing – and have fun! What on earth had that got to do with my anticipated life-and-death struggle with the dark forces... I made it clear that I would be very disappointed if fun was what I had.

After a free-flow physical warm-up where we squirmed and stretched in a random way for three times longer than one might need, Tim took out his shruti box:

... and taught us a scale. Sa, Re, Ga, Ma, Pa, Dha, Ni, Sa... Expectations crash. What am I doing here. We are indeed going to learn to sing. Indian classical-style. Don't get me wrong – singing, until I moved to France, was a big part of my life. And Tim is a deeply knowledgeable man with a lovely voice. But that wasn't the ticket I thought I'd bought.

So I spent the rest of the next 2 days trying to recalibrate myself to what was, instead of resisting it. To no avail. My pal Maryll had travelled even further – from Catalonia – with similar motivations to me. We gossiped and bitched. And then, having sat for hours in complete boredom while Tim coached people individually to hit the right note, frustration levels for me now off the scale, there was only one way out: two people pinned me to the floor and gave me some shiatsu. Phew. Around the room others developed their own responses through bodywork, dance and vocalising. When Bill the cat walked in at the end of the second day it really looked as though the mice had gone bananas.

Meanwhile, you are probably wondering what Tim was doing the while. Hm. Well. Kind of there, and kind of not. At close of play he asked us for some shiatsu, distant-healing style. For a few minutes he lay in the centre of the circle and we did... whatever we did. And he thanked us. And everyone in the group, except Maryll and I, thanked him for a wonderful 2 days.

Later, in the pub, and in Tim's absence, I let rip in front of Bill. Slash and burn, wham bham, cut down everything and everyone in sight. Later, I was mortified by my arrogant outburst. But lo, the group seem to have enjoyed it. I am considered to have made progress in self expression of a particularly angry kind. Which is a little baffling. I consider myself pretty well developed in that department.

So there was personal development, even if not as I had envisaged. And I found that even basic vocalising – a raga scale, and a little song – rekindled something for me. Today I linked up with a pianist friend and romped through a bit of Mozart, Fauré, Vaughan Williams. Perhaps, thanks to Tim Jones, I have refound my voice.