6B. "Ahs" and "Ooohs"

• Everybody walk. Watch your breath. The air comes in, bounces out, then there's a pause. The next time you exhale, drop your mouth, and exhale with a whispered "ah" sound. Not a sigh but a steady stream of air. Inhale, then exhale with a whispered "ah." Hang your mouth open. Open mouth, open "ah" sound. Add voice and with each breath, increase the volume of the "ah." Use your diaphragm. Stay relaxed. Throat, shoulders and face, relaxed. The air comes in, bounces out, small voice, "ah," and then there's a pause. Two steps for your inhale, two steps for your exhale with the "ah." Two steps inhale, two steps exhale with "ah." Change the "ah" to "oooh." Two steps, inhale, two steps, "oooh ... oooh." Now, four "ooohs" on two steps, inhale, two steps, on the exhale, "oooh ... oooh ... oooh ... oooh." Combine the two sounds. Two steps, inhale, two steps exhale with "ah ... ah ... oooh ... oooh ... oooh . .. oooh."

Danger: Watching the breath may have a downside. You might use your breath to escape from an uncomfortable current experience, to retreat. Fade away.

Example: Suppose you're agitated. What are you supposed to do? Breathe. When overwhelmed? What are you supposed to do? Breathe. Upset in any way? Breathe. But have the feelings gone away? No, they're still there, waiting in the wings.

Instead: An alternative is to look at agitation. What's it all about? And upsetting and overwhelming feelings? Examine them directly. Go into them. Feel them. Work with them. Work through them. Take the time it takes to explore them without being sub­sumed or submerged by them, with a space of detachment. "This is what I feel like when I am very angry." Or very scared. Or very anxious.

We're not always lucky enough to have feelings surface to be explored or played with. Sometimes, we just make them up.

Useful Faking

If we practice a behavior long enough, that behavior may become second nature. We must be careful of what we practice.

"That felt fake." "I was faking it." Well, then fake it. Really fake it. The fake space is the space between the doer and what's being done. In these instances, the performer is distracted and withholds feeling from their action. Withholding, then, is what takes place in the space between per­former and action. So, really withhold. What does withholding feel like? How does it move? Speak? What does it have to say?

After an exercise, when a student comes back with, "That felt fake," or "I faked it," a question that needs to be addressed is: What did that feel like? What were the physical sensations that comprised that expe­rience? Instead of judging, it's time to investigate. The negative judg­ment aligned with "fake" causes discomfort. Withhold judgment and just let feelings be feelings, empty of content.

Terry was recounting a mountain climbing event. She was try­ing to impart the heightened state of excitement and often terror that accompanied the experience. But it just wasn't working. She was pushing on the words, speeding up her language, her eyes and general energy, too expanded. Suppose, instead, Terry had relaxed and told the story from a present perspective. She would let the telling of the story inform her emotional responses. She would find out what the event means to her right now. Her concern would he less on how we receive the stonj and more on her own experience of telling it.

But, suppose Terry is in a play and must recount the story with a heightened energy intended to recapture the excitement and, terror of the event, night after night. She must focus on her physical as well as contextual experience, the interactive dance between her body, feelings, voice and text. She must become the expressive body itself rather then "maker" of the story.

The following exercise brings students back to shifts with, again and again, the practice of immediately and fully accepting experience.