Decluttering Through TranscenDance: Science & Soul of Movement w/ Jennifer Jimenez|Heather Aardema

So where I would like to start is actually on the topic of clutter. And clutter is not just the stuff. It's also anything or any thought or any feeling or any action that gets between where we are and where we want to be. And so what I am wondering is what, what was the clutter in your life? What was weighing you down? What was blocking you from really becoming the person you are today?

Oh my gosh, that's such a great question. It's a loaded question, but I love it because it's, you know, all the things that I think people probably don't think about when they hear the word clutter. So there's more than just physical stuff clutter that I know you teach about so amazingly, but there's mental clutter. There's all the subconscious beliefs, the limiting beliefs, the stories, the patterns, the paradigms that are heavy, that weigh on us. And so just to put things into perspective, when you say where you were versus where you are today, for our listeners who don't know, just to give a few examples, one is I went from the mental clutter of being a penniless professional dancer. Who's ever heard the saying starving artist, right? So that's a paradigm. That's a, and it's true for a lot of artists, but not for all of them. There are, you know, quite a few very abundant artists, but I was carrying the weight or the clutter of that limiting paradigm. Today I run, I do run a multimillion dollar entrepreneurial business that no one handed me that was built from zero, from ground zero to what you see today. And it required clearing that clutter. That's just one example. Another one that's super important to the work I do today in the world was the clutter of feeling like I wasn't enough. And that most importantly, I was, as a professional dancer, um, my body wasn't enough. I was never thin enough, tall enough, my legs were not long enough, not, you know, flexible enough. And so for my 20s and really my early 30s, there was this constant fight, this battle with my body to shrink myself. And on the contrary, today my mission is to help women expand and shine their light and speak their truth and stand in their power. And that starts with loving the body that they're in today. And that's probably one of my greatest transformations is going from a body abuser and the amount of time and mental clutter. Like, I would wake up thinking about food, thinking about calories, thinking about just what it was gonna require of me energetically today to try to fit a specific mold. And I'm totally free from that now. You know, food and movement are tools, certainly, that help me live my mission, but it's no longer about trying to burn a certain amount of calories. It's so freeing to clear that clutter.

So freeing. And what would you say about the societal messaging in terms of clutter? Because there's so much out there, right, telling us that we should look a certain way. And did that— yeah, too.

Oh my gosh. Well, so where, where does this clutter come from? It comes from culture, right? Depending on the culture that you were raised. And I have a friend who grew up in Europe, and she just doesn't have the body stuff that I have that I was raised with, you know what I mean? Not necessarily in my family per se, but the things around, like my brothers had— and God bless them, there's no blame here— but, you know, Sports Illustrated back in the '90s was very much not what you see today. There's different curvy, different-sized women now, it, you know, in different— all kinds of, you know, beauty, uh, diversity now that just didn't exist when I was a young woman and when I was being shaped by commercials, by magazines, by the radio, and just by what people said. You know, I— there were lots of comments. I'll never forget being in dance school. So I moved to New York City to pursue professional dance, and I'm walking down the hallway in my black leotard, in my pink tights, and my little ballet slippers, in my ballet class, and I get handed an envelope. And I walk in, and all the girls are sitting in there, and they're opening— we're all opening our envelopes, and it's our grades for that semester. And one of the grades that we are graded on is our body. I had no idea I was going to be graded on my body size, shape, form, and I got a C. Now, I, I know it sounds silly, but at the time, this young woman who is trying to measure up, trying to fit in, where I— you know, we're taught through school that our grade determines our future, determines our success in life. So if we get A's and B's, we'll do well. If we get anything lower than be that we'll probably end up being a failure. So for me to, to feel healthy in my body and relatively really good at that time, and then to see other girls sitting next to me that were no more talented, no more, you know, brave, no more hardworking than I was get A's for their quote-unquote bodies, and for me to be given a C— that was one of the things. Those experiences shape the inner clutter, that inner picture that we're trying so hard to work towards. Absolutely.

You know, I, uh, my goodness, that must have felt like a kick to the gut when you saw that. I mean, just, I bet you can— you've healed, you've moved beyond that, but I bet you can still feel that sensation when you saw that.

Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. For many years, it— I wasn't conscious of it. I didn't even remember the memory until I started to do some of the deeper healing work, some of the somatic healing, which is an embodied form of healing, because those memories don't just live in our mind, they live in our soma, they live in our whole body system as a vibration. You're not enough, you don't measure up. That then can drive really harmful behavior for many, many years. And so when I started to do this deeper healing work, and I got some transformational coaching, and I found conscious dance and energy medicine and mind-body-spirit healing, started to pull the weeds, memories started to rise to the surface, not to go back and relive them, but to embrace that, you know, probably what she was, 18-year-old young woman. And I literally rewrote that story, Heather. So one of, one of the practices that I also do in my coaching is that if there is a memory that keeps surfacing, or that just simply surfaces, and it is, it does, it does still provide us a visceral sensation in the body, you You can rewrite that memory. Maybe you didn't know that. Maybe some of you do know that, but I literally wrote out the disempowering story the way I lived it and what it felt like and how it felt like a kick in the gut and how it literally stayed with me for, you know, basically until I left that school and that, you know, that class. Like, I just never felt really great energetically being in that space. And it actually drove me to lose 10 pounds and all kinds of, you know, behaviors, right? So then I burned it. I went outside, put it in a little fire burning chimney thing, you know what I mean? And just sent it out into the universe. And I just forgave the teacher. If the teacher had known better, the teacher would've done better. You know, if the, if the university had known better, they would've done better. They were doing the very best they knew how at the time. I would imagine they don't do that anymore. I hope to God, you know, that they probably don't. That was 30 years ago. It was a long time ago. And Today, now, so I wrote the story the way I would have loved to have lived it, where I'm walking down the hall and I get handed a piece of paper and I open up a piece of paper and I get, you know, E for exceptional. You're an exceptional human. You have exceptional energy. You're hardworking, you're determined, you're growing, you're improving. You are enough. You are beautiful just as you are and strong and healthy. And strength and health is the most important thing to be successful in this career, not fitting a certain size or shape or being a certain number on the scale. And I read that over and over again until it was really ingrained in my soma, in my nervous system and my memory bank. It's like planting a new seed in place of the old weed and then just nurturing it with love, with light, with water. And now I can, I can think about that story and tell it without it impacting my body anymore. And that's the goal, is that that clutter, energetic clutter no longer lives in my body. And I know you teach this, and I do, that, you know, for me as a health and wellness expert and transformational coach in this space, over and over and over again, I see a direct link between particularly women that I work with— men too as well, but I work with a lot of women— their weight and their protective mechanism that is the excess weight and their physical space around them, the clutter in their home. And the two go hand in hand. And so as you do this deeper heal— you think, oh, clutter clearing in my physical space is just about making it happen and throwing stuff away or giving stuff away and just clearing it. But really what I find is when my clients do the deeper energy clearing in their subconscious and in their bodies, all of a sudden the clutter, it gets itchy and starts to feel tight and like it has to go, and it just starts going, like they just start it. It's just, they're compelled to do it versus it feeling like a chore and challenging and difficult. And, and what, what also happens is even if you do clear the clutter, if you don't do the inner work, the clutter is going to come back because it's an energetic pattern.

100%. It will come back if you don't do the deeper work. I agree. And I am just thinking right now, so many of us watching or listening have experienced something like you experienced 30 years ago. Your story, it brought tears to my eyes. The ceremony that you created, the letter writing, the burning, and then rewriting the story. I had a coach tell me in high school, after practice one day, he pulled me aside and said, Heather, you need to lose weight. You need to lose weight if you want to be competitive. And he told me a certain amount to lose.

Wow.

And, uh, of course I doubled that amount because I was so shocked and mortified and all the things. And I lost that weight, but it began this cycle of losing and gaining and losing and gaining that I had for years. And, uh, if anybody right now is in that cycle right now, I want you to know, we both want you to know that, that you can heal from that. You can move through that. You can get to the other side where that's no longer your, your reality. Um, what a beautiful tool that you just shared with us, Jennifer, to, to be able to take agency and create the story that you really do want. Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah. Thank you. Well, you, Mentioned dancing. And so I want to share with you, a few years back, I met a woman in her mid-60s and she was divorced. It was a divorce that she did not want. And for a long time, she could not get out of bed. She was depressed. She felt so heavy, just so miserable and Just, just awful. And then one morning she woke up and she had an idea. She decided to turn on some music, her favorite music, and dance. Amazing. She danced for 2 hours. And after the 2 hours of just dancing by herself in her home, she felt amazing. And that became her therapy. So every morning for years, The first thing she does is dance. So she doesn't fill the calendar with anything else. This is sacred healing time for her. And when I say sacred healing time, I really do mean she was healing. And I'm wondering with your background and your knowledge and wisdom on dance and conscious dance, is there science behind this? Yes.

Yes, there is. Lots of it. Yeah. Tons of science, and that's the great thing. I mean, science has finally caught up to what humans have been doing and have known for centuries, really for thousands of years. Humans have used music and drumming and moving. In tribal times, the tribe would meet the warriors who were out in battle with drumming and sounding and shaking and hopping and dancing because they knew the trauma, just intuitively. They wouldn't have been able to scientifically tell you as medical allopathic, you know what I mean, doctors at the time, but they intuitively knew we need to help our warriors shake the trauma, digest it, integrate it, move it through their system. And same thing for— I mean, we still dance at weddings. That's like one of the cultural things we continued to carry forward. Thank goodness there's still some dance, you know what I mean, in our culture. But yeah, so science is really, really clear that they've more, more recently there was a study done about depression in general and they studied everything from exercise to weightlifting to aerobics to of course antidepressants, different forms of SSRIs and whatnot. And dancing outperformed all of those forms of therapy, head and shoulders, just dance, what you're talking about, just this, you know, way of moving the body, allowing the body to be the sacred medicine. So the New England Journal of Medicine did a 21-year study where they studied people suffering from Alzheimer's and dementia, and they also studied all forms of movement and exercise. And dancing increased mental acuity by 76% and decreased Alzheimer's and dementia. I mean, there's no other therapy on the face of the planet that, that can claim those kinds of results. This is 21 years worth of data. I mean, it's powerful. The other studies show that, um, dance alone, just even a few minutes, my friend. So this woman I know danced for 2 hours. Let's just talk about 3 minutes, one song. The average song is 3, 3 and a half. Some songs run longer, but just 3 minutes of dancing activates your happy hormones, dopamine, Oxytocin, serotonin, and endorphins in the most powerful way. There's just— we're wired for this. Now, some of you might be thinking, well, I don't dance, I can't dance, I have two left feet, I feel super awkward in my body. Here's what's beautiful: that's clutter, that's a programming, that's something that you picked up along the way that isn't your true nature. Have you ever seen a 3-year-old at a park concert say, "Mom, I have two left feet. Mom, I don't like to dance." Oh no, no, to their little girlfriend that's coming and wanting to twirl and spin and roll around on the grass. You don't see children talking that way. It's because that's— we're wired to move rhythmically to the sound of music.

It's—

and later in life we learn, oh, there's a right or a wrong way. That's technique. That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about letting yourself, like, if you want to and you need to, first close the blinds. No one needs to see. Be in your space. Close the door. Throw on a song. Let yourself feel awkward and silly and quirky at first. And what, what you will find will happen is the true you gets unlocked and unleashed. There's this freedom of self that is so powerful, and you connect with your true essence and your soul, and it's just the most liberating thing. The thing that so many people tell me when they come to a Transcend Dance class, especially the ones that feel the most awkward in their body, is within, you know, maybe 10 or 15 minutes, right? They, you know, takes a minute to move all the way from the left brain to the more right creative brain where we're not in our logical, critical mind. But once that journey happens and they're in this space, they feel free, they feel liberated, they have fun, they giggle and laugh and play, and the body knows what to do. The other thing this does is— I believe that our issues live in our tissues and that in order to heal it, you must feel it. And the body is our greatest teacher, our greatest healer. I believe we all have an inner physician within, but what we're often doing is move, telling the body very robotically, walk here, walk there, sit for 5 hours, stand now, go to the gym and do more. It's very linear movement. Our everyday life is very typically linear unless we work some odd job where we're, where we're moving rhythmically or circularly. But the average human isn't. And dance, when you let the body begin to move, it will mimic circles, spirals, flowing type movement that looks like— so if you were to look at, um, cells under a microscope, they're spinning. If you look at the strands of the DNA, there's this spiral energy. So if you take the average person and turn on music and then blindfold them, they're not dancing two steps forward, two steps back, right, left, right, left. They get into this this, like, almost like they're underwater, this three-dimensional fluid flowing movement, because that's the way our body's energy patterns— I believe we're energy beings, which by the way is scientifically proven. It's not a belief anymore. It's science. It's science. It's real science. We are quantum energy and we are dancing filaments of light, even if we can't physically see it with our eyes. So the body starts to mimic those movements. And I believe, because I've seen over and over and over again with clients of mine that come in with a locked shoulder or pain in their hip or a headache or massive fatigue. And what I teach is that's the time to connect with the earth, to open up to guided breath, to move, even if it's just super gentle movement. It's not, you know, dancing doesn't have to I look like Taylor Swift on stage, you know, like it's whatever the body is seeking and wanting to do. And these clients, within just a few minutes, the headache's gone, the locked shoulder. By the way, one of my favorite stories is when early on, I'm in my mid-20s, so I mean, I came into this work early. It was my 50-hour labor with my daughter that taught me very quickly that I was in my head and I was in controlling struggle. Real abuse with my body. And I was like, okay, this isn't gonna work. And then over the next 4 years, I went into a deep healing and I healed the trauma of my birth through this practice of conscious dance. And it was really in this 4-year period of time that it found me. And then the early stages of what is today Transcend Dance and the 10 stages of Transcend Dance were born. And I was teaching at a conference. My mother's, I have a thought leader mother who's the founder of our institute. Her name's Mary Morrissey. And she, for many years, was the president of the Association of Global New Thought Ministry. And this was a large conference with about 1,000 people, and I was coordinating all the mind, body, spirit classes. They didn't really have a lot of that back then, but I was like in my mother's ear going, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, you have to bring this to all these people. You guys sit all day in these very spiritual, heady conferences. We've gotta get these people moving. So let me, I'll coordinate it all, but we have to do this. And so I brought in all these different teachers from all over the world, and I of course threw myself in the mix. And so I'm teaching my first class of like 100 people. It felt like the biggest thing I'd ever done. And this woman runs up to me with a locked shoulder. She's in excruciating pain. She's like, it's been 9 months. I haven't been able to sleep. I can't lift my hand above my arm. Like, I can't function. And I love to dance, and I really, really feel called and wanna take your class, but I don't think I can. And so I just proceeded to just share from my heart and I let her know what I know about the body's healing. I said, what if you just let your body move in the ways that it feels pleasurable to move? What if you just breathe? What if you just let the music move through you? What if, you know, just do what you can. Like, this is a safe space. There's no right or wrong way. Definitely don't move to the degree that it's going to hurt, you know, and let's just see what happens. At the end of class, about an hour and a half later, she comes running over, tears streaming down her face, and I'm immediately worried. I'm like, oh no, maybe I should have told her not to do the class. You know, like I'm 26. I have no idea. You know, I'm super young in all of this. And she looks at me and she starts laughing and she reaches her hand up above her shoulder. She's like, Jennifer, it's gone. The pain. Is gone. I've been to every chiropractor, orthopedic doctor, like 5 doctors, like 6 this, 7 that. Like, she names like all the people she's been to that haven't been able to help her, and the healing lived within her. Like, she— the healing was available to her the whole time. It was probably, you know, I don't have a logical way to describe it other than to say most likely she shouldering something. It was embodied pain, trauma, whatever, that she finally let down with music, with breath, with community, the vibration. Also, when we come together as humans and we move together, there's this what's called collective effervescence. That's this collective joy that trains the nervous system. It can be a pattern interrupt. So if you're like, I have clients that have struggled with depression and they've forgotten what joy looks like. And they come into class, and there's this one of the 10 stages where we partner with somebody and we do mirroring, mirror dancing, just fun, playful. It's, you know, nothing fancy or hard. And she said, you know, the woman I was partnered with was exuberant. She was beaming with authentic joy, and I inherited it like it was contagious. Like, I haven't been able been able to feel that on my own. I haven't been able to create that, but I could— it was magnetic. I could feel it in my body. Now I can remember. It's, it's like, it's just magical. It's so powerful.

So powerful. And you mentioned the nervous system. And so this is— is this something that we can use? It's available to us all, right, to help regulate our nervous systems? Sounds like it.

Absolutely. And like I said, certainly you can come and learn more about transcendence and more formal modalities that take you on a guided journey. And I'll share with your, you know, audience a free gift of how to do that here in just a moment. But I really mean it. You know, if there's a song that you know that when you're driving in the car, this song comes on, you know the one, it's probably one from high school, you know, or one of those songs, and you just can't help but tap Tap your feet and sway your shoulders and a smile comes to your face. Music is my greatest partner in this work because music activates the right brain. It bypasses logic and it moves through the soma. So one of the greatest ways to regulate the nervous system is music. Of course, breath and really working with breath consciously, but then just a few minutes a day. You know, it doesn't have to be your friend's 2-hour— I mean, that's amazing and kudos, you know, but a lot of people are like, yeah, that's not going to happen. You know, I got kids to get to school, I've got this, I've got work. But, but you do have 3 minutes. One of my favorite power tools with clients is the 5-minute power move. We all have 5 minutes. We all spend 5 minutes on Facebook or Instagram or on Netflix or on video games on our phone, like Candy Crush or whatever the game is. You know what I mean? That you can borrow from those 5 minutes and do something that's really, really healthy for your mind, your body, and your soul. So yeah.

Yes, you can. Yes, you can. And so I want to ask you about Transcend Dance. How did you come upon the name? I love the name. And, and tell us a little bit more about it.

Yeah. So how did I come across the name? That's a really great question. I was— so in all transparency, I used to call it something else. Else. And then another woman had something similar, and she asked that I not— she had a trademark, so I was like, okay, I won't use that. And then I was just calling it Movement in Dance as a, as a transformational healing tool. It was like a really, really long name, you know, like, just here's what it is, you know. And that's the greatest thing about that, is if anybody's out there launching a new work, it really doesn't matter what you call it. You'll probably take it through 5 different names before you land on the thing. I had a woman come to one of our conferences when I was calling the long drawn-out thing. And she fell in love with it. And she runs a school in Michigan. It's a massage school that her mother founded, and she has a year-long track for the school. And she wanted me to come and train her trainers so that the movement and the embodiment module of that year would include Transcend Dance. And I hadn't launched a certification yet. And quite honestly, that's what drove me to like, okay, I gotta like finally like choose a real, you know, like brand name and really trademark it and the whole thing, cuz it's gonna be now certified out in the world for other people. And I just, I, you know, it was really spirit. There was just this one day where it's really all about transcending, you know, the lower vibrations and the lower emotions into a higher vibration energy of love and vitality and aliveness and gratitude and abundance. And it's it's a tool to tune the instrument. Our bodies are like— if you think about a guitarist, they don't just pick up the guitar and start playing. What do they do? They tune it to play beautiful music. Our bodies like that. We unconsciously pick up energy from our neighbors, our partners, our clients, the world, and we carry that heaviness around. So to have a tool that we can use where we work with music, we work with breath, We work with our minds and visualization and empowering thoughts and feelings through specific movement patterns to live as our most in love with ourselves in the world, full of joy, full of gratitude selves. So there's 10 beautiful stages that you can come and do. Um, I love to give a free taste of it, you know, um, the free gift for your beautiful audience, if it's okay to give it to them.

Yeah, absolutely.

They just would go to bti.com/dance and type in the coupon code FREECLASS. So everybody in your community can get a free, you know, experience of it. Cause I will say it is really therapeutic to just come and be guided, you know, and just because we give, especially women, right? We're giving, giving, giving, giving to everybody else. So just to come and really fill up your cup and recharge your battery, it's like taking your phone and plugging it onto a battery station. That's the way I feel at the end of class. I feel like I've had a chiropractic adjustment, an energy healing session, a life coaching session, a conversation with God, a reconnection to my vision, clarity. If I'm having questions or unsurety about my life, like I'm just on point, I'm ready to go and I feel full of energy and vitality.

So, you know, I want all of the listeners and the viewers to know I have done Jennifer's class and I felt euphoric. I just— happy tears. I just felt so whole and complete after doing your class. And I, uh, worked through a lot of pain. There was a lot of healing that happened in that class for me personally. And so I'm so glad. I'm so grateful that you're giving this free class, uh, to this community, to our community. And, um, I have one more question for you.

Yeah.

In life, We can go light or heavy regardless of the circumstance. And I love talking about the lighter path. And so to you, for you, what does the lighter path look like? What does that mean to you?

Mm, such a great question. It really means regardless of circumstances, situations, or conditions, I could have an illness, I could have an injury, there could be a problem in my community, something massive and quote unquote heavy or dark going on in the world. And I have agency. I get to decide and choose not sugarcoat it, not stick my head in the sand, not deny it. You know, part of what Transcendence gives me is a space to come and scream into the wood floor and shake out my anger about stuff that's going on in the world and cry and move the energy, but then tune to, who do I choose to be today? Am I going to be a person of increase? Am I going to bring love and joy to my interactions? God, use me as an instrument for your good. What, what would you have me, Jennifer, with my voice, with my time, with my gifts and talents, to make a positive difference in the world? Like, be on your podcast today, Heather. There's a lot of things I could be doing today, and you could be doing today, and you have chosen to use your voice for good. That's what really living the light path is for me.

So that was so beautiful, and I just, I just love how you brought that to life. Jennifer, we've got your free class. Where can people find you on social media?

And so yeah, so Transcendence Global for Facebook or Instagram, and for just more information about Transcend Dance, you can just go to bti.com/dance. Thank you for having me, Heather Aardema.

Thank you for being here. I want you to know I feel lighter right now than I did at the beginning of the call. You are such a gift, such a light. Thank you so much for being here.

Oh, it's such a pleasure. Thank you again.

Thanks for watching. If this resonated with you, give us a like and share with friends who could use some lightness. Don't forget to follow our page for daily doses of living lighter. And remember, if it feels light, it's right.