Soulbirth Blog

“Bellydance for birth”
by Maha Al Musa

Maha Al Musa is a mother of three gorgeous children – two sons and a daughter, writer, human rights activist, dancer, doula and lover of all things connected to the divine ‘feminine’. She is of Palestinian / Moslem and Lebanese / Christian background and was born in Kuwait and migrated to Australia in the early 60′s.

In 1996, whilst pregnant with her first son Kailash, she reconnected to her cultural roots through the “bellydance”.

When her son was six months old Maha began facilitating Bellydancebirth® classes in Byron Bay, Australia after being introduced to the dance by a local midwife, Annie. The classes were extremely popular with pregnant women and Maha developed a keen rapport with many of her students and midwives. She began working as a doula (birth assistant) with local home birth midwives and encouraged women to embrace their pregnancy journey with strength, empowerment and courage. She realized many modern women were estranged from not only their physical but also their emotional and spiritual body in this most powerful feminine cycle.

Through her classes, Maha presents Bellydancebirth® as a means for women to explore these most primal movements, drawing on her cultural heritage for its wisdom, healing and ancient knowledge. She weaves together the ‘old world’ with the ‘new world’ through the belly dance creating a joyful and uplifting experience for all mothers to be.

After the birth of her second son Tariq, at home in the water, she realised her dream in writing her book “Dance of the Womb”. Then to give birth a third time round at the ripe young age of 46 to her beautiful daughter Aminah (how lucky I was to have a girl!!) gave Maha an opportunity to make her long awaited DVD – to share with all women the positive power of her native dance in pregnancy and birth – all an incredible gift.

It further solidified her understanding of Bellydancebirth® in an even more powerful and holsitic way – she was able to refine many of her ideas around dancing in pregnancy and gained even more experience of it’s use in labour. Maha really felt that her third labour was enhanced by the belly dance in a way that was different from her first two births.

“I really felt that the belly dance gave me a very strong focus for my breath in my labour with Aminah……rather than just ease and dissipate the intense sensation of each contraction, the circling and spiraling movements helped to ground me deeply into my pelvis as I breathed through each wave……..I was able to let go, surrender and remain free of fear and thought … I really used the belly dance movements as a beautiful meditative guide through first stage…..it was really incredible to experience these new ways of utilizing the dance in my labour. I am so grateful as a facilitator of Bellydancebirth® to have been given this wonderful opportunity to test out my work again!!”

Maha’s book and DVD are two fold in their message, both as a valuable manual for women and an expression of the essence of Middle Eastern women’s instinctual creative “feminine” expressed in an authentic and profoundly positive manner. Maha has always felt that most images, both visual and written about Arab women are usually one dimensional stereotypes that she, nor many of her sisters do not resonate with.

She hopes her book and DVD will shine a light on the positive aspects of Arab women’s culture and take belly dance the dance of birth to a deeper realm for all women worldwide to have access to….

Maha’s DVD and book will soon be available to order through the Soulbirth website.  If interested in pre-ordering, please email me at: faye@soulbirth.com as I am in the process of ordering some in. I had a beautiful conversation with Maha this week and we are planning to bring her over to Perth in Aug/Sept 2010 to run a training program for us here in the West. I can’t wait, as I have always been a huge advocate of bellydancing throughout pregnancy and birth.

To visit Maha’s website, follow this link:
http://www.bellydanceforbirth.com/