We Stand With the Freedom Fighters in Iran & Dance for a Triumphant Revolution! Learn More>>

We Stand With the Freedom Fighters in Iran and Dance for a Triumphant Revolution!

Iran, My Mother – A Dance Tribute by Banafsheh

Music: Sohrab Pournazeri & Homayoun Shajarian

Iran, My Mother  ای مادرم، ایران زمین

From the dark depths of oppression where the unimaginable happens to those who are simply trying to live with sovereignty, love and joy, the world’s first women-led revolution was born in Iran with the central slogan — Woman, Life, Freedom — inspiring all of us to stand for a just and equitable world while remaining aligned to our greater virtues and what we love. For those in Iran, this comes at an unimaginable cost.

Among those whose lives have been lost and innocence destroyed by the heartless brutality and insidiousness of the Islamic regime are the children of Iran… the light of possibility for a country in need of healing and a world in need of urgent change. 

Iran, My Mother, an original dance tribute by Iranian-born sacred dancer Banafsheh Sayyad, represents the heartache, eternal love and bond between mother, child, and homeland as a deeply heartfelt and symbolic tribute to the Iranian mothers whose children’s lives were brutally taken.

In this dance, Banafsheh aims to express the deceased children’s deep, abiding love for their mothers, and for their homeland, especially in the time of Nowruz where families gather to celebrate. For many families, there is an empty place at their gathering which will never be filled… an ache that will never be cured.

Through this sacred dance, we invite you to hold space for the unbreakable bond of mother and child and their ongoing heartdance — which can never be broken. And for the sheer possibility that as the Earth renews herself, positive change can happen when we allow our shared humanity to guide us.

این رقص را تقدیم میکنم به شما مادرانی که دختران و پسران فرزانه و پهلوان ایران زمین را پرورش دادید. به شما افتخار میکنم و با شما همدلی میکنم. فرزندان جان باخته تان هم خودشان جاودانه شده اند وهم عشقشان به شما جاویدان

For all the amazing Iranian women
who have mothered heroes for all of eternity some of whom are mentioned below

To learn more about the world’s first women-led revolution in Iran, check out The Woman, Life, Freedom Summit: Voices on the Liberation Movement in Iran.”

Dance of Oneness® is the dance I had been waiting to do all my life. From a young age I had danced, read watched and followed Isadora Duncan, Martha Graham, Joffery Ballet, Margie Gillis, Gabriel Roth and many more than I can name that moved in a way that spoke to me. Dance of Oneness® is the culmination of all that I had been drawn to in the other dance forms which seemed to be missing the main ingredient. Banafsheh has found the missing thread which is the opening to the Beloved, to truly give yourself in movement to the Divine energy that resides and moves through all of us from the Earth and the Heavens. I felt that for the first time in our dancing. It also reintroduced me to my own body, allowed me to accept my imperfections and for the first time in years swim naked in the ocean. All of this and more.

Janet Sawatsky

Canada

Transformative! Banafsheh skillfully takes us step by step to an experience of dance that brings me deeper into my body, to peace, feeling grounded and open to beauty and to love. Most importantly for me, the process brought me to experience a lovingness toward myself. I appreciate her presence of gentleness and fierce passion, and I’m inspired to bring my best self into my world.

Mary Regis

USA

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