Joana Saahirah´s World Blog
A Collection of Articles, Videos, and Freebies on Egyptian Dance, Self-Discovery & Empowerment
She showed me what was possible🌟
Once upon a time, a time that seems distant and yet so close, I had an awakening.
A Tunisian artist called Leila Haddad was going to present an Oriental Dance performance at "Culturgest", one of the most prestigious theatres in Lisbon, Portugal.
Leila dragged a fascinating culture behind her. Her photo on the poster of the performance smelled of cumin and "bokhour" (incense); her ellusive presence promised a magic I´d never witnessed.
At the time, I knew...
What I learned in 2023🎉
Growing older is inevitable - the privilege of the ones who live to tell; growing up is optional.
And what I´ve observed is that most of us grow older without ever growing up.
One of the reasons why we don´t grow up is because we refuse to learn from life experience.
I´m a compulsive learner. Give me a course, a book, a podcast, any great learning tool, and I´m a happy girl.
Yet, I know that there´s no better school than life experience.
...
Murder at The Oriental Café
This is not what you think. And certainly not what I expected.
When I moved to Egypt, during the official - bumpy - start of my career, I experienced the infamous cultural shock. I also suffered from the even more infamous "colonizer´s syndrome".
I criticized. Pointed fingers. Couldn´t understand how locals thought, felt, and behaved.
I grabbed, perhaps tighter than I should, to my values and perspective on the world, presuming they´d be superior to the ones I was...
Truths on Self-Confidence nobody Told you About
Am I Self-Confident?
We can affirm that I am. Most of the time.
I believe in myself - my inherent value, talents, and ability to make great things happen.
Sometimes, I fall off that wagon - big time. Life throws me a punch and I doubt myself, I go back - even if for just a moment or a short season - to a disempowered place of victimhood, lack of self-trust, and amnesia. But, make no mistake, I know my way back home.
You can tell when you´ve gone astray...
3 Things that Instantly Change Your Life
The obvious isn´t that obvious - here´s something experience has taught me; something I tell my students, frequently.
In other words, in our search for the extraordinary, we ignore the power of the ordinary, the simple, what´s right in front of our eyes.
In a time when everyone and everything seems to exist at a high speed - too fast, if you ask me -, we need to slow down, take a step back, and reconnect with what truly matters.
In this blog post - 3...
3 Principles of Self-Empowerment
Self-Discovery & Empowerment are essential parts of my work. They´re also, in my experience, an indissociable part of Egyptian Dance.
When I first wrote about it - in my first published book "The Secrets of Egypt - Dance, Life & Beyond" -, I was criticized, ridiculed, and not-so-secretly hated. That was in 2013, the year the first edition of the book came out.
Today these concepts have become trendy and plagiarised.
I could tell...
Random Pleasures that Feed my Soul
Images that speak more than words
A couple of pleasures that feed my soul
Consider it basic self-care. Rituals of self-preservation. Routines that nurture what is human in me
A creamy cappuccino, come rain or come shine.
Sprinkled with cinnamon or dark chocolate.
Books.
Reading them, above all; smelling their pages; browsing bookshops; discovering new books; last but not least, writing books (I have two published; more on the way).
...
Give it to Yourself
Picture this (sorry in advance for the unpleasant image):
I have my period.
I´m exhausted. Gloomy. Feeling like hell. And my inner demons crawl out from under my bed, like in a terror movie.
On the mirror, I see a distorted reflection of a woman I used to know. I look at my swollen belly and aching breasts - I sigh; I turn around and observe my butt, my thighs, my back. For some reason I don´t care to scrutinize, I don´t like what I...
The Souhair Zaki effect
Every dancer has a moment that has changed her, or his, life; the perspective they have on dance, music, themselves.
Some times, those turning points are negative - I´ve heard terrible stories of dancers traumatized by teachers, colleagues, audiences, employers -; hopefully, and in many cases, those turning points are positive. Dance and life changing.
I´m privileged to have several of those moments, the ones Oprah would call "ah ah moments", in my...
What I´m saying YES to, this Christmas
I´m sitting at a coffee shop - a cozy, warm, dim-lighted nook -, writing about my Christmas.
There´s a calm atmosphere in the air; a kid asks his mum for a brownie (mum says no, kid throws a tantrum); a geek reads the "Wuthering Heights" at the table next to me.
My man comes in my direction holding two cappuccinos in his hands - he´s smiling at me, trying not to spill the coffee; his face, tender.
(Idyllic)
This is how I´d have...
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