Tantsu Core

The year Harold Dull took Zen Shiatsu stretches into warm water and started Watsu (Water Shiatsu) he brought Watsu’s nurturing holding, heart connection and breath coordinated movements back onto land and started Tantsu. It can be shared with anybody anywhere on a carpet or mat in loose clothing.

Now 25 years later he brings what has been learned in the years since in Watsu back onto land in Core Tantsu. Floating and stretching those in our arms level with our heart center we discovered how much connection and movement comes from that center as well as our body center, how together they are the core of our being.

On land, breathing with someone, cradling their core between our legs as we rock, stretch and work whole sides of their body, we discover a level of containment, of peace, that, alongside all the physical and emotional benefits shared in Tantsu, is a new way of being with others.

In the first module of our Basic Core Tantsu (PAX) weekend you learn to cradle someone from the back (illustrated in the first 4 pictures to the right). After first connecting and exploring movement at the core itself, you explore up through their face, head, neck, shoulder, arm and out to their hand. Then after returning to the chakras in the core you explore down the legs and the feet. Since you remain in the same comfortable position throughout with access to the whole body, this is presented as a progression, not a fixed sequence, and you are encouraged to add whatever stretches, holds or movement you feel called to.

This module can be taken by itself in a Core Tantsu Posterior Cradle (Tantsu P) evening which prepares you to give a complete sharing from the back on both sides with anybody.

In the second module (illustrated under the first four pictures) you learn to work one whole side cradling someone from their front. You can follow a progression similar to what was followed from the back, but this cradle presents more opportunities for rocking and freeing the spine. With both hands over the back we work down it, first repeatedly leaning back and pulling with our outbreath, then playing a keyboard down the sides of the spine with our fingers, then letting a spiral movement come up into our shoulders and alternately pull our arms (and their back) faster and faster until chaos and an absolute stillness is reached.

If you first do the posterior cradle on one side before rolling someone into the anterior cradle you will find that the safety and trust its containment has already established makes it easier for almost everybody to fully benefit from this even closer hold.

This module, too, can be taken by itself in our Core Tantsu Anterior Cradle (Tantsu A) evening and both sides can be shared in it with family and freinds. Attend with a partner or freind.

A third module, the final day of our Tantsu PAX weekend, adds additional stretches and moves and ways to more fully inegrate both cradles.

An additional weekend, Core Tantsu: Integrating the Tradition (ZT), can be taken before or after PAX. Its day long modules introduce moves and priniciples of Zen Shiatsu and earlier Tantsu holds that can precede the Core Tantsu cradles.

A third weekend, Core Tantsu: Body and Soul (BOD), deepens our connection with those we hold close. Its first module, Tantsu B, can be taken as an evening course by those who have taken Tantsu A.

Additional courses continue preparing Practitioners and Trainers. The profound effects we see in our students, even after just 3 hours of class, and the ease with which the Core Cradles can be learned and maintained, convince us that this way of holding each other must be made available to everybody. We maintain a registry of all those who study Tantsu. We store your transcripts there so that you can combine classes with different instructors and fulfill the requirements to be registered as a Tantsu Sharer (one whose path is offering free Tantsus to the public), as a Tantsu trainer of our first weekend and its modules, as a Practitioner listed to the public. The Registry, besides giving you access to classes around the world, will list centers and places to share Tantsu with others on the same path.

to the degree that connection with the heart and the breath is the basis of spirituality