Rabia Dowson
I am a Dance leader and have been involved with the Dances for twenty years. I facilitate groups mainly in the North-West, where I live, and also other parts of the country. The Dances and my journey on the Sufi path form the warp and weft of my life; they are my passion and my joy.
I believe the Dances to be a powerful tool for healing, helping to strengthen consciousness and character. The Dances have the potential to change our view of the world and our place in it and I believe that everyone can access these ways of being. My teaching style nurtures this in a way which is relaxed yet focused.
My full time work is as a remedial massage therapist, person-centred counsellor and homeopath and my aim is to support all those who seek a happier, healthier and fuller life through activities which build on motivation, strength and energy for living. The Dances feel very much a part of this ethos.
As a Dance Mentor I love to guide aspiring Dance leaders, so continuing the transmission of Samuel Lewis.
I was initiated onto the Sufi path in 1998 and I am a spiritual guide for the same order, the Sufi Ruhaniat International.
Shamsuddin
I began leading the Dances five years ago, and in some ways still remain rather mystified as to what it’s all about. However, I am at least clear that I love the experience of singing resonant, heartfelt sounds while moving through a sacred space with others.
Each of us doubtless brings our own experience and meaning into the Dance. I see profound delight, challenge and change happening in myself and others through this practice, and I celebrate that.
I have trained in Dance leading with Philip O’Donohoe and Neil Douglas-Klotz, and I lead regular Dance circles and one-off events in Scotland. My life journey has included Osho, Celtic festivals, parenting, professional life and Sufism.
Glen Burden
Mantra, melody and simple body movements – what could be more beautiful than human beings expressing the living quality of life through singing and dancing together? It is a sublime joy to be able to share this uplifting, healing form of sacred dance and Glen’s dance-leading journey has taken him to a variety of countries and settings over the last eight years.
Jilani Prescott
Jilani is a talented musician who has been playing viola for the Dances since 1997, and leading Dances since 2005. She has worked as a musician and teacher since 1989 and spent several years training as a healer beginning in 1994. Since meeting the Dances of Universal Peace, she has increasingly realised in them an opportunity to combine these skills. Her teaching style is clear and down-to-earth, light-hearted but powerful. People often comment on how heartfelt and moving her viola-playing and singing are. She is known for her lively, dynamic Dance-leading which attracts people of all ages to her Dance Circles. She has led Dances at camps in Wales, Yorkshire and the South of England since 2005, and has been invited to share Dances as far afield as Scotland and France, in addition to her regular groups near Hebden Bridge in West Yorkshire. She is mother to three young boys, and with her husband Robert, they run their family home as a DUP retreat space called ‘The Heart Centre’.
Daren Messenger
Daren was swept away when he first came across The Lords Prayer in Aramaic taught by Saadi Neil Douglas Klotz in the late 1990′s. Since then he has been studying, practising, retreating and latterly teaching about this prayer in it’s sung form as a spiritual and embodied practise as well as leading the Dance version of this prayer. Daren will be sharing this prayer dance- line by line in Aramaic- through the camp culminating in leading the whole dance cycle towards the end of the week. As a guitarist with a long term passion for the possibilities of spiritual experience within music- as taught by Hazrat Inayat Khan- Daren will also be offering musical support to the dances generally. As well as embodying his connection to this Sufi lineage- and in particular the words of Jesus (Yeshua) in his native Aramaic language- Daren is also an initiate in the Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism for over 20 years: initiated into Mahamudra by his holiness Tai Situpa in the mid to late 1990′s. Subsequent to this long personal practise of Buddhist meditation- and as a qualified Existential and CBT psychotherapist- Daren studied ‘mindfulness approaches’ within an academic research tradition at Bangor university in order to teach Jon Kabat-Zin’s ’mindfulness’ work within a secular and scientific psychological context. Thus Daren will be also guiding mindfulness practises (meditation sessions) daily at the camp. As we live in circles communally and are able to move between different sessions and teachings Daren sees camps such as SAC as a great opportunity to ‘let go’ of roles that we may have become too attached to or identified with- and to grow accordingly.
Maris Warrior
I have been leading Dances of Universal Peace and Sufi practices since 1995. Born in Estonia, I lived in Findhorn for over ten years since 1998, where I led regular DUP and Sufi circles, co-founded Shambala Retreat Centre and gave birth to two daughters. I now live and share my heart in the Southern Scotland, drawing inspiration from both my deep connection with Tibetan Buddhism, and from my love for the Indescribable Mystery of Life. Supported by my Sufi teacher Pir Shabda, I guide aspiring souls on both Sufi path and dance leading in the UK and abroad, kindling and nurturing the light in their souls in a soft and gentle, yet intoxicating manner.
Sandra Sunfire
Derwenlas in Wales has been Dancing Dances of Universal Peace for around 24 years now and continues to welcome new Dancers as well as those with more experience and visitors who are in this beautiful part of the world. In recent years Sandra has been enriched by the invitations of our International Dance family and has Danced in Latvia and Poland.
“The Dances continue to be a central part of my practice, my healing and my journey through life. I love to be part of the very real flourishing sense of community that the Dances bring in such a joyful way.”
To learn more about the Dances of Universal Peace, please have a look at our About page here.