If you're thinking about running one, good.

Ecstatic dance facilitation is the practice of holding a freeform group dance with music, consent agreements, and attention to the body. Onizal gives it five phases. Their length changes with the gathering; the free dance needs room to unfold.

If you're a DJ, facilitator, or community organiser thinking about running something like this in your space, good. That's why this site exists.

Onizal is open source. Everything here is given freely. The philosophy, the five phases, the exercises, the music guidance. Take what resonates. Leave what doesn't. Build your own version.

The only thing I ask: credit the traditions this draws from. They're older than any of us.

You don't need an Onizal certification or permission to use this framework. Start with practices you understand through your own experience and are prepared to guide. Rehearse with the music and arrange someone who can support the room while you lead.

Here's the reading order I'd suggest:

Read the manifesto first. Understand the why before the how. If the philosophy doesn't resonate with you, the format won't either. And that's fine. There are many ways to do ecstatic dance. This is one.

Read the section intros in order:

• The Ritual — how to open a session
• The Solo Journey — how to wake the body
• The Tribe — how to build connection between strangers
• The Dance — how to hold the freeform dance
• The Landing — how to give the experience a clear ending

Each section has chapters with specific exercises. You don't need all of them. Pick the ones that feel right for your group. A first session can be simple: one opening ritual, one or two solo exercises, one partner exercise, the dance, and a quiet close.

Teach through dance. Use the chapter sequences as starting points and choose the pace for your room. Start the music and get people moving, usually on their feet. Offer one short cue at a time while you demonstrate alongside them. Choose floor movement or sitting when it serves that particular practice. In breath-led exercises, connect the inhale and exhale to the movement and the musical phrase.

Listen to an Onizal set and its arc on the Music page. Prepare a quiet instrumental bed for the opening, songs that suit your chosen exercises, a spacious free-dance arc, and a gradual landing. Try the movements to the actual tracks before leading them. Agree with the DJ on cue points, how to lower the sound, and how to finish early if the room needs it.

Rehearse the outline with your music, including the transitions. If it runs long, remove an exercise rather than shortening every exploration. Prepare consent agreements, support, and an emergency plan before inviting people. Use only practices you are competent to guide. A playlist alone does not prepare you to hold a room.

Once you've run a few sessions:

Afterward, ask a few willing dancers what helped them enter the dance and what interrupted it. Compare that with what you noticed: unclear instructions, rushed transitions, or a passage that needed more space. Change one useful thing next time. Browse the Solo Journey and The Tribe when you need another approach, not because every session needs a new exercise.

A longer gathering can leave more room for the opening, exploration, and integration. Extend when the people, space, and event can hold it. Keep a shorter session simple and complete. Depth can arrive in a small movement; a longer running time does not need a fuller list of exercises.

Choose a rhythm you and the community can sustain. Let people know when you will meet again, invite feedback, and keep the welcome open to newcomers as friendships develop.

Your first few sessions might be small. That's fine. Word of mouth is how every ecstatic dance community grows. The people who come back are your core. Take care of them.

Ecstatic dance creates real vulnerability. The no-talking rule, the contact, the low lighting, the altered states. A good room turns that vulnerability into a gift. A bad room turns it into a problem. You, as the facilitator, are responsible for the difference.

What follows is guidance for organisers, drawing on consent practices shared by Seattle Ecstatica. It is a preparation checklist, not confirmation that every host has these arrangements in place. Publish the actual support people and reporting route for your event.

Read these at the start of every session. Post them on the wall if you can.

1. Consent is ongoing. A yes in minute one is not a yes in minute thirty.
2. Ask before touching. Especially for lifts, weight-bearing, intimate holds.
3. Pause when unsure. Stepping back, freezing, silence, or hesitation means stop and give space. A smile or sensual movement does not establish consent.
4. Acknowledge power. Regulars, teachers, and men carry more weight in the room. Check in more, not less.
5. Receive no gracefully. No explanations required. No bargaining.
6. Impact over intent. If you hurt someone, meaning well does not undo it.
7. Collective responsibility. Everyone can seek support. Organisers remain responsible for responding; the person harmed does not have to manage the situation.

Because the floor is wordless, give everyone the same handful of signals:

• Prayer hands. Teach palms at the chest as no thank you. Do not assume everyone already knows the gesture.
• Solo wristbands. A coloured wristband means I am dancing alone tonight, do not approach me. Have them at the door.
• Hand to heart. Your own hand on your own chest signals I am with myself right now.

Teach the signals in the opening circle. No wristband or gesture is required to refuse contact. Explicitly allow speech for boundaries and requests for help. Every exercise needs a solo option and an easy exit.

Speak directly to men about the pressure women can experience on a dance floor. Keep an invitation easy to decline. After a no, give space; do not follow someone, repeatedly approach, bargain, or ask them to manage your disappointment. These expectations apply to everyone.

Eye contact, sensual dancing, politeness, or being paired in an exercise establishes no permission to touch. Intimacy inside an exercise creates no expectation afterward. Let a shared dance end without pursuing more.

If you offer polarity work, describe direction and receptivity as capacities available to every body. Let partners choose and change roles. Never interpret a boundary as blocked feminine energy, fear of surrender, or resistance that must be pushed through.

In Seattle they call them HeartTenders. Arrange identifiable support people who understand consent, their responsibilities, and the limits of their training. Size the team for the room and the exercises, rather than relying on a fixed headcount. The person leading or DJing cannot also be everyone's only route to help.

Introduce the team at the opening and explain where to find them. Include women in planning and support, and listen to their experience without expecting them to carry all the safety work. Give the team authority to interrupt an exercise or pause the dance. Someone other than the facilitator must be available for concerns about that facilitator.

Publish a reporting contact before the event and repeat it afterward. Explain who receives reports, when they can expect a response, and the limits of confidentiality. Provide a route outside the facilitator for concerns about them. Take reports seriously, including reports about friends or regulars. Do not require the person reporting to confront someone or join a mediation.

Consider a support fund for practical help such as a taxi home or ticket refund. State what is actually available, and who can authorise it. Never advertise support you have not arranged.

Movement can bring up strong feelings. Tears, shaking, or distress do not tell you what is happening inside someone. Avoid promising trauma release or interpreting a reaction as healing.

Arrange a support team, make it easy for dancers to ask for help, and prepare an emergency plan. The dancer's wellbeing comes before continuing the session.

Books and somatic theories can inform your learning. They do not qualify you to diagnose a dancer or establish that a particular reaction is beneficial. Ask what the person wants instead of telling them what their body is releasing.

Do not encourage someone to intensify a reaction, recover memories, or continue an exercise to prove they are open to the work.

• Quietly ask whether they want company, space, or help from the support team.
• Ask before touching or holding them, including when your intention is to comfort.
• Make it easy to stop the exercise and move to a quieter place if they choose.
• Respect a refusal of company while staying attentive to immediate safety.

A person choosing to rest is different from someone collapsing. Never assume collapse, unresponsiveness, or breathing difficulty is emotional release. Follow the event's emergency procedure and seek qualified help. The NHS emergency guidance is a UK reference; prepare for the local emergency services wherever you host.

• Someone asks for help or wants an exercise to end.
• A boundary is ignored, or contact continues without clear agreement.
• Someone appears distressed and cannot comfortably continue.
• There is a possible medical emergency or immediate danger.

Pause the activity and involve the designated support person. Ask what would help: more space, a quieter place, or someone nearby. Follow the event’s first-aid and emergency plan when further help is needed.

Three things help more than any particular technique:

• Your own regulated nervous system. If you are frantic, the room will be frantic. Do your own breathwork before the session. Arrive grounded.
• Permission through your voice. A few words at the opening, something like "whatever comes up is welcome here," lets people know they will not be asked to hide. That sentence alone frees the room.
• A closing that actually closes. Peak states without integration are dangerous. Bring the music down slowly. Give people real time on the floor at the end. Sit in a circle. Ground the body back to baseline before anyone walks out the door.

Reading I have found useful. The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk. Waking the Tiger by Peter Levine. Caffyn Jesse's writing on what she calls the pulse model, which treats ecstasy, satisfaction, and integration as one cycle instead of three separate events. None of this turns you into a therapist. All of it makes you better at the part of the room that is not about the music.

If this work keeps calling you, get trained. Somatic experiencing. TRE. A facilitation training that actually covers trauma. The longer I do this, the more I think the training matters.

Onizal begins with Ecstatic Dance, with Gabrielle Roth’s 5Rhythms as a central movement influence. The modern DJ-led gathering has roots in the Kalani community in Hawaii. Other traditions contribute to particular practices. The Lineage chapter explains these connections and offers a brief acknowledgement for the opening circle.

When you teach these practices, credit where they come from. Say "this is inspired by Sufi whirling" when you teach whirling. Say "cacao ceremony comes from Mesoamerican traditions" when you serve cacao. The lineage matters. Acknowledging it is how we keep the practice honest.

Call it whatever you want. You can say "Onizal Dance" if you're running the five-phase format faithfully. You can say "inspired by Onizal" if you've adapted it. You can give it your own name entirely.

What matters is the practice and the people, not the brand.