Meet Sarah Sampson

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Sarah Sampson a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Sarah , really happy you were able to join us today and we’re looking forward to sharing your story and insights with our readers. Let’s start with the heart of it all – purpose. How did you find your purpose?

I’ve come to discover that I have a deep longing to be a part of spaces that encourage the expression of our raw, vulnerable, and brilliant humanness. The practices I study and share are dedicated to understanding and accepting ourselves more deeply, creating safety within the body, and fostering connection with others. Through the Dallas Movement Collective, I strive to provide spaces for honest self-expression and collective healing. This journey has not only been about my own healing but also about creating pathways for others to heal, connect, and flourish.

Finding my purpose has been a deeply personal and transformative journey. My path opened up through a process of healing, as I tended to my own wounds, particularly the sexual trauma that had led to dissociation and a profound discomfort in my body and voice. This healing journey made me realize the necessity of safe spaces where people can reconnect with their bodies and find a sense of home within themselves.

I believe that our disconnection from our natural expression, often a result of individual and cultural trauma, can be tended to through diligent practice, met with sincere self compassion. Modalities such as ecstatic dance, ritual theatre, song and drum circles, and the practices of The 360 Emergence, have been particularly helpful on my path. This work is essential, especially in our current global landscape, where the skills to see and be seen, feel and be felt, hear and be heard, as well as holding others and being held, are more crucial than ever.

Growing up in the deep country, I’ve always held an intimate relationship with nature, and this connection has deeply influenced my approach to embodiment work. Working with The Mind Body Ecology Institute, I’ve been able to merge my passion for embodiment, earth care and sustainability. There’s a vast link between our connection to the land of our bodies with the care of land of the planet. At its core, this work is about fostering a sense of belonging, both within ourselves and within our larger community, all the way back to the earth we all share. Here a memory of our inextricable interconnectedness awakens. My purpose is to move from that place.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

Through the Dallas Movement Collective, I host gatherings that incorporate embodiment practice, connection circles, live music, sound healing, meditation and interactive art. It takes village to make this happen. The whole thing thrives on volunteer hands, intentional artistry and inspired collaboration.

These spaces are centered around a multi-generational movement community that celebrates diversity, welcoming people from various cultural, gender, and socioeconomic backgrounds to come together to dance in a sober and trauma-informed environment. We are building a net-work. A net that works. One we where can all practice holding and being held.

Our offerings include:
– A weekly Sunday community dance at Owenwood Neighborhood Space that individuals to move and express freely within a safe and supportive container.

– A once a month special event at the Sammons Center for the Arts based multiple modalities of expressive arts dedicated to wellness.

– A once a month Movement Meditation based in the practice of The 360 Emergence, an embodiment, free-form, spirit-driven movement practice motivated by an ethic of care and justice that bridges dance and personal growth, rigor and freedom, individuality and the global collective.

– Quarterly international guest teachers and artists based in the 5Rhythms and other forms of conscious movement practice.

Gathering all the creative threads and people together to make experiences that hold the potential for healing, empowerment and vision is where I feel most at home.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

The three qualities that have been most impactful on my journey include:
Embodiment
Deep Listening
Resilience

Embodiment:
I didn’t create an organization centered on embodiment because I am particularly talented or natural mover. In fact, quite the opposite. My dedication to learning and sharing movement has come from real difficulties with feeling at home within my own skin. Embodiment in its most essential form is about being in the body, in all its sensations and intelligences. Bringing compassion and acceptance to our emotional and physical experience is a practice.
My work encourages the development of embodied congruence: the capacity to attune to what’s happening inside and finding a way to express it on the outside.
Occupying our bodies as leaders is essential to showing up in the brave, honest way that fosters real connection.
I don’t think the world needs more perfectly put together leaders. Instead, I find myself wanting to learn from those with hearts willing to break and bleed for the world, those brave enough to own their own fragility, and those here churning the challenges of their lives into compassionate action.

Deep Listening:
I’ll be the first to admit listening has not always been my strong suit. Developing the capacity to listen deeply has not only been invaluable in my organizational leadership, but it has also nourished all my human connections. I think there is a desire in all of us to simply be heard. My community, collaborators and advisors know I’m available to be a witness to their experiences, concerns and inspired ideas. The qualities I’m devoted to practicing when receiving others are curiosity, compassion and non-judgment. For those early on their journeys of leadership, I’d encourage folks to create clear pathways for input from multiple perspectives and to weave those thoughtfully into organizational movements. I’d also recommend avoiding jumping to solutions and advice giving, as often people simply want to be seen and understood in their experience.

Resilience:
Whew, the ups and the downs of working in the intersection of the arts and wellness are real. The mountains and valleys have been emotional, financial, mental… Developing personal skills for staying regulated through the stress of leadership, such as meditation and yoga Nidra rest practice, have helped keep me glued through unsteady times. I believe that as leaders, it’s vital to find the practices that allow us to disconnect from producing and working to get present with the deeper parts of ourselves. In my experience, the time taken to attend to my nervous system has only deepened and enriched service to my organization. I also recommend taking a breaks BEFORE reaching burnout. I’ve learned that one that hard way.
Naps heal. Airplane mode helps. I have a teacher who says, “breathing won’t change the world, but we won’t change the world without a breathing A LOT along the way.”

What’s been one of your main areas of growth this year?

In the past 12 months, my biggest area of growth has been learning to ask for help.
During my first year of leadership at the Dallas Movement Collective, I tried, and failed, to do everything on my own. This hierarchical and isolated approach to leading proved to be neither supportive to myself nor the community I serve.
Over time, I realized that this method of leadership was not sustainable. The Dallas Movement Collective emerged from a desire to be part of an organization with concentric circles of leadership. Being supported by an advisory board, a team of artists, and a community code of agreements has created brave spaces that feel much lighter and stronger. This structure has been instrumental in teaching me the importance of shared leadership, multiple perspectives and collaboration.
The future now feels limitless and flourishing. I am incredibly grateful for my team, my community, and my mentors – and my therapist! This practice of asking for help and embracing collective leadership has been the real teacher of resilience. It has shown me that true strength lies in our ability to lean on each other and work together towards a common goal

Contact Info:

Image Credits

Photography Credit:
Suellen Matteus, @spiritofma

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