Allison Kenny shared her story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Allison, it’s always a pleasure to learn from you and your journey. Let’s start with a bit of a warmup: Have any recent moments made you laugh or feel proud?
Yes. I have a new student who told me she spends all week looking forward to my belly dance class. When I smiled, she got very serious and said, “It’s true. All week I wish for Monday to come.” In just a few classes, she went from showing up in simple yoga clothes to arriving fully made-up, adorned in jewels, hair beautifully styled, and wearing a long shimmering skirt. She said, “Belly dance has been on my bucket list most of my life. I was afraid to give it a chance and prioritized being a wife and mother first. Now I’ve found you and your class, and it not only fulfills this wish but also makes me feel like I’m coming home to myself.” Her words made me feel happy and proud.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I’m Allison Kenny, the creator of Bellydance Meditation®, a fusion of belly dance, mindfulness, and divine feminine embodiment. For over 15 years, I’ve been guiding women to reconnect with their feminine essence through movement, meditation, and sacred reflection. What makes my work unique is that it’s not just about learning dance steps; it’s about creating a safe and soulful space where women can return to their essence with honor, and in communion with Mother Earth, the divine, the community, and themselves. Alongside teaching classes and hosting inspiring gatherings, I recently published the Bellydance Meditation® Devotional, a book designed to bless and inspire women on their spiritual journey of womanhood. Right now, I’m especially excited about leading sacred site travel experiences and expanding the ways women can reconnect with themselves and our planet.
Appreciate your sharing that. Let’s talk about your life, growing up and some of topics and learnings around that. What relationship most shaped how you see yourself?
When I was a child, nature, especially the trees and the cosmos, felt alive to me. The landscape, rivers, and autumn leaves seemed to whisper, filling me with unconditional love that moved in, through, and all around me. The natural world felt parental and familial, and I carried an overwhelming sense that it delighted in my very being. That is how I came to see myself. Now I understand this as an indigenous knowing, a sensibility that lives in the bones. And through belly dance, I discovered the dance itself is prayer, a way of entering communion with the cosmos, with Mother Earth, and with the elements.
What did suffering teach you that success never could?
Suffering was my initiation into alchemy. When my world fell apart, I retreated inward, convinced I would live the rest of my life as only a fraction of myself. When I set out alone into the big city, I immersed myself in everything my heart had always longed for: dance, art, and a Bohemian life. I did not do this to prove anything. Rather, in the silence of loss, I realized I was completely free.
In that state of freedom, I chose to do what my heart had always desired: dance. Shortly thereafter, I encountered belly dance, or as I like to say, “I found her and she found me.” The dance seemed to hold a special kind of magic, a healing magic. The more I moved, the more I began to heal without needing to think, explain, or analyze. The dance itself awakened my body as an alchemical vessel, a sacred cauldron, an elixir, a practice that casts and recasts the heart, psyche, and spirit.
I began to understand on a somatic level that all things were being stirred, liberated, generated, integrated, released, beautified, and illuminated. All of these practices, sensations, and insights were coming from practicing belly dance. That is why I call the moves “sacred movement codes.” The moves themselves carry ancient wisdom for healing across time. Before long, I was radiant, like the phoenix rising from the ashes, I had healed from the inside out.
Next, maybe we can discuss some of your foundational philosophies and views? What do you believe is true but cannot prove?
I believe in an afterlife. I believe that we can call upon our ancestors and that they do come and assist. I don’t know the right etiquette for this, but I believe it. I have seen them from the other side.
Okay, so let’s keep going with one more question that means a lot to us: What do you understand deeply that most people don’t?
I have come to understand the quiet art of co-authoring life with destiny and the divine. To move gently with the rhythms of your own unfolding, sensing that your life is written not by you alone but together with the sacred. This truth may be unseen by many, yet it can shape everything. When you stand on a threshold, perhaps a pattern you keep circling or a chapter in your life, you may feel that life is happening to you rather than with you or through you. In that moment, mind your approach. Step forward with reverence, clear perception, and the bravery of faith. Honor the opportunity to choose how you will respond. These choices often open the way to the other side: the leaving behind of old patterns, the beginning of a new chapter, the upleveling to a way of being more in tune with synchronicity and grace.
Contact Info:
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/allisonbrynkenny/
- Other: Amazon Author Page: https://a.co/d/bWsG7nP
Image Credits
Headshot credit: Julie Ryan Photography
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