Daniel Challenge
Juggling with the Hivers
“ Guys, a challenge will take place in the Youth Camp. See you at 17h30! ”
was the message that launched the juggling workshop in a intriguing way. The objective was to give to this shared moment a spirit of a collective aim rather than the typical image of the a first juggling class.
The hivers came, and we set the challenge : “at the end of this session, we all are going to do 3 balls throw – 3 balls catch (better know as a flash). All together. No balls will fall. We’ll have only 3 tries. No winners, no losers; only the satisfaction of trying it. And let’s go!”
Some hivers had already a general knowledge of juggling, either because they learnt it at school or because they had a juggler friend. Other had never try it before. It was the space and the moment for everyone.
Tonight juggling with Daniel and the HIVERS
What I found quite interesting was how the group organically started challenging itself to go further and further. This is something that happens every single time in a children group’s first juggling class, but it was the first time I saw it happen in a group of adults. Probably, thanks to the comfort environment that we evoked at the very beginning; or maybe thanks to the friendship of hivers; or perhaps it was simply a group of people that didn’t lose their capacity of calling back their childness.
The environment was chill, even hilarious at some points. A ball in the floor wasn’t a reason to be ashamed but to laugh. Everybody celebrated the achievements of the others. Time was running and it seemed that we could succeed.
My challenge was to re address the learning processes, as sometimes their research was getting distante of our initial collective aim. It was there where a new tool (at least in my juggling courses) played its rolle : slow motion! Why I didn’t think about it before?! It was a super useful tool to see in detail every micromovement that happens extremely fast when it is the first time you juggle; but most of all, it was super funny! It was there that I discovered that there are more muscles moving in your face (specially the tongue) than in your arms when you first try the 3 balls flash.
More and more people came in between, and finally the moment came : collective 3 balls flash first try. 3, 2, 1 and go! One ball fell down. We were super close! No worries, it was the first try. Only 5 minutes after we fell all ready to try it again. Balls up! A few seconds of suspense and… no drops, We did it!
