These are a collection of written scripts for each participant in my project. Scripts are meant to be explored before clicking on the interview excerpts to the left. All previous content warnings apply. These written scripts are a blueprint for the audio scripts which have ad-libbing. Head over to the audio scripts to explore audio for full length movement sessions!
(Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Major Depressive Disorder)
[describing an anxiety attack] It would be a sense of weakening in my limbs, so not really feeling like I have the ability to hold things or hold on to anything. Like forming a concave shape in my chest, not physically but very much metaphorically closing in and feeling like I'm being crushed. [...] maybe like an elephant is stepping on you like on your chest, like I feel that physically. Sometimes I'll start to shake sometimes I won’t start to shake. Sometimes I start crying other times I just sit there numb. But usually there's always like that sense of suffocation of feeling like I'm being crushed and suffocated as well as also the, the shakiness even if it doesn't manifest externally, I still feel it inside.
Stand up and stretch your arms above your body into a position, just on the side of straining.
Feel the extension of every bone in your body and hold the tension in your muscles.
Breathe into that discomfort.
Slowly, starting from the top of your head, imagine the strength and energy seeping out of your body.
Let your body melt, slowly drop your hands down.
Feel your spine curve and liquify.
Your legs shake and soften into the ground
Lower yourself until your entire body is touching the ground.
Relax your limbs.
Breathe in and hold your breath.
Feel a sudden weight on your chest.
Breathe out shallowly.
Feel the heavy weight of something sitting on you.
Imagine it lifting slowly, and with every breath, expand your diaphragm more.
Extend your rib cage.
Feel the stretch of your chest.
With every breath, feel the air flowing through every vessel of your body; through the tips of your toes and fingers, to the edge of your skull.
[describing an anxiety attack] It would be a sense of weakening in my limbs, so not really feeling like I have the ability to hold things or hold on to anything. Like forming a concave shape in my chest, not physically but very much metaphorically closing in and feeling like I'm being crushed. [...] maybe like an elephant is stepping on you like on your chest, like I feel that physically. Sometimes I'll start to shake sometimes I won’t start to shake. Sometimes I start crying other times I just sit there numb. But usually there's always like that sense of suffocation of feeling like I'm being crushed and suffocated as well as also the, the shakiness even if it doesn't manifest externally, I still feel it inside.
Put your arms out in front of you, palms facing up
Feel a weight in your arms
Imagine the heavy weight of a box
Feel the surface against the palms of your hands
Suddenly, like the strings of a puppet cut loose, there is a loss of feeling in your arms
They drop to the side and the box falls in front of you
A numbing sensation starts in your shoulders down to your fingers
Slowly wiggle your fingers, shake your arms out
Feeling starts to return to your fingers, traveling up slowly through your arms
Flex your hands and arms, feel the tension in them again
Bend down to pick up the box, hold the weight once more
Feel the dimensions of the box in your hands, your arms supporting its weight
Now set the box down slowly, with full control
I think the way that I often perceive or conceptualize it is as if it is a downward spiral, like I start one place, and then it maybe is broader at the top. So it's less and less effective. And then as you get further and further into the thoughts that are racing in your mind... the easier and quicker it is to spiral down to a dark place. So, growing up in Kansas, maybe this is just Midwestern imagery, but I think of a tornado starting at the top and funneling down very quickly, exponentially into a place where I have no control over my life but also over myself. That's the fear at least. Logically, I know that I do, but like, when I'm thinking emotionally, that doesn't register.
Concentrate on things you have control over in your life
Find a center of gravity
In your body, outside your body
The center of a spiral
With the tip of your finger, your entire arm
With your body, or head
Draw spirals
Controlled, concentric circles
Spiraling around and around and around
With the center grounded
Turning around itself
Awareness of the curvature in every turn you make
Think about something that makes you feel out of control
Slowly, the circles become less even
Unbalanced, the sides of each spiral stretch
And contort
The center is upended
The spiral turns out of control
Your body is out of control
Flailing in all directions
Move in the chaos
Find your center of gravity again
Pull at the extremities of your body
Closer to that center point
The circles in your spirals are concentric once more
Overlaid perfectly
And, again, highlighted a sense of instability in my life, because at that point, the place that my mom had moved into, didn't have any spare beds. It was a studio apartment in Washington, DC. And so the living situation was very unstable, because I didn't really have a home that I was going back to, like, I wasn't going back to my home I grew up in, I've never really lived with my mom since I left.
Stand still with your feet hip length apart
Wiggle your toes and dig them into the floor
Feel the soles of your feet grounded
Balance your weight evenly against your right and left leg
Enjoy the stability in your body
Lift one leg up to the side
Try to balance and hold the position
Observe the difference in stability
Explore various positions that stretch the limits of your balance
Center yourself once more, grounded
Begin turning around yourself in slow circles
Turn faster and faster
Stop and try to walk around
Consider how the instability of your body–the dizziness, the vertigo
How does it throw off your balance?
Sink down to the ground and take a moment to regain your balance
[about suicidal ideation] So a lot of the time when I do that, I have to try to ground myself. Because I feel very much like disassociated, like I don't get attached to my body, when I'm thinking like that, and I don't think about physical ramifications. So sometimes I have to be like, Oh, reminder, there's pain involved. Reminder, they're like people that you have relationships with that would care. Reminder that you're not just like a whim of your own mind.
Under careful control over your body
Move freely in your space
Think clearly about
Your body creating shapes
Taking form
Feel the intention behind
The dynamics, textures, quality of your movements
Strings attached to every joint in your body
An unknown puppeteer
Pulls at random points
Parts of your body jerking, lurching
Unpredictably, abruptly
Strings are cut
Snapped in half
In complete control of your body
As you move through space
With your own design
And then also, there's a sense of like, fight or flight. I have learned that my coping mechanism is fight, it isn't flight. But often it feels like the person you're fighting against is yourself. Like the voice in your head. So like, if I were to visualize it, like, sometimes I think of myself shouting back into my mind, like yelling at some other representation of me. Or like, trying to grapple with physically some other voice who's telling me something about myself that I know isn't true.
Visualize an image of yourself, in your head or a physical image in front of you
Remember something negative or hurtful you may have thought about or said to yourself
Imagine the image of yourself saying these words to you
How does your body language react?
Talk out loud and reply with words of love, forgiveness, positivity, healing
What do you want to say to yourself?
Are you yelling? Whispering? Conversing normally?
As you continue speaking, let your body move along to the words in your response
Are you gesturing angrily? Pacing in a circle? Confidently standing upright? Curled on the floor?
Not nervousness, but like when I would have anxiety attacks [...] I would start to feel internally like I'm shaking, like, even if I'm not physically manifesting that outside. It would feel like sometimes, like, I'm internally shaking, or like, sometimes if I was driving, that would happen. Like, I'd feel like I'm caving in, like everything in my body is like caving in internally, not necessarily externally. But like, within my heart, I feel like it's like, like, imploding. Yeah, it's like becoming small, becoming very isolated. Those are all things that I'm thinking of.
A rumble below you
A tremble
Beginning at the tips of your fingers
Expanding up your arms, through your torso
Up and down, to your head and legs
An earthquake
Shaking the floor underneath you
Rocking your body back and forth
Your body vibrating wildly
Try to draw these convulsions inward
Contract your body
Collapse the shakes
Into a minute orb in your core
Visualize all the tension in that sphere
And expel it from your body
(Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Major Depressive Disorder)
[describing an anxiety panic attack] So like, if it happens, like it's just my heart's racing, like, I just have to sit there, I have to close my eyes and kind of like be within myself for a minute and just breathe through it until, until it ends. And it's just associated with like a high heart rate. And like, shaking, I shake a lot.
[describing an OCD panic attack] I get so overwhelmed. It's like this feeling of just complete, like everything feels wrong, every single thing feels wrong. And so usually what I do for those is, like it's still elevated heart rate. I'm still stressed that way. But it's more like sensory overload.
Come to an acute awareness in your body
Feel the air prickle your skin
Your feet, feeling the texture of the ground
With your eyes, observe a detail in the environment around you
Pay attention to any background sounds
their timber, dynamics
The aromas that you can smell
Focus on the timing of your breath
Start breathing
A bit faster
Faster still
Even faster
Your body starts shaking
Starting in your fingers
A tremble
Your arms, legs, head
Almost
Out of control
Now, close your eyes
Block out your senses
Ignore any sounds, smells
Breathe more slowly, deeply
Control your movements
Slow them down
As if you are now moving through thick honey
Embrace a moment of stillness
Stay
Slowly, once again become
Aware of your senses
[clarification on this excerpt and the script: Andrew described that writing suicide notes was their way to quantify the world, to take something they were feeling in the moment and express it. It felt empowering to them and they approved of the following script.]
And to make myself feel better, I would write suicide notes. Not with intention, just to feel like, okay, well, you know, I just got to get these feelings out, I gotta put them somewhere I got to place some blame, try to figure out who is making me feel this way. And if it's not just me, is it somebody else, is it just me, just trying to write it out to make myself feel better? Well, every time I would write one, the allure of actually following through with it is just increasing.
Reflect on something you want to write to yourself.
It can be words of encouragement, a reflection on a difficult time, descriptions of forgiveness, anger, sadness, joy, pride. It can be an account of your day, a secret no one else knows.
With your whole body, trace out each letter of your name, addressing the letter to yourself
Then, draw out the words in the letter with your body.
Let the ideas take form through movement.
Are you writing with a finger, hand, or arm?
Or is your whole body forming every letter of each word?
Are your movements acting out the letter?
How does each word make you feel?
How does your body transcribe your thoughts?
Finally, write out a closing signature from yourself using a finger, a foot, an arm, a leg, your head.
I just feel very unlike myself, I feel more like a body than I do like a person. Like, there's kind of just like this shell of myself that will just sit in my room on my bed and go through the motions and do the homework and, and, like, you know, text my boyfriend, just exist and it's not until I can get that shell to go outside. Like, nothing's gonna change because I'll just sit there and and feel like, it becomes hard for me to discern what happens from day to day and like my concept of the passage of time changes a lot. Like days go by a lot faster when I'm like that. Even though in the moment it feels very slow.
Go through a certain motion that feels comfortable, habitual
Keep repeating it, ceaselessly
Build up to a sequence of movements
Repeat over and over again
Until you can perform them mindlessly
When does your body start to lose sense of the boundaries between each movement?
Focus on the tempo of your pattern of movements
Now execute the movements slowly
Even slower, then as slow as possible
Perform it fast, then frantically
Move like gravity has been multiplied, weighing down on you
Then move like gravity has disappeared
As you change the dynamics of the rote sequence of movements, how do you become more aware of the distinctions between each action? Of the quality and details of each gesture?
(Major Depressive Disorder)
[describing depression symptoms] I feel like the biggest thing though is just that my brain and body are not connected and just having trouble with executive functioning. [...]Even though I want to get out of bed and I want to do this thing that I know logically I enjoy but then I just can't get myself to do it. [...] And so I started thinking, why can't you do this? Why aren't you doing this? So then I'm like, okay, maybe just move your hand or move like your finger. And sometimes I guess I can do it. But other times, I just can't.
Think about the index finger on your right hand.
Pay attention to the sensations on that finger. The nerves, the skin, the muscle, the tendons and ligaments connecting your finger to your hand.
Wiggle it around, feel the floor against your finger, feel it brush up against the other parts of your hand
Start to move the other fingers on your right hand
As you are moving your right hand, direct your focus to your left hand.
Try to keep moving your right hand, but experience the physical sensations in your left.
How does that feel?
Sink into that disconnection.
Try this with other parts of your body.
Focus on the sensations of your left leg while trying to move your right arm.
Try different combinations of body parts.
Focus on the awareness of one part of your body while moving another.
[describing depression symptoms] I feel like the biggest thing though is just that my brain and body are not connected and just having trouble with executive functioning. [...]Even though I want to get out of bed and I want to do this thing that I know logically I enjoy but then I just can't get myself to do it. [...] And so I started thinking, why can't you do this? Why aren't you doing this? So then I'm like, okay, maybe just move your hand or move like your finger. And sometimes I guess I can do it. But other times, I just can't.
Free flowing
A tailwind
Lifting up your movements
Enjoy the liberty of your body
The way it moves
The unrestrained
Traveling around your space
Arms, head, legs, torso
Wiggling, jumping
a childlike bounce in your step
Playful, skipping, twirling around
A deep seated freedom
From your chest and expanding outwards
Fluidity in your joints
Building inertia
Momentum throughout your body
Then, freeze
Thick, wet clay
surrounds your entire body
Trudge through the heaviness around you
Until your body feels
tired of the tension
Stuck in motion
Freeze in that stillness
Muscles tense, tight
Claw your way out of the clay
Carve a path
Until your body and limbs are unbounded
And you once again feel the wind
Uplifting you
My doctor and I have discussed chronic fatigue syndrome a lot. I can't find any reason, any other reason then that's another one then also, when I'm feeling depressed or not, then that also makes me really tired. That's also, another annoying thing is that so many things come from that like, could be a symptom of me being depressed or should just happen in other ways too. And so usually some of them can just compound on each other. And I think just not moving around makes me more tired. And just because I don't have to go bike to class and I'm just not moving around as much. And I think maybe that has added to it.
Start dancing around with as much kinetic energy in your movements as possible
Build up the intensity of your frenetic movements
Sprint back and forth across the room, jump as high as you can
Keep moving as frantically as possible
Expend all the energy in your body through your movements
Feel the adrenaline rush through your body
After every drop of strength is used up, come to a stop and collapse on the ground
Feel the flow of your blood pumping through your body
The ache of the fatigue in your limbs
Sink into the exhaustion, until you feel almost lethargic
Relax your body, breathe
Start to stretch and move your body like you are waking up in the morning
Slowly sit up, then stand
(Generalized Anxiety Disorder)
I used to feel like my heart was kind of empty. Like right now it feels full, it feels completely like I feel complete in my chest at the moment. I know there's someone embracing me that way. But when I used to feel lonely, it feels like a completely open space. And I can feel that there is cold air flowing in. And I want to find somewhere to go and rest very safe place. But I cannot find it and that is how loneliness felt for me.
Wander around the space you have
Observe the dimensions of it
Where its empty, where it's cluttered
Come to a comfortable place
Stand still and close your eyes
Feel the air around you
Think about a time you felt lonely
What caused that loneliness?
A person, situations, memory, place, words that someone said to you before
With that feeling in mind, begin moving in your space
Imagine a small hole in your chest
It starts stretching, gaping wider
Until it is a large hole, and your entire chest is empty
How does your body respond? Does it move through space differently?
Start to curl in on yourself, wrap your arms around your knees
Think of something that makes you feel safe
Imagine the whole in your chest slowly closing up
Filling with solid warmth
How do you move differently when you feel safe? How do you respond to your surroundings?
[describing anxiety] Yeah, I feel like Anger [from the movie Inside Out]. Not from the outside, but on the inside, like I can literally feel lava actually flowing out from me. And it's just all over me. That's what I feel. That's the thing that I could describe myself about. It doesn't look like it from outside, but internally it is this way.
Think about something that makes you anxious or nervous
Allow those feelings to become
Lava ignited
smoldering in your lower abdomen
Sluggish, but warm
building, growing, lighting up
A sudden tension in your torso
exploding out of your head
the lava cascading down your body
Covering every inch of skin
Sharp at first
Prickling your skin
But cools to a pleasant warmth
Muscles relaxing, cocooned
Wading slowly
Through warm soup
Yeah, I would just say, like, there's a lot of expectations on my back. I feel like like, how Santa Claus carries the bag, like the same thing. Yeah, it's helpful. It motivates me. But it's also like, demotivates me whenever I whenever I'm personally struggling.
Walk slowly in a circle
Think about something that makes your heart feel heavy
Now imagine a weight on your back
Getting heavier and heavier
How do your movements change?
Feel your muscles strain against the weight
Try to pull the weight with all of your strength
Slowly, feel the weight start to lessen
Shake out your body, roll out your shoulders
Until you can walk freely again
In the summer of 2021, I was supported by a major grant from the VPUE Undergraduate Research grants at Stanford University to conduct preliminary research on my HIA project. The following is a score of scripts I wrote based off of Darkness Visible by William Styron. Regarded as one of the best personal accounts of Major Depressive Disorder, this is an intimate memoir filled with haunting descriptions of the Pulitzer prize winner's mental illness experiences.
[…]my brain had begun to endure its familiar siege: panic and dislocation, and a sense that my thought processes were being engulfed by a toxic and unnamable tide that obliterated any enjoyable response to the living world.
For myself, the pain is most closely connected to drowning or suffocation[…]
Close your eyes, take a moment to breathe out.
There is water lapping gently at your feet.
Feel your toes, the bones, the muscle, gripping the floor.
Hold firm, the waves are pushing you back.
Something larger builds in the distance.
You hear the gentle rumble of the ocean.
A large wave stands tall, the weight of the water crashing into you.
The harsh pressure swirls around you, your mind blanking out.
The tide recedes and with it your thoughts are washed away.
I fell onto the bed and lay gazing at the ceiling, nearly immobilized and in a trance of supreme discomfort.
Lay down on the floor.
Breathe and feel the floor pushing up to meet your back.
Draw patterns into the ground: swirls, lines, shapes
Twist your body into an uncomfortable position.
Hold the moment of stillness.
Inhale, expand your breath.
Exhale, relax into your position.
Slowly, increase the tension in your muscle.
Your muscles shaking, aching with the strain.
Let go, come back to your initial position.
Repeat for however long needed.
[...] this is why brutal insomnia so often occurs and is most likely why each day's pattern of distress exhibits fairly predictable alternating periods of intensity and relief. The evening's relief for me—an incomplete but noticeable letup, like the change from a torrential downpour to a steady shower--came in the hours after dinnertime and before midnight, when the pain lifted a little and my mind would become lucid enough to focus on matters beyond the immediate upheaval convulsing my system.
Think about something that makes you anxious.
There is a crawling sensation inside you.
Feel how it makes your heartbeat faster, your body tingling with nervous energy.
Let the frenetic energy build and influence your movements.
Travel through the full space around you.
Move faster, faster, faster, your body reaching out to its furthest points.
Explore different levels of movement, jump up and sink down low.
Your movements are frantic, sporadic, sharp, your body trying to be everywhere at once.
Build up the kinetic energy, feel the heat under your skin.
At the height of your energy, STOP.
Relax all the muscles in your body, like the strings to a puppet are cut
Take a moment of stillness.
Feel your heart rate continue to beat at a fast pace as your body slows down.
Now, move languidly, like you are wading through a thick syrup
Explore the way your body feels in the moment.
This certitude astonished me and filled me with a new fright, for while thoughts of
death had long been common during my siege, blowing through my mind like icy gusts of wind, they were the formless shapes of doom that I suppose are dreamed of by people in the grip of any severe affliction.
Told that someone's mood disorder has evolved into a storm--a veritable howling tempest in the brain, which is indeed what a clinical depression resembles like nothing else
It is a storm indeed, but a storm of murk. Soon evident are the slowed-down responses, near paralysis, psychic energy throttled back close to zero. Ultimately, the body is affected and feels sapped, drained.
Part 1:
You are standing in the middle of a storm.
A strong wind pushes against you.
Do not fight it.
Let it take you along its path
As it screeches in your ear.
Part 2:
You are the wind, whipping harshly.
You push against an object
forcing it to move.
Swirling along an undetermined path.
Let out a yell from deep within your belly.
Part 3:
In the aftermath of the storm
You are exhausted, battered
Sway along with the small breezes left
That fall, as the disorder gradually took full possession of my system, I began to conceive that my mind itself was like one of those outmoded small-town telephone exchanges, being gradually inundated by floodwaters: one by one, the normal circuits began to drown, causing some of the functions of the body and nearly all of those of instinct and intellect to slowly disconnect.
Part 1:
Feel every joint of your body.
Pick one body part–an arm, the upper half of your chest, even a toe.
Keep everything else still, locked in place. The rest of your body is immobile.
Wiggle the body part you chose.
Explore the different ways the joints rotate, your muscle tense and relax, how the skin feels as it stretches and contracts
Discover different ways to move the body part, drawing patterns in the air, moving with different textures–alternating between soft and stiff, sharp and flowy.
Work through each body part one by one until you have moved your entire body.
Part 2:
Explore full body movement.
Pick one body part.
Freeze it; allow the rest of your body to keep moving.
Continue to freeze each body part, until your entire body is frozen.
Stay in that moment of stillness.
There is no doubt that as one nears the penultimate depths of depression-which is to say just before the stage when one begins to act out one's suicide instead of being a mere contemplator of it--the acute sense of loss is connected with a knowledge of life slipping away at accelerated speed. One develops fierce attachments. Ludicrous things--my reading glasses, a handkerchief, a certain writing instrument--became the objects of my demented possessiveness. Each momentary misplacement filled me with a frenzied dismay, each item being the tactile reminder of a world soon to be obliterated.
Grab an object that is important to you.
Part 1:
Observe the physical aspects of it: its texture, its shape, its color, its patterns
Allow these characteristics to inspire your movement
Part 2:
Now use your body to physically engage with the object.
Do you grab it, twist it, caress it?
Move around it and let its gravity take control of your movements.
Part 3:
Reflect on the object’s story and its meaning to you.
Think about the memories and emotions it evokes: nostalgia? Something joyful or disappointing?
Allow your body to naturally move along to your thoughts.
This sound, which like all music--indeed, like all pleasure--I had been numbly unresponsive to for months, pierced my heart like a dagger, and in a flood of swift recollection I thought of all the joys the house had known: the children who had rushed through its rooms, the festivals, the love and work, the honestly earned slumber, the voices and the nimble commotion, the perennial tribe of cats and dogs and birds, "laughter and ability and Sighing, And Frocks and Curls".
Observe the sounds you hear in your environment.
Perhaps it is the hum of the air conditioner, chirp of a bird outside, knocking of construction work, chatter of people talking, maybe even the sound of your own breath
Are you picking one sound to focus on or hearing the full symphony around you?
Let these sounds influence your movements; are you moving to the tempo? The dynamics of the sound? The quality of it? Do the sounds have a specific meaning?
Allow these parameters to influence your movements
Are your movements reacting to the sounds or are they mimicking the sounds?
Focus on how your body feels, how it embodies or reacts to these sounds.