Dance of Oneness: Pulse of Life & the Whirling Heart
Workshop with Banafsheh Sayyad
Saturday, September 12, 2026 | 11:30am–5:30pm
Pars Place | Vienna, Virginia
What if you could move through uncertainty without losing your center?
Join Banafsheh Sayyad, visionary teacher of spiritual embodiment and internationally acclaimed sacred dancer, for a day-long immersion into Pulse of Life & the Whirling Heart, where sacred dance, Sufi whirling, the poetry of Rumi and embodied awareness become pathways to greater vitality, clarity and resilience.
Drawing from her new book, Dance of Oneness: Embody Love and Luminosity to Transform Your Life, Banafsheh will guide you into the wisdom of the Divine Feminine and the intelligence of your own body.
Through dance and conscious movement, you’ll explore ways to release constriction and heavy emotions, reconnect with your sacred sensuality and transform held energy into grounded strength, aliveness and presence.
At the heart of the workshop is Sama, the sacred Sufi practice of whirling, taught through Banafsheh’s distinctive feminine approach. From atoms to galaxies, life moves through rotation and spiraling. Whirling invites you into this universal rhythm while cultivating the ability to remain centered, receptive and responsive as life moves around you.
Banafsheh’s approach is designed to prevent or minimize dizziness, making the practice accessible even if you have never whirled before. Through guided instruction, surrender and deep listening, you’ll discover the inner balance that can emerge when movement becomes meditation.
What You’ll Experience
Sacred dance and conscious movement, Sufi whirling and Sama, breath and embodied awareness, Rumi’s poetry, Divine Feminine wisdom and practices that support a deeper connection to your body and inner center.
Whether you are completely new to sacred movement or an experienced practitioner, you are welcome. Move at your own pace, listen to your body and discover what becomes possible when you enter more fully into the pulse of life.
Instruction will be offered in English, with Persian translation available as needed.
About Banafsheh Sayyad
Banafsheh Sayyad is a visionary teacher of spiritual embodiment, master sacred dancer, award-winning author and choreographer with an MFA in Choreography and an MA in Chinese Medicine. Her life’s work is devoted to helping people cultivate greater health, awareness, resilience and joy through conscious movement and embodied wisdom.
Drawing from Sufi mysticism, Taoist teachings, Chinese Medicine, Tai Chi and Qigong, her distinctive approach integrates sacred movement with an understanding of meridians, acupoints and chakras. Internationally acclaimed for her pioneering fusion of spirituality and sensuality, Banafsheh has inspired thousands around the world to experience the body as a portal to presence, vitality and joy.
Come as you are. Leave more deeply connected to your body, your center and the living pulse within you.
Member
Banafsheh - Dance of OnenessEvent MemberIranian-born master dance artist and transformational teacher, Banafsheh communicates the universal message of Sufi mysticism and Divine Feminine wisdom in a passionate yet serenely meditative way. Her dance is an interplay between trance and directed movement, precise yet abandoned and unrestrained. Her explosive yet fluid movement is sensual and ritualistic, uniting the feminine and masculine energies, body and soul, light and dark in a marriage of opposites. She invokes the ancient roots of dance as devotion, prayer and adoration while blazing an original trail in contemporary dance with her masterly fusion of high level dance technique and spirituality.
Her mesmerizing offering of the timeless Divine Feminine inside a contemporary gypsy dervish beckons all to engage, serve, exalt and honor our sexuality as sacred. She is one of the few bearers of authentic Persian dance in the world, an innovator of Sufi dance previously only performed by men and a pioneer in contemporary Persian dance, all of which characterize the form she has created called Dance of Oneness® geared towards empowering women and men through sacred embodiment.
Internationally known for her innovative movement vocabulary and high artistic and educational standards, she draws from her extensive background in Sufism, Persian dance and ritual, Tai Chi and flamenco to present a new form, rooted in tradition yet universal.
Banafsheh’s movement is comprised in part by the Persian alphabet translated into gestures and movement, which when put together dances out words and poetic stanzas, mostly taken from the works of the great mystic poet, Rumi, whom she has studied extensively, resonating with his fierce yet gentle essence that beckons each and everyone to break through conformity and limitation to find their individual glory.
Banafsheh comes from a long lineage of pioneering performing artists. Her father, the legendary Iranian filmmaker, theater director and actor, Parviz Sayyad, hailed as the Charlie Chaplin of Iran, is the most famous Iranian of his time. Banafsheh is a recipient of the prestigious James Irvine Foundation grant in Dance. She holds an MFA in Dance from UCLA where she taught Persian dance. She has studied with some of the great masters in dance and choreography including Antonia Rojos, Victoria Marks, David Rousseve and Donna Uchizono. Also an acupuncturist, she draws from the Taoist view of the internal functioning of the body to uncover the healing, rejuvenating aspects of movement. Banafsheh’s solo and ensemble work with her dance company, NAMAH has been presented extensively in festivals and by dance presenters in North America, Europe and Australia where she has gained tremendous audience and critical acclaim. She recently performed at the closing night of the Festival of Sacred Arts in Madrid at Teatros del Canal. Her 2011 dance film In the Fire of Grace with author and scholar, Andrew Harvey traces Rumi’s journey of the Soul in dance.
