Youth On Fire!

Youth On Fire: Birthing a Generation of Embodied Global Leaders

By Melissa Michaels

Like our planet, young people across the globe are heating up. As they come of age, some are ablaze with outrage about the environmental and social toxins they face. Others are barely flickering, having dimmed their light through self-destructive behaviors. Simultaneously, there is an ever-expanding group of youth on fire, collectively illuminating the path from addiction into action, from fragmentation into integration, from isolation into community. What makes the difference?

A dance-based rite of passage process guided by loving mentors and inspired role models can make the difference and has, for hundreds of young people worldwide. Surfing The Creative International Rites of Passage Process, as developed by Melissa Michaels, sees young people in their true light. By honoring the essential soul birthing that is occurring during the adolescent cycle of life, young people are rising up out the ashes of their suffering, awakening to their full potentials. Within the fabric of a dedicated and diverse community, they are given concrete ways through arts of body, heart, and soul to transform their personal pain into medicine for the world.

Youth on Fire tells the story of this process, which is unlike any other youth program around the world. Melissa not only understands the importance of helping young people develop their inner lives but addresses this need in both traditional and contemporary ways. Her programs bring youth together from every continent on the globe, some who have not yet found their spiritual foundation, with others from all of the major religions. Through universal practices, she teaches youth how to deepen their connections to their bodies, and how embodiment is a powerful doorway to one’s soul and spirit. This work consistently gives youth non-dogmatic opportunities to find themselves and their common ground, all the while honoring their diverse lineages.

Youth On Fire describes the process, protocol, and practices that weave together to successfully create this multi-cultural learning experience. Beginning with an intimate look at the ways that young people are disconnected from life within and around them, this book takes the reader on a moving journey through the specific developmental stages of this modern dance-based rites of passage experience. Each chapter describes the theoretical underpinnings of this creative and life-giving way of initiating youth into adulthood. It describes specific somatic and secular ways in which this kind of process unfolds in diverse environments. Woven throughout the book are intimate stories and authentic photographs of young people who have positively navigated through the demanding terrain of adolescence during Surfing The Creative.

The book begins with Melissa’s description of her own adolescent journey from a state of high risk to dynamic wellbeing. Through her challenging yet inspired story, the author was left with a clear knowing that the children of the world were calling and that movement is their universal language. She was guided to raise the children that would help raise up generations to come. Each aspect of her adolescent crisis and awakening served as a launching for her body of work, as described through the rest of Youth On Fire.

Topics that are specifically addressed chapter by chapter in Youth On Fire include:

~ The birth of the soul in adolescence and how rites of passage processes throughout time have been designed to meet that critical developmental mandate.

~ The architecture of traditional rites of passage processes and how the author has found a way to translate this design into a contemporary process that can meet youth around the globe, in both wilderness and urban environments.

~ A detailed overview of the 7 cycles of the author’s arts based rites of passage process that has been enacted with young people around the world.

Woven throughout Youth On Fire are the case studies of diverse youth who have journeyed through the 7 cycles of this rites of passage experience. Their stories breed hope, revealing the unique power and potential of attending to the spiritual development of adolescence in these creative time-tested ways. It also shares the stories of how youth from historically conflicted religions, classes, races, genders, and cultures have practically and powerfully grown bridges of sustainable peace through this somatic and creative process. It reveals a movement that is happening, the building of a global network of youth dedicated to movement based practices that support spirit-based action and collaboration.

As one youth leader states, the work revealed in Youth on Fire is a dance of consciousness rising around the globe. This book offers to tell this timely story.

Available February 2018: Youth On Fire by Melissa Michaels

Golden Bridge Presents: Surfing The Creative Film Short (A 12 minute film that tells the story of this work with youth around the world.)

Melissa Michaels’ new book Youth on Fire is relevant—and in fact necessary—for any of us engaged in initiatory work in any way with young people. The body-centered approach Michaels has pioneered translates decades of somatic theory and research into rites of passage as they are consciously practiced today. In fact, her work is the first contemporary dance-based rites of passage process serving youth around the world.

I was first exposed to Michaels’ approach as a participant in the Global Passageways gathering she co-hosted in 2008. Having come from a wilderness-based rite of passage background, I had little context for movement-based processes as pathways of initiation. This book distills decades of study and practice to their core essence, making Michaels’ hard-won wisdom and insight widely available. The language is delicious: soft, lush, engaging. This book is very readable, while at the same time could function effectively as a textbook-type introduction to body-centered rites of passage.

Another key feature of this book is that it is a truly cutting-edge. Her narrative rests on a foundation of contemporary, global youth culture with all its many shades and manifestations: images, poetry, quotes, and stories of the young people touched through her Surfing the Creative process are found throughout the text. What she describes is a process that has clearly emerged out of her personal biography, training, and the raw material of the people, places, and moments that have shown up, grounded in a body-centered approach. Her love of young people rings through on every page. Meanwhile, the specificity of her narrative is sure to inspire some new experimentation in your own life and work.

At the same time, this book clearly draws on the wisdom, experience, and insights of many, over generations. Michaels impeccably references the sources of the ideas, activities, and concepts she draws upon. She highlights those upon whose shoulders she stands, and in so doing models effective recognition of those that have come before.

Do not put this book down until the end! The last two chapters offer new frameworks that anyone engaged in tending the hearts, minds, bodies, spirits, and souls of young people will want to read, highlighting all the while that Melissa is tireless in her work, continuing to tread new ground even now. Passing the baton to the next generation and dynamics of diversity are a few of the fiery topics she addresses. As soon as I finished this book, and I began to hungrily await its sequel!