Name: Sunday Morning Ecstatic Dance May 3rd
Start: 2026-05-03T11:30:00-04:00
End: 2026-05-03T14:30:00-04:00
Location: Cocoon Philly

Ecstatic Dance is a freeform movement journey, held in a safe and sacred container, & facilitated by trained facilitators and professional DJs. It’s a place where we can be our unique selves, and also connected to a common source.
LIMITED SPACE AVAILABLE- This event will cap at 25 attendees.
Date: Sun May 3, 2026
Time: 11:30am - 2:30pm
Flow (we will do our best with timing, we keep it slightly flexi in the moment)
Warm-up: 11:30am - 12:15pm
Opening Circle: 12:15pm-12:30pm
Ecstatic Dance Journey (including cool down) 12:30 - 2:15pm
Closing Circle: 2:15pm-2:30pm
🔥Warmup Leader:
Simcha Rachel Guttenplan, also known as the Whollyculturist, is a healing artist, ceremonialist, oracle, sacred sounder + dancer, and weaver of transformational experience who lives at the crossing point of spiritual guidance and creative expression. www.thiswhollylife.com
Drawing from Kundalini, Kabbalah, ThetaHealing, Reiki, somatic awareness, and the sacred arts of ceremony and ritual, she creates containers where people can drop beneath the noise and return to the truth of who they are.
As a fine artist, internationally exhibited photographer, self-published author, and creator of the intuitive oracle deck The Deck of Queens, she has spent her life translating the mystical into form -- on the page, on the wall, and in the room.
She is a gatherer of practices that are whole and holy, here to evoke sovereign authenticity through artistry, sacred sounding, facilitation, and embodied presence. Her mission is ancient and alive: to create a world where people fully embody, express, and integrate their truest selves.
(Kundalini Certified by 3HO · ThetaHealing Certified · Reiki Master)
For Ashes and Embers themed Sunday Morning Ecstatic Dance, Simcha opens the journey by weaving practices, metaphors, meditations, and mindful movements drawn from Kundalini, Kabbalah, and the somatic healing arts -- tending the threshold between what has burned and what is ready to rise. She will then weave live with DJ Lightray, layering her voice and sacred sounding into his set.
🎧 DJ Leading Our Dance Journey:
LightRay Beats
Drummer | DJ | Percussionist
https://bit.ly/m/lightray
LightRay is the rhythmic force of nature behind a sound that’s as primal as it is futuristic. A lifelong drummer and percussionist, he brings decades of groove-driven experience to the decks, weaving Afro House, Tribal Bass, and sacred rhythms into healing dancefloor experiences. With a background in live bands and organic percussion, LightRay fuses live electronic drums and acoustic percussion into his DJ sets to create immersive journeys that awaken the body and elevate the spirit.
Before stepping into the DJ world, LightRay performed for years as a drummer and percussionist across live electronica, jam, and funk scenes, most prominently with the band Signal Path. The group toured North America for years, helping to forge the live electronica genre, performing with bands like Lotus, Particle, Umphree's McGee, and at festivals like Bonnaroo and High Sierra Music Festival. Now LightRay channels that same improvisational, electronic energy into his live DJ sets, blending ancestral rhythms with modern textures and deep, primal bass.
Whether he’s behind the turntables, drum kit, or leading a drum circle, LightRay is here to move energy. His mission is simple: Music is Healing. Beats are Bliss.
Don’t miss his Sacred Sound Session—a hybrid live DJ set with percussion that ignites connection, movement, and magic on the dance floor.
Ecstatic Dance as we know it began in the year 2000, on the Big Island of Hawaii. Little did we know that this would inspire a movement, a culture, and a community, that would spread across the world.
💜Event Organizers:
💥Boombox Ben (Ben Selin)
Boombox Ben is an event organizer in Philadelphia. He came to Ecstatic Dance in 2023 and it has massively changed his life since then. Ben has been called to organize community events and share the joy that dancing has brought him.
🦋Veronica Carpenter of Blissful Butterfly Yoga
Veronica is a yoga therapist and self-love cheerleader with over 20 years of experience supporting children and adults in mental health and caregiving. Rooted in her own healing journey, she helps humans reconnect to themselves through practical, playful practices. She began practicing ecstatic dance in 2021 and found so much joy and nourishment in a Sunday morning practice, and so here we are. Yoga helped her feel safe in her body, ecstatic dance helped her feel free. She now helps organize events to share that experience with others.