One of Laban’s most intriguing comments about “incomplete efforts” (a.k.a. effort states) is that they express a variety of “inner attitudes.”
Apparently, Laban became intrigued with the less fully crystallized efforts carried out between essential actions. Though initially puzzled by these purposeless movements, he came to see them as psychologically expressive, and in that sense, attitudinal. Thus he concluded that the inner workings of our personalities are revealed by the effort states.
Effort states are not steady states. Instead they are dynamic fluctuations in which the energy flows freely between yielding and contending qualities. So the Dream State expresses movement moods that are pleasurable and also nightmarish. The Stable State is not only calm and steadying but also threatening and even tyrannical.
Find out more about these psychologically expressive effort compounds in the MoveScape Center course, “Incomplete Efforts (Mostly).”