RE: Thoughts about dancing and sense of solidarity

Dear Mr. X,

Thank you for your long email message the other day. Not only did the things you wrote made me feel extremely delighted but you also sparked off good thoughts about dancing within me. Your description of me when I dance (and especially when I dance with you) was so beautiful that I had to keep on going back to it again and again. I never thought that our dancing made such a big impact on you nor did I know how much it made you reflect. I also really enjoyed reading the stories about your dancing experiences and what was the reason for you to start dancing.

You said that now the biggest question mark in your mind is that why do I dance. You further raised up an interesting question whether dancing has an absolute or instrumental value; that whether the absolute value is, rather than develop one’s skills in dancing, to experience something together with other people, in which case dancing would only provide (the best) tool for that? Do we practice our dancing skills just to improve and become better or is there something else behind it?

I have also pondered around these same questions, though maybe from a bit different angle. I have asked myself many times the same question that is now in your mind: why do I dance? Why do I put so much of my time, effort, money, tears, patience, energy and heart into dancing? A short answer would be that because dancing makes me oh so happy, because I love doing it, but that’s not really the ultimate answer, is it? I can’t really give you a proper short answer because, as I see it, the why includes variety of elements that together make dancing such a beautiful and dear thing for me.

As you pointed out, the physical act of dancing releases endorphins and other hormones that give the brain an instant reward. However, in my experience doing physically more demanding activities gives a bigger dose of those hormones in a shorter period of time, thus if this was the thing I was looking for, I would rather spend my time in the gym (the after-workout glow is definitely the motivation to get myself to the gym). Partner dancing, especially the kind that includes close embraced dance hold, does add its own twist to the physical side, though, with a pleasant contact to another human being, and I can’t deny that this wouldn’t be one of the reasons I enjoy dance styles like Kizomba and Zouk. At least for me, being physically close to other people is some kind of a basic necessity of life (read: I love hugs) and partner dancing responds to that need.

The above mentioned would probably be some of the absolute values of dancing for me, yet another (and more significant) being the satisfaction of self-improvement and a feeling that I’m able to be good at something if I put my effort into it. When it comes to dancing, the improvement factor is easy to keep up, for example, by trying out different dance styles and there sure are plenty of styles out there to try out! Dancing is extremely good for developing body awareness and body control, because you need to use the whole body from head to toe. Learning to gain control over yourself leads surely to some sort of feelings of satisfaction and fulfillment.

These factors I would, however, consider as secondary (yet not irrelevant) reasons for me to dance. I must agree with you that the primary reasons to dance come from the factors that could be regarded to have instrumental value for me. Maybe you have noticed that the most common topic I write about is a dance connection? Well, it’s not a coincidence. I find it absolutely beautiful that two people from different backgrounds, maybe from opposite sides of the world even, who doesn’t know each other at all, can come together and understand each other through dancing. Dancing is some kind of universal language that connects the dancers all around the world.

In addition of having a common language, dance floor also has its own social rules of how to approach or communicate to other people. It can go exactly as you described: dancing provides “an excuse” to connect with other people in a way that it otherwise would be regarded maybe awkward, unnatural or at least unusual in other social situations. If I approached an unknown person outside that dance floor and immediately, without hardly changing a word, would get physically as close as in partner dancing, it would most likely to feel weird and probably be interpreted in a whole different way (taken into account that usually the dance partners are the opposite sex). Similarly, building a friendship with a dancer can include an extra level of connection: the communication you create during your dances.

Not only dancing can be a way of meeting new same-minded people but it can provide a great tool of getting to know the other person different from verbal communication. As I have written before, sometimes it feels that a three-minute dance with someone can tell more about him/her than a two-hour conversation. One reason for this, I think, is that people tend to drop their every-day masks, self-defense shields, roles or whatever you could call them, when dancing and thus more easily reveal their real selves. Finding out about that real self behind the social masks can be a difficult task but that is what at least I’m interested of when getting to know to someone. On the reverse of the coin is that it is easier for me to drop my masks and be totally myself. It is a very liberating feeling.

What comes to factors that concern more of me internally, one significant reason for me to dance is that dancing helps me to be present in the very moment. My mind shuts up. My worries disappear. There is no future, no past, only the moment in hand: there is only that dance. Surely there are other ways to live in the moment (and that is what I strive to do all the time in every situation) but when I dance I don’t need to do any other “tricks” I sometimes need to get my mind away from the past or the future. Also, while dancing I have experienced many moments when I've felt like my mind, body and soul are in harmony with each other and that feels just wonderful!

Last but not least, dancing is definitely a way to express myself. It can provide a way to handle whatever there is going on inside of me; let it be joy, sorrow, excitement or hatred. It is a way for me to explore my artistic side, to get inspired, to be musical and to express whatever the moment brings out from me. Music has always been a big part of my life and I love the feeling of the music being “inside” of me when I dance. I guess the need of self-expression lies in every one of us: some draw, some write, some sing – I dance.

As you can see, the answer was nothing but short, and I could probably go on with the list if I put more thoughts into it. The list will also most likely change during time: even on one day the main motivation to dance is different form the following day. However, I guess the point is that the reason for me to dance is multi-dimensional, though in most cases dancing is a way or a tool to experience something, for example a sense of solidarity with other dancers – something that you described as instrumental value.

Surely, these are just my thoughts and other people must have other reasons for them to dance. I'm very much interested hearing your further thoughts about this. Why do you dance?


I’m looking forward from hearing you again,

Riikka

Dancing Is To Create, Not To Reproduce.

Have you noticed that after you have been dancing a while the same dance style, you have a tendency to stat repeating yourself again and again? At least I have that tendency. There's like thousands of things you can do with your hands and yet I end up doing the exact same styling for each turn. How boring is that?! Similarly, there's thousands of variations of dance patterns and yet I constantly hear leaders (including me when I lead) go: if I dance more than couple of dances with someone I get bored of my own repetition of dance figures. So how do you prevent yourself (and everyone else) of getting bored?

The thing about social partner dancing is that since you change your dance partner constantly, you can repeat the same things over and over again without getting too frustrated of your repetition, because the same things feel different with different partners. The new partner is the new element in your dancing and thus you can fool yourself into thinking that you're being innovative with your dancing even though in the reality you still put that hand to exactly to the same position every single time. Sure, there's nothing wrong with that signature styling of yours, but how about trying something new every now and then?

I got a nice wake up call of my repetition tendency when practicing with Daniel few weeks back. Not only did he tell straight to my face that I should do something new (and kindly reminded me of that as many times as needed for it to get through) but also the way we danced together made me want to explore some new possibilities I had been ignoring before. To be honest, I can't remember the last time I felt so inspired when dancing. I noticed the increase in my inspiration levels when dancing with other dancers too, though my playful attempts to do something out of ordinary seemed to be sometimes regarded strange or amusing. However, this made dancing feel more fun and yet made me think of more ways to move to the music.

Coincidentally (or maybe not?) the following weeks we had quite a different zouk classes; it was not the normal let's-work-on-this-figure/technique, but about finding inspiration. As they put it: if there is a tree full of leaves we can shape it to different kind of forms, but if there are no leaves, there's nothing to shape. I must agree that cutting the raw edges out from a dancer's own way of moving and interpreting the music is a way easier task than trying to put something totally new there; no one can really tell you that this is the way you should interpret the music, nor there is only a one way of doing that. It's how the music (or something/someone) inspires you to move - and that inspiration needs to arise from inside of the dancer.

So what made me suddenly feel so much more inspired back then? Maybe it was the playful atmosphere we were able to create in our dancing that opened my eyes to the fact that dancing is not a serious thing, but rather an exploration or a play between two dancers to create - not to reproduce - something in that very moment for that specific song. Too often I have been worried of making 'mistakes' with interpreting the lead and that has drawn much of my concentration from interpreting the music. On the contrary, if something went 'wrong' with Daniel, e.g. I didn't understand his lead in the exact way he was trying to tell that to me, I could see him getting excited about the situation and of what new possibilities that situation could offer. This attitude made me feel liberated to try out whatever came into my mind since there was no need of being worried of making 'mistakes' - it was just part of the game. In this way we could dance together literally for hours without neither of us getting bored because we both constantly wanted to try out new things. Some things worked while others didn't, but who cares? The point was to get inspired and have fun with it.

One thing that has previously proven to work for me to find more inspiration, it to try out different dance styles. Every dance style has its own interesting tricks, stylings and way of movement and those can open your eyes to some modifications and creations of your own. Not long ago I got a comment that WCS has changed the way I listen to music while dancing not only WCS but also Zouk; or when I was taking voguing classes I constantly tried to put some elements of that into other dance styles. It is like adding vocabulary to your dance dictionary.

Have you heard of the quote 'to be inspired is great but to inspire is an honor'? Certainly, the best compliment I've ever got has been that my dancing has inspired someone. It sounds like a good dancing goal, doesn't it: to be an inspiring dancer both for myself and for others.

Redefining Myself.

Last weekend I travelled to my first foreign WCS event to Neverland Swing 2015 held in a small Dutch city called Veenendaal about an hour train trip from Amsterdam. I won a full pass to the event from a J’n’J competition in the Swinging Xmas Party Weekend last December and thus had a good excuse to travel again to Holland for dancing. Another good excuse was to meet up with my best friend and to spend some quality time together in the beautiful city of Amsterdam.

The event was pretty small scale, having only one workshop day, two parties and roughly 50 attendees, but it had a nice cozy feeling in it and actually this kind of friendly atmosphere is the reason I prefer smaller events to huge ones. The level of the dancers was also closer to my own and maybe this is why I felt more comfortable on the dance floor – sometimes being in a lower level compared to most of the dancers makes me feel I should be somehow better than what I am (a bad habit I should definitely get rid of). The workshops were thought through nicely, each class supporting the next one forming a good continuum, and concentration on the dance technique was something that supported my own learning the best possible way.

It is very useful to define some kind of goal for a dance weekend, even if it was just to enjoy the social dancing to the max. This time I decided that I was going to put my concentration during the whole weekend to my basic technique – I was not going to practice stepping variations, hijacking or things like that. There are some specific things that irritate me in my basic WCS dancing, such as my anchoring and stiffness of my arms, and those are the ones I’m trying to fix during this dance semester. Thus, I was mostly 'just' following and not even trying to mix things up so that I could learn first to follow well before adding in some spices. Because of this decision, at some points I felt like I was being a boring (or uninspiring) follower because I didn't do much variations or suggest anything.

However, being a 'boring follower' didn’t prevent me from winning the level 2 J’nJ competition (thank you my lovely German dance partner for the dances in the finals!!). To be honest, I was quite surprised about the judges decision because I didn't feel that I was contributing our dancing with anything special. Maybe the judges were paying more attention to the team work this time? Anyway, it felt nice to have this kind of encouragement to keep on working with my basic technique and following; apparently I'm heading to the right direction. As a prize I got to be part of the teacher’s show (someone must have the video of me dancing there - I need to find it!) and further I won yet another full pass to the next foreign WCS event: West Coast Swing Insomnia in Slovenia on 1-4 October 2015. So apparently I need to continue travelling for WCS (not that I would mind!). Who's in?

Why I wanted to write this post was actually to write down some feelings I went through during the event. I think that for the first time I felt that I was being part of the crowd, that I could identify myself as a WCS dancer. That was a nice feeling. I've always liked everything WCS has to offer as a dance style but felt a little bit like an oddball within WCS dancers. Maybe I have been identifying myself so strongly as a Zouk dancer that it has put my confidence in WCS down. Or maybe identifying myself as a Zouk dancer has been my excuse of sticking in the beginner level in WCS. Whatever the case it might be, I find it quite interesting that I notice this only now after dancing WCS for quite a long time!

So, from now on I would rather like to identify myself simply as a dancer, not some-specific-style-of-a-dancer because identifying myself as a Zouk dancer has obviously already restricted my improvement as a dancer (even though it might have contributed to my improvement as a Zouk dancer). Same goes with identifying myself as a partner dancer, something that I have been definitely doing – I don't want the identification as a partner dancer to restrict my improvement as a solo dancer because in the end it will restrict also my improvement as a partner dancer. You define yourself. As simple as that.


So, here we go:

I am a dancer.

...

Hmm, I like the sound of that.