#ballroomdancer

Ballroom Dancer – I’m Not Cut Out to Be One. (Or, Am I?)

Because watching good dancing is so moving, I feel like you can generally forgive people for believing you have to be special in order to learn it. To be sure, there are many incorrect assumptions about becoming a ballroom dancer. Indeed, some think you need to have specific qualities to take lessons and become a ballroom dancer.  As a matter of fact, they are sure you have to be: …a natural…

Man can be quite egoistic, and that gets in the way of learning.

Being Aware

I have started a new partnership this year. Although she has been doing Latin dances for a number of years, she has just started learning Standard dances barely less than a year. Sometimes she is not able to stand balanced and there are times I felt that the is rushing and pushing me.

Ego Me

The egoistic part of me is quick to think that she is too fresh and lacks control. As a result, I get impatient and thinks that she is not catching up with me. The more I think about it, the more I realise it is the "ego me" at play. I started to question deeper, how can I improve the situation?

A Positive Perspective

Once I am mindful of my ego moments, I started to think differently. When encountering difficulties with partner, I will ask myself, "How can I make it better?". I changed from assuming she is bad, to focusing on how I can fix it.

Example: Waltz Natural Spin Turn

You may refer to this page for detailed description of the steps. On step 5, leader is supposed to lead follower to turn on toe. Most of the time the leader moves back into step 6 too quickly, before follower fully shifted her weight to left foot, before she can perform brush through with right foot. That is why she don't feel balanced, as she was forced to move into step 6 before she can stand on her left foot.

Due to mistake in step 5, leader rush to step 6 too fast. It also caused follower to fall forward. In order to maintain body contact, follower has to rush forward. So leader may felt being pushed or she is rushing ahead of time.

From this incident, I learned that I was the cause of her unbalance, and pushing. This learning occurs when I become aware of my ego, and changed into positive thinking.

Advise To Self

Ask:

How can I lead her to slow down/speed up?

How can I lead her to stand balanced?

How can I lead her to move in the desired direction?

Dance Vision App Review

I’ve been learning to dance for a few months now and with my busy work schedule. It gets hard to drive 45 minutes to go to a dance class. Something that has made my learning to dance so much easier is the Dance Vision app. It contains so many tutorial and body exercise videos to help you better yourself as a dancer. The app follows the DVIDA syllabi which many dance instructors use in their…