Dancing as a way to get to know yourself & others in 10 lessons
...including the realization how many societal trigger points will be challenged when you do a couples dance class ;)
Today I will write about dancing.
And connecting. And comfort zone expansion. And intimacy. And closeness. And the mess around males & females & polarities that society throws on us.
And all of that: non-sexual, non-romantic.
Cos yes: dancing with another person is a much deeper interaction that we might think & that is worth talking about.
In case you wonder, what the heck has dancing to do with science? Or visual art? Or entrepreneurship? Or scientific illustrations? (In case you subscribed for this)
Dancing is dependent on human chemistry & our energies = science
Dancing IS visual art: have a look at professional dancers, they are breathtaking!
Dancing is a way of interacting & communicating & you can become a professional dancer = entrepreneurship
Dancing is NOT a scientific illustration, you got me here… even though I could imagine I could make a science-inspired illustration about the dynamics of dancing, cos there is a lot at play, worthy to visualize & explain what happens.
Anyways, most of all, dancing with another person is about the interaction of two human beings & in everything that I do and am in my life, human beings and our human-ness are an essential aspect of it.
As an entrepreneur & scientific illustrator, my “clients” are first of all human beings, not money-bringing-thingies. So I honor them on that level first!
Science is done by humans, therefore speckled with human flaws & without us appreciating our human-ness in science, it will go down the drain.
And Art: well, its one of the most beautiful things in life, done by us humans. No, AI can’t compete, never will and is AI art is basically bullshit :)
At the very of all that, what stands out is, that humans & human-to-human interactions are crucial for life.
And if we look at society, many people feel disconnected from others, lonely, depressed & anxious. We seemed to have lost the connection to ourselves and others and how to establish it in a healthy way.
And you can science-your-way into explaining all this with facts, it won’t help. In the end, we need to be humans and connect to other humans to fix this issue.
That brings me back again to dancing: it is one of the easiest ways to connect to another human being and practice connection & openness.
So if you ever feel like you want to expand your comfort zone, get to know yourself, learn a new skill & connect to other people, maybe challenge your conditioned gender stereotypes: sign up for a dance class!
Before I share with you my spicy & surly triggering learnings for some people, a bit about my own dance history, for you to know where I am coming from.
My dancing history:
When I was a teenager, I felt super ashamed to dance in a club; I was so self-conscious & embarrassed & did not know how to do it.
With ca 15 or 16 I went to dance classes, it was basic ball-room dances like Wiener waltz, ChaCha, Rumba, Samba, Foxtrott, Tango etc.
In Germany, where I grew up, you signed up with one partner & danced with that partner all the time. Luckily for me, I became friends with an older boy in my highschool, who was in the same dance school & much more advanced.
He became my fixed dancing partner & I was soo happy about it. I learned a lot & thee best was, that he always mixed & matched all the dances!
At some point I stopped the classes & never picked up on dancing again, even though I really loved it. I also thought, that I wont ever find such a great dancing partner again, making it almost pointless to even try.
When I moved to Sweden for my PhD, I started dancing again because my boyfriend back then was mexican & danced Salsa, Bachata & we did a Kizomba course. I slowly got used to dancing again & loved it!
The thing is, that in Sweden, you sign up with a partner, BUT you rotate with all the leaders in the course. This was brilliant, because like that, its possible to learn much more, much faster.
Along the way, I also realized that dancing with strangers, is actually not such a big deal. It does require some courage and fearless-ness, but this is why its perfect to try it out!
At some point 8-9 years ago I discovered West Coast Swing & was hooked! It is maybe my most favorite dance of all! I joined courses, workshops, festivals etc & keep on improving.
For this summer, I decided I want to expand my dancing horizon & decided to learn Bugg and Fox, both Swedish dances. I am just three weeks in, but I can tell you: its freaking awesome!!
Somehow my dancing repertoire and the feeling I get exponentially increased and I have much more fun, finding people who dance all the dances & mix and match them, just like my first dancing partner in Germany!
Wow, now I got carried away a bit, just to give you a rough overview about my dancing background. But I am currently SOOO motivated & cant wait for the summer & all the dancings to happen.
We have a forest pavilion here in Umeå, which is filled with all kinds of trial hours of dances & social dances where we can practice & a whole dancing week is coming up, with live music in a barn outside of town.
Anyways, for those of you who want to know about the realizations & learnings I had over the years, in case you want to try it out, here comes a list of them. I will give tipps & tricks for both, men and woman!
1. Practice of following and leading
As a woman, I am classically a follower to a leader, who is usually a man. And I can tell you from the get go: if you have troubles following anyone, especially following a man as a woman: this is the perfect setting to practice that!
I have a rather classical and conservative view on male-female dynamics and over the years I realized, that I have not really had a healthy masculine role model in my life.
It was quite the opposite; what I learned was that as a woman, you do it all: emotional, mental, physical, spiritual, financial and organizational all-round talent to back up the lack of healthy masculine leadership.
For a feminine woman, this turns into burn-out, very fast. So for me, this was something normal to learn & observe & grow up in… until I realized, not such a long time ago, that this messed me up completely; I have been more in my masculine energy due to this conditioning & I disregarded my feminine core for a long time.
With being a follower while dancing, I, and you if you want to, practice to follow a man. For me this is the perfect setting to get exposed to many different masculine energies & practice this trait.
Just like as a leader and man, you practice how to lead and guide a woman when you go to dance classes.
Which to my understanding, many men have not been taught on how to do that in a healthy way. (… no need to point out toxic masculinity, cos then just have a look at toxic femininity & we have the mess society is in currently ;) )… but I am not gonna deviate into this topic here :D
2. Receive, trust & surrender to a leader, often a man
With this practice of following and leading during dancing, comes an automatic practice to receive a lead, follow it, trust the man and surrender to his guidance (as a woman).
Phew, I might have touched upon many triggering topics, maybe some controversial words like surrender etc.
I don’t care, this is the reality. Also in reversed roles, when a woman leads and a man follows: same-same with trust & surrender.
Society has unfortunately taught us women that it is something bad and dangerous to surrender to a man. We don’t actually need man, we can all do it ourselves! And men are terrible, all toxic and bad and and and… what a load of bullshit…
Cos then you have the epidemic of burnt-out women who cant keep their shit together, are disconnected, masculinized & out of their feminine energy, no intuitive guidance etc… damn, I deviated a bit, butt not really, its connected.
Soooo, in case you are a woman and want to learn how to trust, receive & surrender to a man in a safe setting: go to a couples dance class.
Equally so, if you are a man & feel the need to learn healthy leadership & create a safe space for a woman & guide her: go to a couples dance class.
3. Setting boundaries, saying no, creating safe physical spaces
What you will all learn in such a class is, how to set boundaries, say no to someone you don’t want to dance with & learn to communicate when something is unpleasant.
You don’t have to dance with everybody & if you have troubles saying “No”, its a great space to practice it, without being mean, but kind.
If you can’t do that & start avoiding people rather than saying no, you will learn about your avoidant behavioural patterns… which might make you realize, where else you try to avoid a conflict rather than communicating healthy about it… wink, wink ;) …
You will also learn how to read other people. Because some might never ask you out on a dance evening. You will learn the physical signs and body language and might come to a silent-agreement to never dance with each other, because you both feel that you dont enjoy it.
Equally so, you will notice when you feel being intimidated to dance with an advanced dancer. Your insecurity might come out & you could start practicing working on that one.
I guess you get the gist: you will learn A LOT about yourself and others!
4. Chemistry & connection between people
I already touched upon this a bit before, but what you will immediately realize when you dance with different people is, that there is chemistry with some, and nothing with others.
This chemistry can create a connection, which leads to an awesome dance, a great friendship & maybe you will find a new favorite dance partner, with who you can practice all the moves and also all these inter-personal thingies I mentioned before.
But what this will tell you too is, that it is normal to vibe with some people and not with others.
You don’t have to like everyone, enjoy hanging out with everyone and you don’t need to be liked by everyone either. And there is nothing wrong with that. It’s normal!
This might have implications on other parts of your life, where you suddenly realize, that colleague of yours feels off, but you don’t need to be buddies with them.
You can just work together & that is it.
You will learn to read small & subconscious cues about yourself, others and the settings you are in. Great life-lessons I can tell you!
5. Leading & following styles
Every leader leads differently. Just like every follower follows differently.
Depending on the dance you are learning, there are different ways to lead: with the arms, the whole body, the legs, the chest, a combination etc.
But more than that, some leaders have a soft grip, others a more strong grip, some lead very lightly but still make you move parts of your body automatically, while others are much more clear & its easier to understand.
The thing is, if you don’t dare to trust & receive a lead, it will be hard for the leader to lead you as a woman.
So a great dancing experience means a softening into the connection & a receiving of leads & giving the man a chance to show you what to do.
And I can tell you: it is not always easy! At all! But it is always worthy!
It is this beautiful play between giving and taking, receiving and leading & if both dancing partners are open to the connection & the dance, you WILL find a way to adjust to each other & make it an awesome 2-3 minutes together on the dancefloor!
6. Ease, tension & resistance in your own body
You will notice why and how things work or don’t work, observing your physical body.
How much at ease are you? Do you feel tense in your arms? Your shoulders? Is there a resistance to be close to the other person?
All these aspects will make or break the dance experience you have.
But if you are aware about this, you might notice a general tension that is part of your body.
Maybe it comes from stress, maybe from pressure you have at work, or maybe indeed from a distrust towards a man leading you. Or vice versa.
And again: this has amazing implications and realizations for the rest of your life!
Maybe your romantic relationships, maybe your family dynamics, or friendships, or the fact that you are burnt-out & stressed at work: it will show in your dance!
And that again might lead you to improv other parts of your life!
7. Different body types & human traits
The beauty about human beings is, that we all are different and look different. There is no one else like you or like me.
On the dance floor, you will encounter all kinds of body types: tall humans, short humans, thin humans, voluminous humans, older humans, younger humans, cute humans, not-so-cute humans, smiling humans, serious humans…
And every time its a surprise on how the dance can turn out! Because oftentimes, before you don’t try, you don’t know if its gonna be a match-made-in-heaven or a dance you will never want to repeat.
It will teach you that ANYBODY can potentially dance! It will humble you and make you realize that judging others on their looks has nothing to do with how well or bad they dance or not.
I can tell you from my own experience, I have had some of my most awesome dances with leaders who were much more full in their bodytype than me. They were AMAZING dancers, the weight doesn’t determine weather someone can connect to another person & lead them & make them feel safe or not.
Equally so, I have had tiny, thin older grandpas, who I was afraid to hurt, but who had such an amazing way of dancing, that I had the best time ever!
Weather someone is tall or short, big or small doesn’t usually matter so much and it is an amazing experience to blend all these things out & simply look at the chemistry of the dance-moment that we can build together!
Having said that, you might develop a certain preference and there is nothing wrong with that.
For me, I will prefer taller or heavier or bulkier or stronger male humans than me, because it will give me the instant physical safety of being able to lean on them and stay safe in any dance move they want to try. Also a slightly stronger grip is something I prefer.
8. The physicality of bodies: sweat, breath and scent
Depending on the dance you dance & the occasion, you wont get away from being exposed to the physicality of our human bodies:
sweat, breath and scent! We all sweat, we all breathe, we all have a scent.
You need to get used to it & take precautions to make it a pleasant experience for everyone, including yourself
I can already tell you now: if you have an issue with sweat, don’t go for dances where you sweat a lot, cos you WILL touch another sweaty human being.
If you don’t like it, avoidit. If you don’t care, great, go for it!
Usually men sweat more than woman and I love to see in my dancing communities, that those men & leaders who sweat a lot, they just change their shirts. Done.
If needed, several times per evening. And they don’t even hide it. It can be a white shirt first, then a green one second.
One of my dancing friends even only dances in red t-shirts, so the followers see his state of sweatyness & can decide if they want to dance with him or not… until he changes to another fresh red one :D
Oh and because I mentioned breath: I noticed for myself, that when I am tense orr a new spontaneous move happens, I hold my breath, out of excitement or focus or surprise.
What that does is, that it disconnects my leader from me. He wont know about. where parts of my body are, this might sound strange, but our breath is directly connected to how relaxed we are, and the more relaxed, the more at ease & the better to lead a follower is.
So my challenge is: breathe properly while dancing :D
9. Trust, trust & trust
In the end, a couples dance class is about trust, trust & trust again.
No matter if you do it with your partner, a friend or strangers. Trust is the basis of it & if you dont ahve it, the dance will most likely suck.
The beautiful thing is, that you can establish that type of dancing-trust quite quickly and the more you dance with someone, the most it will strengthen.
The more your capability to learn to trust & develop trust will strengthen too, so if you have a hard time trusting people, again: go do a couples dance class! Its a great setting to practice & develop trust to other human beings.
And with trust comes connection & as I mentioned in the beginning, this is something all of us humans crave for!
10. Intimacy & closeness
Last but not least, dancing in a couples dance creates intimacy & closeness, not on a sexual level.
Sur, iff you do it with your romantic partner, that might help your relationship.
But if you dont do it, a type of intimacy & closeness appears either way. Because depending on the type of dance you dance, you are more or less close, it is more or less open, slower or faster in pace.
These are all factors that create intimacy & closeness.
I have developed some great dancing friendships in my life and it is amazing to see how much you could trust someone else, only because you trust them during dancing.
In a way, your personality will shine through all your dances & you will connect to people and get to know them & it will potentially make you feel less alone, isolated and disconnected.
And yes yes, I have seen romantic couples emerging from dancing classes and courses, it is not a given, but also not a surprise when you find a hobby you love and get to know new people & suddenly someone is on your radar you connect super well with.
So yes, this is it for today! I hope this elaboration about dancing & life & connection and humans was valuable for you.
I personally find a lot of value in it & my current new motivation to learn new dances & combine them brings me so much energy! I just love it!
Let me know if you have any dancing experiences, would love to hear about them!
Love,
Daria