the cuban salsa blog

Rule number 6 continued…

I wanted to talk about how taking yourself too seriously impacts others.

There is no room for negativity within a dance environment…period.

If you are asked to dance or are in the middle of dancing with someone please be aware of your demeanor. Whatever you express, be it with your facial expressions or your body language, people feel it.

It impacts them and others they subsequently come in contact with after you.

You can set up a good chain or a bad chain. Use it as an opportunity to boost yourself by boosting others.

I don’t care how miserable we are dancing with them and I don’t care how off beat they are. Unless they are hurting us or making us physically uncomfortable, why do we need to show it?

Are we really that good? If we think so, then we need to get over that dream. And fast.

It’s very simple. With a few adjustments to your facial muscles, you can make yourself and others feel great, or you can make the both of you feel and look miserable.

Lighten up on your partner, you’ll probably dance better anyways.

And I will be sure to double check myself and follow my own advice.

This picture was so lame..I just had to use it!

This one comes from “The Art of Possibility” an amazing book by Ben Zander, which serves to challenge some of the everyday assumptions we take for granted in everyday life. Challenging these “norms” gives you a way to unlock possibility -thus the name.

It was given to me by one of our dancers and for the past few weeks, I start my morning off by reading a few pages from it.

The fourth chapter is “Rule Number 6″: in order to reveal yourself, don’t take yourself too serious.

In a nutshell, by not taking ourselves too seriously we strip away the layers of our calculating self (ego, measurement, negativity, feelings of scarcity etc) to get down to our central self.

In dance I am always trying to get closer and closer to my central self. I think getting to the core of you should be the goal of every dancer.

Why do I dance? Because every movement, every dance, every shift, allows me to strip off the garbage that really isn’t me. It brings me closer to myself -the real me.

It can do the same for you, if you allow it to. Next time you are dancing, don’t take yourself serious, and see what happens. See what movements result, see how you move, see how you feel.

Shave off the layers of bullshit, and see yourself.

I’ve spent a good portion of my time trying to figure out exactly what the right formula is for maximizing each dancer’s potential.

There could probably be a list of about 100 things but here are two things that every teacher should keep in mind:

1. Give them the techniques for success.

Give them standards, tools and the confidence to use them.

2. Teach them with the goal of making yourself dispensable.

Make everyone a teacher.

3. Wipe the fog off their glasses so that they can see clearly.

Remove limitations. I think a good teacher does nothing more than open-up possibilities.

How many of you guys actually want to maximize your creativity as a dancer?

I beg the obvious because some people are perfectly satisfied with doing the body movements over and over again and using a  set of “cool moves” to use out in the nightclub -over and over again.

If that’s the case, this is not for you. This is for those not satisfied with the basics of dance and want to actually express their creative being.

The good news is that we are all creative by nature as human. But socialization creates a set of rules we begin to live by as we age. You react a certain way in this situation, you stand this way when this person is around, don’t express emotion in public, don’t dance that way, people are watching etc.

Socialization itself is a good thing. You can’t throw a temper tantrum in the middle of Wal-Mart because they ran out of Twinkies. Thank goodness.

It seems like society gives you the rules to express impulses and along the same lines, your dance instructor gives you another set of rules. Don’t let the aesthetic guidelines of a dance become sub-conscious habits.

And don’t try to fool me in class by saying “I am aware of what I am doing.” You see, that music shifted 20 times and your movement style stayed the same. I caught you in the act because I know you and I know you come to class to get better. You came to Paso and you want to be a complete dancer, not a robot.

Warning: Unquestioned habits will kill you as a creative dancer.

Fear not. Becoming a creative dancer involves nothing more than removing assumptions that you have grown comfortable with.

In one of our intermediate classes the other day, I watched first hand as I questioned and tore down their assumptions about how they move their body:

“Why do you have to move both shoulders?”
“Who says, you have to start your dance with two hands?”
“Who says you can’t dance stiff?”
“Who says you must dance upright?”
“Who says your arms need to be in front while dancing”
“Who says your close position needs to be like that?”

Stripping off all of these assumptions, the movements that resulted were amazing! I was watching real dancers in action. They fell out of habits -”basic steps”, mundane shoulder movements- and begin to change everything at will.

I now understand that most people don’t even realize they are moving the same way because they just don’t even realize, period!!

Questions to help take you out of the box.

#1 “With the way I am moving my body right now, what assumptions am I making?”

#2 “What can I do to give myself more options?”

Give it a try.

There is nothing wrong with the rules, patterns, and structures of dance. They help create context and a unified language. In the beginning, they are VERY useful for learning the foundations.

But dancing with the same steps, texture, facial expression and posture without being aware of it can wreak havoc when it’s time to be creative within the limits of your particular style of dance.

All of you have tremendous potential as creative dancers, but YOU just need to be made aware of it.

Great image courtesy of Syliva's Latin music blog: http://www.ondacarolina.blogspot.com

Impact on others.

Whenever Paso takes it to the outdoors the not-so-obvious side effect is on the younger crowd.  Thinking back to some of our outdoor adventures, there are almost always children watching and mimicking what we do.

Now on the other hand, watching the adults mimic each other on the nightclub floor is not so cool!

About a week ago I found this post on addicted2Salsa.com:

I have been watching the ‘Dancing with the Stars‘ show for a while now and I have grown accustomed to watching great ballroom dances and good non-Latin Latin dance routines. I praise the celebrity dancersprofessional dancers on the show are required to dance a specific genre of dance, such as salsa, and we come to find out that they don’t know what is real salsa dancing. Now, I do understand that there are different styles of salsa dancing around the world. My judgment takes this into account. However, when you slap on stereotypical non-salsa dance steps with house music and state that you are salsa dancing – that is a for their hard work and determination in learning something completely new to them. This is nothing against them because I truly admire their progress. However, I always have an issue when the whole different story. The video below is what gives salsa dancing an improper typecast compared to what you and I know and love.

My biggest gripe with the whole thing is the judges. While Carrie Ann Inaba is measuring entertainment value and Bruno Tonioli is measuring timing (you can see him hit the table when couples dance), Len Goodman is supposed to be judge who prefers traditional steps and music. Len usually criticizes couples when they don’t follow proper dance structure in terms of proper steps for the assigned dance, but last night was a different story. I have finally come to accept no judge or professional dancer in the show knows what is real salsa dancing.

See for yourself at the judges reaction and let me know what you think!”

Naturally I chuckled because this is an American Salsa website!

Here is my reply to which I am still waiting for a reply:

Eduardo

For the great enemy of truth is very often not the lie-deliberate, contrived, and dishonest–but the myth-persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Too often we hold fast to the cliches of our forbears. We subject all facts to a prefabricated set of interpretations. We enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought. -John F. Kennedy

In case you were wondering, our “big point” is to make real Cuban dance a real possibility for anyone who wants it. We don’t care where you came from, how much skill you have, or even if you have money or not!

But we want to change so much about the way people perceive dance and dance instruction in the U.S. and we’ve taken the hammer to quite a few commonly held misconceptions-women don’t lead, it’s impossible for non-black Cubans to dance as rhythmically as Cubans etc. It felt good to know that we have actually made real changes out here in the Triangle. Here are some of them:

Effect #1: Awareness

When we first came to the Triangle, no one really had a clue as to what Cuban style was about. Most people thought that Cuban style and Rueda-group Salsa-were the same thing. I think some instructors were and continue to reduce dance to a series of rote movements while forgetting about culture, philosophy and development of real creative personal expression for the student.

There are some very good instructors out here but somewhere down the line, a big picture is being left out. Sometimes I think instructors may believe in dancing to express and interpret the music, but have to give young students what they want -turns. Eventually, instructors have to go against the business norm, and teach what they believe in. You may think you’ll lose money but in the end you will have a stronger foundation and people will respect your stance. You’ll probably even earn more money.

To me it felt like that some Salsa students out here in the Triangle think that Salsa exists in a vacuum. And that knowledge of the antecedents of Salsa-Afro dances-and a deep understanding of music and expression really don’t matter that much if your spins are tight and your styling looks good. The music doesn’t really change, so why should I change my dance or my beliefs? Total 70′s time capsule.

It’s been a little under two years and what began as a vision is evolving into a movement with the help of musicians and bands like Tambor Vivo and GarDel playing real Cuban music. People are beginning to wake up to the beauty of real Cuban dance. To be honest, it’s non-dancers that are being made aware faster than the “dancers”! This is what we hoped for. I have always said that the future of this dance is totally dependent on how many fresh minds we can reach.

In less than two years Paso went from a vision to the only dance school with its own studio and very distinct and individual culture.

Effect #2: Added color to black and white.

Go to any nightclub night and you will find very little Paso presence on average.  But go to any live event and the majority of dancers there will always be Paso, dancing Cuban style and the distinction between the two is very clear. When we first came here the scene looked like it was mass manufactured, and everyone looked suspiciously similar on the dance floor. I think we added a little bit of color to the scene, in the form of you, our dancers.

Effect #3: Set the bar higher for Latin dance schools.

We wanted to take a holistic approach (thanks for this one Rich) to dance and give students the complete picture: music, expression, supportive atmosphere, and possibility to become great. We are by no means finished and every day we are perfecting this formula. But we have had some exciting breakthroughs and have made some innovations that we hope other instructors will mimic.

Last night one of our new students came dropped by to visit class with her Spanish teacher who just happened to be Cuban. He was so exicited about what was going on at Paso, and in his excitement as he heard us playing Clave for the class said to her: “make sure they teach you Clave, that’s the most important!!!”.

But little did he know she already knew Clave because all new paso students, in their first hour of dancing learn to dance on Clave.

“You have to keep an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out” – Groucho Marx

1. Styling is personal.

This is first and foremost. Ironically, if memory serves me right, Eddie Torres -founder of NY Salsa On2- says that styling is “personal” and “spontaneous”. I was surprised to see that there were no classes in styling listed on his website, or any mention of him or his wife teaching it explicitly. On a side-note, there is a strong contrast between the principles first outlined by Eddie Torres and what NY Salsa is today.

I think the whole idea of teaching someone how to “style” their dance is most certainly an American/European thing -not Afro Latin. It seems as if some dancers feel that trained styling makes their dance more refined. When does refined become processed?

2. Styling is spontaneous, resulting from music and emotion. You can prepare for it, but not teach it.

Styling is an outward expression of feelings that come and go. Do you know ahead of time what mood/direction/feeling your dance will take? If so, then you are limiting yourself to only those feelings. A good instructor teaches the stroke but does not paint the portrait for the student.

3. If you teach it, people will do it. Usually verbatim, and rarely will they ever improvise.

Because you are teaching something that is usually done spontaneously, people will begin to forget what is you and what is them. In other words, they will spontaneously recite styling routines and over time actually fool themselves into thinking that it came from them. This is a dangerous habit-based phenomenon that functions largely outside of your awareness. Just look at the dance floor next time you go out? You can tell everyone purchased the same styling kit!!

Here is an example. As a dancer you experience a feeling brought on by the music, let’s say pleasant anticipation. Rather than play with this feeling and allow it manifest itself physically in its own way, based on your own human experience, you dig into your memory bag of routines and pull something out, ie; body wave. You’ve essentially disconnected your body from the decision loop and let your mind control things.

Our mind loves routine, pattern and regularity. It keeps us out of harm’s way. But do you really want to dance ‘safe’?

4. Creating your own style is a more challenging route. But a necessary part of self-discovery.

Some people have a very difficult time with their bodies. The easy answer for the teacher is to give them a fish rather than teach them how to fish. Unfortunately, giving someone a fish will only feed them for a day. Instructors should promote and train body awareness, aligned movement and balance. These are some of the things that allow students to create their own styling. This requires an instructor that’s educated in  formal principles of dance and movement, and it may take longer, but in the end you have a dancer, not a robot.

When it comes to being yourself, there is no better time than the dance floor.

You know, I feel like the most interesting part of dance is teaching it to others.  If you get me talking about learning theory, I might not ever shut up.

Make better dancers in shorter amounts of time. This is our basic goal. Better dancers meaning dancers who are both technically sound and capable of expressing themselves in an authentic -emotionally connected- way. Note I said, shorter amounts of time, not short. Efficiency should reinforce quality, not interfere with it.

Anyone can become a great dancer. We ride heavy on this premise and assume it the moment people walk into our studio. We don’t cut much slack for a reason. You already have what it takes. I think we’ve proven this at Paso now and in the past, by making dancers out of anyone who wants to put in the time to do so.

Once you accept that dance instruction should be simple and efficient, AND that anyone is capable of becoming a great dancer, what can we do to make it better? We are already years ahead of other schools in terms of instruction methods, we want to go light years.

These are just a few questions that pop into my head. Please feel free to add everything and anything else. I know there are more efficient and tighter methods out there and right now we are on the hunt!!

Should classes be longer or shorter?

What would help you develop certain areas faster?

What areas are focused on but not focused on enough?

What would you change? How and why?

Please donate any exercises or ideas or experiences that you have that would help dancers to improve.

If you’ve got any input, give it. What may seem like nothing to you may be a “light bulb” to us.

As always think outside the box. Feel free to email us as well: info@pasosalsastudios.com

Thanks!

For the most part, people come to dance class to get better. Some of you may say, “I just come for fun” but this is not entirely true. You don’t need to train in a studio to have fun with dance. The scene is full of people who are not actively training. The difference between you and them, is that casual wasn’t good enough for you. You wanted to understand, improve, and take your dance to the next level. Not only that, but you came to Paso, where principles of dance are first and Salsa is second.

If you take classes at Paso, you are probably an aggressive improver. No one else survives our culture but gung-ho people who really want to learn how to dance, not just how to do routine Salsa.

Ask yourself what change/improvement will help make dance more fulfilling for you?

Make it super specific. General is no good. “I want to become a better follow.” What does this mean in tangible terms? This is a goal that you will tire of because it can’t be gauged. Make it concrete:

“I am going to become better at following complicated moves with direction changes.”

“I am going to become better at dancing with my body while following my lead and staying on track.”

“I will improve my movement and make it more aligned.”

Figure out a game plan with ‘why? why? why?’. “I can’t dance on beat.” Why? “My feet move too fast.” Why? “Because I can’t derive the beat from the music” Why? “Because I am focusing on my steps.” Why? “Because I just don’t know them well enough”. EUREKA! You just drilled your way to a concrete issue that you have the power to change.

There will be days when dance won’t be fun. But if you keep pushing yourself to improve, it will always be fullfilling.