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Dance Rules - Life, Learning and Dance |
| Three Rules for Success on the Dance Floor |
| by: Shawn Trautman |
| Three concepts govern all the rules of etiquette that will impact your ability to learn and practice social dancing. The mastery of these concepts will dramatically increase your success rate in the “classroom”—referring to wherever you are learning, be it a ballroom or your living room—as well as on the dance floor, once you are out practicing and enjoying your new skills. These three concepts are ones to keep in the back of your mind even after you have put this book up on the shelf and mastered all of the dance moves and steps taught in these pages. These three bits of wisdom to remember are respect for self, respect for others, and responsibility for all of your actions. |
| Respect for Self |
| When you show “respect for self,” you enable yourself to learn to dance as well as learn to dance with a partner. As you show respect for your body, you will treat it accordingly. Posture improves, carriage improves, and you begin to look like a dancer. A person who respects his or her body holds the head up and the shoulders back. This person also respects the limitations of his or her body. When you dance, you also need to show respect for your intelligence and ability to learn. When you are confident in your own mind’s ability to learn the material, you will learn it faster. |
| Respect for Others |
| Because social dancing involves more than one person by definition, showing respect for others is imperative. This includes respecting their bodies, physical limitations, learning styles, and learning paces. Most of all, respect your dance partner’s personal space. If he or she looks uncomfortable in the particular position you are learning, exercise your communication skills and fix the problem as best you can. If your dance partner has a particular limitation that physically won’t allow him or her to do a particular movement, talk about it and move on. As mentioned earlier, social dancing is multidimensional, and most moves are optional in a dance. Change to a move that may be a challenge, but also a possibility, and don’t get discouraged. Respect your partner’s learning style and pace. If your partner needs to watch the DVD to truly grasp a concept visually, don’t rush through it and get frustrated when he or she doesn’t execute the move properly prior to viewing the DVD. |
| Responsibility for All of Your Actions |
| The third and final rule to live and learn to dance by is to take responsibility for all of your actions. The blame game is a pursuit of frustration that can only end in disaster for your dancing career and sometimes your relationship. Once you take responsibility for a mistake, you can take the next step and figure out how to fix the problem and prevent repetition of the incorrect movement. This will expedite your learning process and prevent the formation of “bad” muscle memory. As you take responsibility for your actions, it will encourage your dance partner to take responsibility for his or her own mistakes and will re-center the focus on the problems and the dance, rather than on each other. When you are responsible for your mistakes, you are also responsible for your successes. |
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