22 Things Good Dancers Do Differently

 A dancer blog post has been making the rounds lately and has excellent advice. Here are just a sampling of the gems:

7. Strive to constantly make new discoveries about dancing (rather than waiting to be spoon fed the answers). This is a crucial part of developing your unique perspective and voice. Don’t be a dance robot.
8. Seek out instructors/mentors they mesh with and who push them.
9. Practice the shit out of everything. Does this one need explaining? Of course you’ll need to do high-quality practice, not mindless practice.
10. Disregard their inner critics’ harsh thoughts. Your inner critic is just a little child trying to distract you from doing worthwhile things. Hit the ignore button.

Read the whole article here:
http://rebeccabrightly.com/good-dancers-differently/

Your Reflection - Guest Post by Carmen Bellotti

Welcome back! Glad to see you again.

I want to talk about a common thought in all student’s minds – “These moves don’t look the same on me as they do on _________. I will never be able to dance like ________ does”. Comparison happens all the time in the classroom and is a self-defeating thought to have, especially when you are just beginning. No matter how effortless a move may look, others are still working to improve upon it. I write this blog as a way to motivate and inspire you to continue down your path, and not to let those negative thoughts hinder or stop your growth.

The key is to focus only on yourself, which I know is easier said than done. I was guilty of mirror watching others in my baby dancer days. I remember many times I left class frustrated after spending most of my time staring at my classmates. Why didn’t I look like them? I didn’t think it possible for me to have the control and flow that the other dancers did. I tried to force my body to move like the others but to no avail. However, once my sights were focused on MY path and MY progress I finally became the dancer I had envisioned. Try to look only to you during class and when learning or relearning a concept, find one thing to praise about your growth. It could be as big as finally mastering a concept or simply feeling stronger in your posture. Both are great milestones and you should be proud of your progress no matter how small of a step it may seem.

Many think once you have a concept, you are done learning – WRONG. I remember feeling so discouraged when I began advanced classes and saw how far behind I was all the other students in the room. At this point I did not have a shimmy and wanted nothing more than to have the others' perfectly timed hips. What I realized soon after was that they all too were still working on their technique. Refinements can be made to any and all movements, and without consistent practice we cannot maintain our technique.

Writing this makes me recall a moment I hold onto from my Bohemian days (Ed. - the troupe Carmen performed with in CO). We were preparing for a performance when after a run through my troupe-mate, Suzie, said “There is always an aspect of failure in my dance”. I turned to her and said “That just means there is room for growth”. Growth is growth – all of it equal in weight. Acknowledge it and praise yourself for your accomplishments.

So don’t worry about the others in the mirror, they are not you! Keep working on your path and soon enough you will be the dancer of your dreams. All of you have the ability to be great but you must be
patient. This is a long journey but know that around the bend lies another milestone. Remember to not
get discouraged by the beautiful people around you, and stay focused on your reflection. In due time, I know you will accomplish all of your goals.

I Release You From Perfection

by Shay Moore
I release you from perfection.
I give you permission to screw up.
A lot.
I invite you take risks that don't always pan out.
I encourage you to laugh at your mistakes,
but take them seriously enough to correct them.
I request you think positive thoughts about yourself,
about your dance,
about your fellow dancers.
I abolish your excuses
so you can realize your capability.
I wish for you to get to know your roots,
which are my roots, too.
I ask that you respect those roots.
I expect you to expect more from yourself.
I hope for you to find your bliss,
and recognize your own beauty
on all its many levels,
in all its many forms.
I release you from perfection.
I applaud each and every misstep
that brings you closer to your Best.

Six Steps to Becoming a Great Dancer (no, really!)

If you have been reading my blog for even a short time, you have likely come across the popular "Four Steps to Becoming a Great Dancer" article I posted in late 2011.  That article stands as the first and most important list of "to do's" to improve your dancing, period.  BUT!  We all know there are a few more steps we can take, which can support those first four magical steps, and push us on to becoming stronger and more confident in our dance.  So here they are, Six Steps to Becoming a Great Dancer, coming atcha!

1. New dancers should diversify.

When a dancer is first dipping her toe into a new genre of dance, in this case bellydance, it is vital that she explore many facets of the dance in those tender first months and years.  Take classes from different teachers and take workshops as they are available to you--even ones you fear might be over your head, or below your notice--take them, the bellydance world is your smorgasbord!  Watch lots of professional videos.  By professional videos I mean professionally produced DVD's and online videos with established professional dancers. (While YouTube can be a great resource, for new dancers who don't know how to discern the great stuff from the terrible stuff, it can sidetrack you. Just be aware of that as you troll around for inspiration.)

How To Critique Yourself

One of my lovely longtime dance sisters and students, Kathy, sent me this in an e-mail recently, rightfully guessing I would enjoy its contents. In the bellydance world, being still truly a non-mainstream art (BDSS does not automatically bring all the trappings of "the mainstream"), we have very few tangible benchmarks for a successful work.  Meaning there aren't publicly recognized trade schools, public 'galleries', or professional critics built around our creative methods.  Aside from the opinions of friends and colleagues, who frankly will rarely tell you the whole truth and nothing but the truth, we have little in the way of true critical review. I think for us, it becomes increasingly important for us to develop a critical eye toward our own work, so we are able to more reliably assess our growth and evolution as we create, separate of the surrounding voices (which may not be giving us the best guidance).  I hope you enjoy the article! And if you would like to learn more about the author, Robert Genn, visit his page at http://painterskeys.com

The Importance of Taking Your Time

This may seem obvious to many, but sometimes I think it bears revisiting this important fact: becoming an intermediate or advanced dancer is so much more than the number of moves you know.  Unfortunately, many teachers "sell" it this way, encouraging students to leapfrog through the class material, drawing students in by boosting their egos but without the attention to detail that would help them become truly strong dancers.  The result is a group of highly motivated and excited dancers surely; but they lack the refinement, control, and polish that they could have if they were instead encouraged to take their time.  They are given quantity over quality, and what's worse is they usually don't know any better.  How could they if no one is setting that example for them?  The teacher who is supposed to be helping them understand what it truly takes to really grow in their dance is sending the wrong message.

I find new teachers run this risk the most.  They may have a lesson plan written out to teach two moves in a given night, and then later report "but they got through all that so fast, I taught them three more things!"  Woah, slow down there m'dear.  Have you really given them all they could absorb--nay, NEED to absorb--in the 15-20 minutes you had to break down and drill those moves?  Or could you have dug a little deeper into what you already had to present them? And in the course of your sessions, is one or two times through the body of material really enough to be throwing new challenges at them?  Or would they benefit from doing it again, looking at it from fresh angles, entrenching it ever more deeply into their minds and muscles?  Perhaps some very talented students are truly ready for new material after a few repetitions, but most are not. Frankly, even among those who learn that fast, they will gain so much by being encouraged to take their time, and dig into the details of the movements they have in front of them right now, before tackling on new material.

Fresh take on a TEDTalk - impulses

Two months ago, I posted a TEDTalk which featured Benjamin Zander talking about getting modern audiences to love classical music.  I didn't tie it into anything dancey, I just really was moved by the video and wanted to share.

Today I was trolling Blogrolls for some new dancey blogs to read, and I came across "The Tribal Way", written by a gal named Chella. She watched the same video a month later, and had a brilliant observation to make connecting Zander's discussion of "impulses" to learning and refining tribal bellydance.

"Zander notes how the learning of a skill progresses. The novice puts an impulse, an emphasis or concentration if you will, on every key. They have to think about each note as a separate entity. As their skill increases, they don't have to think so much about each note - their fingers know where to go and the emphasis is on fewer notes. Finally they become so proficient that they place even emphasis on an entire phrase of notes - one impulse for an entire stretch of music. This is where the magic happens! The notes are smooth, beautifully running into one another with no hesitation.

This idea of impulses can be applied to dance as well. A beginner concentrates on each facet of each move, and you can see it in their bodies - the concentration as they move between each motion. There's nothing wrong of course, this is just the start and I'm sure we all looked a little jerky and robotic in the very beginning. However, when you look at a professional dancer - Carolena Nericcio, Rachel Brice, etc - you will see no impulse, no jerky hesitant movements. Their motions run gracefully together in a stream of dance.

You can see this easily when you watch videos of Fat Chance Belly Dance, and other extremely skilled troupes as well. Why do they seem so graceful? So in sync and smooth?  Other troupes may do the exact same movements, but you cannot deny the certain 'je ne sais quoi' that FCBD possesses. Well, now you do know what - they have so few impulses. Their skill has grown so great that they are playing their instrument with only one impulse."

The rest of her excellent post is HERE. Enjoy!

Tribal Style: Getting our Terms Straight

More blasts from the past today! After I found that old class outline, I also found a repository of some of my old articles from various publications.

Below is an article I wrote for the now-defunct Caravan Trails quarterly newsletter which used to be produced by Paulette Rees-Denis of Gypsy Caravan. I was author of a regular column called "Of the Tribe" for a short time, for which I wrote short articles focused on the topic Paulette had chosen. This was for my first article, sometime in 2001, or maybe early 2002. Enjoy a little retro reading...

Growth is a spiral & Feeling stuck

A favorite comment from a Bhuz discussion a couple years back. It's a great reminder that the way forward is not always straight ahead...

"Growth is Spirallic, Not Linear"

The most common pattern found in nature and all phenomena is the spiral. We see it in every day patterns. Autumn leaves headed toward the ground in a spirallic freefall; the helical form of DNA and RNA; the rings of a seashell; exhaust smoke coming out of a car; sound waves etc. Within the movement of a spiral, there is always a return near the place of origin, but in a more evolved direction.

Our personal growth parallels this movement; we get better, we get worse, we get better, we get worse. Growth is rarely linear. No one just "gets better." Often, it's getting worse that becomes our best teacher and enables us to recover. This gives us a point of measurability toward seeing a larger picture."

Speaking of growth...