2015: Dance Checkpoint #2
Quick review of my summer (May 2015 - Aug 2015, aka part 2 of 2015):
I danced a lot this summer. Perhaps not as much as I would have liked to, but I appreciate the amount of work that I put in. I went to class at least once a week, at best 3 times a week.
If we count my trip to California, then I expanded my dance class catalogue even further - took class from Carlo Darang, Sorah Yang, Mark Dizon (co-director of GRV), Stacey from Kaba Modern, Mappy Mapala some old California dance friends.
I taught class/workshops 3 times.
I attended HDI 2015 (big hip-hop dance camp in the UK), which energised, refreshed, encouraged, inspired me, and was almost 3 years on from when I first started hip-hop.
I have a direction for my dance path ahead (at least for the next few months) and have tuned my dance training accordingly.
I also take class a little more smartly now:
I am more selective about the choreo classes I take so as to keep myself focused on my targets (I seriously used to go to just any class I could).
Before each class I make a point to decide what it is I am going to take away from the teacher
In class, I push myself harder every run-through
I’ve always had doubts about myself as a dancer. I wish I could say that this post is the one where I announce that, KAPOW, those doubts have been forever vanquished. But no, they’re still very much here, and in this post I will spell out how they’ve been looking in this summer 2015.
A lot of people with whom I first started dancing (3 years ago in California) often comment ‘it’s so great that you still dance’. It’s almost as if they expect it to be a fleeting hobby! Upon discovering that I do hip-hop, people also often comment ‘Oh I wouldn’t expect you to be a hip-hop dancer’. I understand it is a little at odds with my personality and body movement. Finally, some of the people around me think I invest too much time in dance, that I’m obsessed with it.
Comments like this make me wonder what is it that keeps me dancing - no, make me doubt whether or not I should still be dancing. It seems as if I should have quit by now because of how un-me it is for me to be doing hip-hop (read: how difficult it would be for me to keep that up).
I’m definitely projecting my own past anxieties and doubts onto people.
So, let’s break it down, why do I keep dancing? Sometimes I wonder if I only do because it’s cool, to help me make friends with 'cool people’.
I’d be lying if I said that ‘the cool factor’ is not one of the reasons I do hip-hop.Of course hip-hop has a great appeal from how very awesomely cool it is. But actually, that is only an initial attraction for me. It’s the reason I chose hip-hop in the first place, over other genres, but it’s not what has kept me going. What has kept me going is all the typical reasons: it’s fun, is a release, it’s a creative outlet etc. etc. You’ve heard it all before and the same romantic-sounding reasons apply to me.
You may be reading this thinking ‘Well why wouldn’t you keep dancing?! Why are you even talking about dance as something that you might have quit?’
I did almost quit, about 1-2 years ago. I still sometimes think of quitting, because I don’t think it’s worth me continuing, considering there are so many far more capable, creative, original dancers out there. Or because I think that I’ve not improved that much and that that rate of improvement will probably stay the same, if not decline. Or because I’m scared of the amount of work I would have to put in if I wanted to become an amazing dancer.
I’m letting the insecure, attention-seeking, doing-things-for-other-people, competitive parts of me win.
A breakthrough in confidence
What spurred me to blog today was, I took class today and it showed me that I should be proud of how hard I’ve worked and how much I’ve improved. Class was taught by a dancer who is very versatile and hard-working (he is younger than me and so all the more inspiring), and his movement is kinda good for me to learn from, since he combines popping/ticking/waving with Contemporary - which are movements that my body likes and leans towards.
I struggled a lot in the class, but also tried to explore some techniques/exercises like really letting my body match the quality of the music, paying attention to timing, playing around with whether to make certain moves big or subtle. Even though my dancer confidence felt beaten and bruised by the end of the class because how hard and stressful I found it, looking back on my video I actually did really well. (So the answer is clearly, stress yourself out to the max every class!!)
I haven’t been posting videos of myself dancing lately, because of lower confidence, lower self-esteem and lower self-worth, and not wanting to put myself out there (those things are present in my life more generally and I’m working on correcting that). Worst thing I’ve noticed is, I’ve actually gone back to not being able to call myself 'a dancer’ in front of people and habitually downplaying my dancing abilities.
Appreciating where I am today
So I’m going to post the video from today’s class. From today’s class, I see that I am definitely a dancer. From today’s class, I see that I definitely have reason to keep dancing. There is no doubt that I have a lot of things to work on and try out and explore, but my hard work is there and it shows.
First, here is a video of me from February 2014, 1.5 years into my dance journey (aka over 1.5 years ago from today, aka about halfway between day 1 and today):
I am good here in parts (I watched this and was quite surprised at some of my execution and how on time I was on some moves) but have many things to work on (still lacking in control, for example. Them weak arms and non-existent core.)
Now, this second video is from February 2015, 1 year after the last video (aka 2.5 years into my dance journey, aka almost half a year ago):
In this 2nd video, I have improved noticeably since the last video, with much better control and better grasp of some techniques, but showing some slowness in picking up choreo (or not being able to pretend to have choreo down/bluffing my way through, which I’ve learnt is a common trick), and though my control has improved, my arms and core are still my weak point.
Now, here is the video from that class at studio today:
This is one of my best classes. I didn’t know I could tick and pop to this extent. I’m proud of how I did in this class. I’ve noticed that the classes that I struggle deeply in are actually the ones that I learn the most in and push myself hardest in.
Also, what’s important about this post is that I’m comparing myself to my previous self, not to other people, and not in the context of 'how should I look at the 3-year mark?’. And actually seeing an improvement from Me-6-months-ago to Me-today is really encouraging. It seems that my summer work (and, more broadly, 3 years of work) was not for nothing.
So, having written something today, reviewed where I am and posted the videos, what I say in answer to that insecure, attention-seeking, doing-things-for-other-people, competitive part of me is: focus on yourself - and the only times you should be looking at other people is to draw inspiration from them and their achievements, not to be negged out by them. With this post, I’m appreciating myself as a dancer, my dance progress and journey, and giving myself confidence to keep going.
dededos
kianamaiart
yousharknotpass
prguitarman
izzy806
ellievsbear
