The day I almost quit dancing ...

[pygmalion]

Okay. Time for true confessions. :wink: As much as we all seem to love dancing, I'm betting that many of us have had an experience or two that was so demoralizing, or discouraging, or embarrassing, or [fill in the blank] that quitting dance seemed appealing -- the easy way out, or even the only way out.

Care to share your experience? What happened, and what stopped you from quitting? Or did you quit temporarily, and come back after a cooling off period? Please share whatever you're comfortable with. 8)

[Kitty]

yes, happened.

When my boyfriend competed and performed all semester long with another chick saying that she was a higher level dancer! They competed in bronse, as I did too, so I didn't think that there was some huge difference in level. He just didn't believe in me.

[dancin_feet]

Before my exams a couple of months ago. I was practising so much and putting way too much pressure on myself to be perfect. Also the pressures on my instructor at the time were not helping the atmosphere between us in our private lessons. Not his fault, I know, everyone is human. I had a couple of nights at home in a row (unusual for me) and realised what I had been doing and that to take a break at that time would set me back 6 months in terms of being able to take the exams.

So it was a very short but very much needed break.

[jenibelle]

Sorry, gotta edit the post for sake of anominity...how could i even think of quitting dancing anyway?
Jeni :D

[pygmalion]

I was afraid that would happen. :(

But all is well, if you've managed to keep dancing. Dancing well is the best revenge. That's what I always tell myself, when I reflect on a couple really awful experiences I've had with former dance teachers. Dancing well is the best revenge. 8)

btw, welcome back, jennibelle. Glad you're here. :D

[10Dancer]

Dancing well is the best revenge. That's what I always tell myself, when I reflect on a couple really awful experiences I've had with former dance teachers. Dancing well is the best revenge.


You said it! I just had this experience the other day when I watched my ex-partner and his new partner practice while I was having a lesson. His focus is now Latin, not 10dance.

I had been thinking about completely giving up Latin and this situation didn't help. But what it did do was make me stop and remind myself that quiting is not going to make me feel better. The only thing that will work is proving that I can achieve my goals, even if I have to keep working towards them alone.

[Sagitta]

My first dance summer 2003. A swing dance where everyone was doing lindy, all I knew was ECS, and was having great difficulties with starting and keeping to the beat. Remember that I'm muiscally challenged. I almost left in tears as I didn't mind asking people but half the time when I started I started off beat, could tell that from just dancing, but wasn't comfortable with the music to start correctly. The frustration was a self-defeating force. The more frustrated I got the worse I got. I didn't do anything for two weeks. Went back another Tuesday night, got even more frustrated, then decided I needed to do something about it. I listened to swing 24/7 and took some lessons to get practice starting on time. :) And now? Well, the rest - bits and pieces - is littered throughout the threads of df.

[pygmalion]

I'm so glad you decided to stick with it. :D

[Laura]

I've thought about quitting several times over the past seven years, but the closest I came to actually making that phone call to my teacher and saying "no more" was this past January. I decided to quit doing Pro/Am and wait for my amateur partner to get knee surgery and then recover (an 8-month time period, unfortunately).

I slept on it, and when I woke up the next morning I realized that it wasn't dancing and competing with my teacher that was the problem, it was doing Pro/Am Standard with him and having to deal with the fact that I was in the upper reaches of Gold level and not feeling like I was ever going to get anywhere. The women who stick it out in Pro/Am long enough to really get to Open Gold and just plain Open are very good, and have a lot more time and money to spend on Pro/Am than I, and it all was feeling like way too much pressure on me: pressure to take more lessons (but not being able to get them due to my teacher's time constraints), pressure to do more comps (ditto), pressure to lose a lot of weight, pressure to have more expensive costumes, pressure to take coachings (difficult to do with my teacher's schedule), possibly even pressure to find a new teacher with better connections and the right kind of competition record in Standard. It takes a LOT to get into the upper echelons of Pro/Am, and I realized it was a game that I just couldn't play.

After thinking about all this I decided that I could still enjoy Pro/Am by making a simple shift in styles. By switching to Smooth I was able to back away from Open level -- I'd never really done Smooth before, so we pretty much started from scratch. Well, from Silver, that is. Also, my teacher is truly a Smooth dancer, and has the competition record to prove it, so this was a way of playing to his strengths and learning from him what he is truly an expert at. I'm still waiting for my amateur partner to come back from his knee surgery, but it's only another month and a half! I'm very excited about that! We'll be doing Standard, which is my first love in competitive ballroom dancing.

[etchuck]

Of course, I did quit dancing when I realized I couldn't afford it and the then-gf at the time wanted more time from me. I resumed dancing when I found a community that wanted me to play a part. Now I'm pretty sure I won't quit dancing unless some unfortunate injury or tragedy falls.

[DanceAm]

I was pulling in to the studio parking lot and accidentally ran down my instructor. I felt bad as the ambulance took her away to the hospital with two broken bones in her legs. Lucky for me there was another instructor free that night and she took the lesson. It has been a great student teacher relationship ever since. My old instructor is in a wheelchair and sometimes I feel bad about it, but, you know, life goes on and I just have to keep dancing.

(No, this didn't really happen.)

I can't see myself quitting dancing. Not altogether, maybe there will be a time I don't compete anymore, but not stop dancing.

[pygmalion]

You had me for a second, you stinker. :tongue: :lol:

[salsachinita]

The day I broke up with my instructor/mentor/boyfriend/best dancer that i've ever seen. It's because I linked him to salsa...as in, he was my salsa world and that was that. It took a little while to shake off the bad energy and learn what salsa really was... and now it's all positive again. Phew!

Been there.......but salsa has a way to heal for those of us daring enought to open our hearts once again.

[Genesius Redux]

I was pulling in to the studio parking lot and accidentally ran down my instructor. I felt bad as the ambulance took her away to the hospital with two broken bones in her legs. Lucky for me there was another instructor free that night and she took the lesson. It has been a great student teacher relationship ever since. My old instructor is in a wheelchair and sometimes I feel bad about it, but, you know, life goes on and I just have to keep dancing.

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

[squirrel]

sort of similar experience with jenibelle... :cry: :cry: hurt like mad... :cry: :cry:

but I got over it!

[Sakura]

I was pulling in to the studio parking lot and accidentally ran down my instructor. I felt bad as the ambulance took her away to the hospital with two broken bones in her legs. Lucky for me there was another instructor free that night and she took the lesson. It has been a great student teacher relationship ever since. My old instructor is in a wheelchair and sometimes I feel bad about it, but, you know, life goes on and I just have to keep dancing.

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: You almost had me too!

I've not reached the point yet where I've felt that I wanted to quit dancing. The fun thing is, is that I have my friends; who since they don't dance, seem to make it their duty to try and ruffle my feathers about dance, or make sure that I laugh about it and don't give myself an annurism stressing about things.

Cases in point:

1. My friend Schuyler seems to care about my dancing on some indefinable plane (as he said this morning); but since I have a cute dance teacher, he refers to my dancing as, "that dancing," or when I mention I have a private lesson coming up, he goes into the, "Priiiivate, eh? :twisted: " mode, leading me to constantly question him as to why I haven't hit him yet. =^__^=;;

2. Apparently my teacher is some sort of starting point for the rest of my female friends (sisters, really), as it was started by Sarah; when I'd get to talking to much about my dancing, or when I'd start getting upset about something, she'd raise her hand in the sort of "Pac-Man/Chatterbox" position and start saying, "Jonah, Jonah, Jonah, Jonah, Jonah, Jonah, Jonah!**" loud enough to drown my voice out and until I stopped being upset and we both started laughing.

So, really, it's all okay for now. :D But now that I've said that, since Murphy {'s Law} love me, things will apparently now begin to go down hill rapidly... :roll: :oops: :roll:

Sakura Kitty :kitty:

**Jonah is my teacher's name