Keeping Dancers Motivated [Archive]

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pygmalion

08-28-2003, 02:14 PM

I know we all love dancing, but as much as I love it, every once in a while I find myself asking, "Why the heck am I doing this anyway?"

When you have those, "why am I doing this," days, what do you and/or your coach do to help keep you motivated?

I'll start.

Things I do:

1. Give myself a dance "dessert". After I reach a big milestone, I give myself a whole private lesson to just have fun. Any kind of dance. No teaching or coaching allowed. Maybe not even structured dance -- maybe club freestyle to techno music. I do this to remind myself how much fun I'm having.

2. I make myself re-read and reset my dance goals every month or so, and definitely near anniversaries. This helps me notice when my motivation is slipping before I get to the burnout stage.

Things my coach does:

1. Tells me jokes. And this is not easy for him, because he's a serious guy. But he deliberately tries to lighten up the tone throughout our lessons, when he sees me getting too serious or too frustrated.

2. Discusses goals and direction with me every 10 - 20 lessons or so.

MissAlyssa

08-29-2003, 01:21 AM

honestly when I have "one of those days" I take a deep breath and realize what my life would be WITHOUT dance....I'd rather be having a BAD dance day than a GREAT day without it.

youngsta

08-29-2003, 01:30 AM

It seems like every 3-4 months I burnout. When I do I'll step back and take about a week break. No dancing whatsoever. Then I fly out to LA for a salsa weekend. Everytime I do it my inspiration comes rushing back. I see where I wanna be--it's right there in front of my face.

Gator

08-29-2003, 02:25 AM

I know we all love dancing, but as much as I love it, every once in a while I find myself asking, "Why the heck am I doing this anyway?"

When you have those, "why am I doing this," days, what do you and/or your coach do to help keep you motivated?

As of why, I guess because it's fun as usual? Although thanks to stiduo it can get real ugly :( YMMV.
It used to be a lot of fun before, and I never thought of what kept me going lately, I guess only my own stubornness, I don't like to quit on anything untill I get what I wanted. Though it's kindda hard to keep going only on that.

Interesting, I gotta try this "review myself" thing once in a while ;)

08-29-2003, 05:25 AM

honestly when I have "one of those days" I take a deep breath and realize what my life would be WITHOUT dance...

I can think of a few people who, when they have a bad day of dancing, make faces like your avatar :wink:

-FF

dancergal

08-29-2003, 07:06 PM

Sometimes I just get in a mood and think I'll never improved and be the dancer I want to be. I just don't have all the time and money it takes. I want to do other things besides dancing. So we take a little break and try to do something else for a few days. Soon I'm almost chopping at the bit to get back to dancing. I think we're just crazy. :lol: My biggest motivator is when we attend a WCS dance convention and watch the competitions. The pros are just so amazing, it always gets you going. Before you know it you're trying new moves and footwork. We usually go home with something new to practice.

MissAlyssa

08-30-2003, 12:13 AM