Social Tango for Beginners

[Zoopsia59]

The trouble is, if you do reject him, he will probably never ask you again anyway. I wouldn't.

If I'm too tired to dance and the person asking me doesn't respect that, then maybe I wouldn't enjoy dancing with him as much as I thought... especially if I made it clear that I WOULD accept his invite if I weren't already totally pooped or hurting.

This is actually not a hypothetical for me... I recently at the end of a very long night tried to turn someone down that I normally enjoy dancing with (and had already danced with that night!) However, he needled me into another tanda, making it hard for me to refuse even after I said I was hurting. He wouldn't accept my refusal with graciousness. Now I have a whole lot less interest in dancing with him again, since he doesn't seem to care about my physical well-being or pain.

If you wouldn't ever ask someone again when they turn you down for a legitimate reason like being done for the night, then you are probably going to miss out on some great partners. Seriously? When someone tells you she is really tired or starting to hurt, you'll write her off if she won't dance with you anyway? Maybe you should try to ask her earlier in the evening next time!

If you see them dancing with someone else after they say that, well, that's different. But I've been approached on a number of occasions AFTER I've removed my shoes and even as I'm getting my stuff together and heading out the door. If someone won't ask me again in that case, I'll just assume their initial invite wasn't sincere, but they felt that they were obligated to ask me for some reason, so they deliberately waited until they knew I'd say "No". If you really want to dance with someone, wouldn't you maximize your chances of your invitation being accepted rather than refused?

 

[sixela]

I think for you the advice would be not to date people you meet on the dance floor NOW.

Very sound advice. Well, I do actually dance with my wife once a year or so, but I suppose being married with two kids no longer counts as dating.

 

[manny]

why not date?

 

[opendoor]

why not date?

Of course dating. Learning tango is not about learning steps or sequences. Learning tango is social learning in the first place. Steps will come by themselves. Tango dancing is pure interpretation. There are no rules. The basic qualifications you should learn for tango-ing is to organize your smart phone, to handle several ex simultaneously and to learn the ending of 30 classical tangos from the 40s. When will you start, finally?

 

[NZ_Guy]

7) If you are not having fun go home

First try not dancing. Sometimes it's just the dancing that's not fun that night, while the music and the ambiance can still be enjoyable without the feeling of having to dance when it's not your night.

 

[Gssh]

I'll be sure to tell my wife, but I'm afraid you're more than 20 years late with that advice ;-).

Well, this is advice to minimize drama...

Joking aside: There are lots of people who find partners, SO's, and spouses on the dancefloor. But for every happy couple you get also at least one heartbroken person who drops out of tango because they confused dance-chemistry with actually liking the other person, or you get a relationship that slowly unravels due to dance-jealousy and the fact that only very rarely your SO is the person you enjoy dancing with the most. I don't this is advice in the vein of "Don't ever do this", but more in the vein of "Doing this might be more complicated than it looks right now, think about it", like "Do not lend money to relatives", "Do not date the ex-SO of your best friend" and "Do not take sides if a couple fights, you probably do not know what it is actually about"

Gssh

 

[newbie]

6) Be generous with your dances, but make sure that you are still having fun yourself

What does this one mean? Not long ago I heard a teacher of mine complaining that one of her students was not generous during his dances, that is, he was too neutral, not adding any personal touch, not giving anything of himself. Or there is another meaning, which is inviting people from a lower league. But how is there a lower league when you're a beginner?

 

[Mladenac]

Advanced dancers have problem of dancing with lower level dancers in a way that advanced dancers kill advanced in themselves.
So I believe that meaning of the sentence is that despite dancing with a beginner don't forget yourself.
Even advanced dancers can enjoy dancing with others if they find sth that they enjoy in dancing.
They must considers others level, but they can always find sth to focus on.
That way others will be challenged and progress, and will feel sparkles of a partner.

I don't find motivating dancing with robot dancers or with zombie dancers.

 

[Sagitta]

Advanced dancers have problem of dancing with lower level dancers in a way that advanced dancers kill advanced in themselves.
So I believe that meaning of the sentence is that despite dancing with a beginner don't forget yourself.
Even advanced dancers can enjoy dancing with others if they find sth that they enjoy in dancing.
They must considers others level, but they can always find sth to focus on.
That way others will be challenged and progress, and will feel sparkles of a partner.

I don't find motivating dancing with robot dancers or with zombie dancers.

The more advanced you get the easier it should be to be able to express yourself no matter the level of your partner.

 

[Mladenac]

The more advanced you get the easier it should be to be able to express yourself no matter the level of your partner.

Hi Smarty
What you wrote is platitude.

I can always express myself, but the kind of expressiveness I can achieve with does not satisfy me with beginners.

 

[Sagitta]

Hi Smarty
What you wrote is platitude.

I can always express myself, but the kind of expressiveness I can achieve with does not satisfy me with beginners.

Really? Well, it is easy to point outside ourselves to say that others kill our dancing. I am ok with you saying that "you" cannot express yourself in a satisfying way with beginners, but disagree with that statement being applied in a general way to all advanced dancers. Can an advanced dancer do everything that he/she wants with a beginner that he/she does with an advanced partner? No! But, I will disagree that it "kills the advanced in themselves" as a label applied to all advanced dancers. I guess it goes to what you define as advanced, also.

In terms of defining advanced. If a person says I know 20 moves and you know 10 moves so I am more advanced then you I would laugh at them. That is a superficial definition. To me being advanced is how well one can connect with one's partner and music in a satisfying manner. This does not mean that one does not have preferences, but a preference is very different from saying that doing something actually makes yourself a worse dancer.

 

[Gssh]

What does this one mean? Not long ago I heard a teacher of mine complaining that one of her students was not generous during his dances, that is, he was too neutral, not adding any personal touch, not giving anything of himself. Or there is another meaning, which is inviting people from a lower league. But how is there a lower league when you're a beginner?

All of the above?

I was thinking mostly about the mindset - the other people at a milonga are not there as props in a play that is staged to entertain me. I have no right to demand from them that they provide a postive experience for me. I can offer (well, try to offer) positive energy and engagement to other people, and accept their choices -whether they reciprocate or not. I can try to avoid assuming malice in others behaviour. But while i think it is a good thing to provide something/anything to make the milonga a better place/give the people we dance with as much as we can/be in general present in a positive way, i also think that we have the same responsibility to ourselves -to take care of our own happiness. So if there is malice it is not a virtue to downplay it. Enabling negative behaviour is not a good thing - basically the usual "be a good person, but not a sucker" platitudes.


Gssh

 

[Mladenac]

Really? Well, it is easy to point outside ourselves to say that others kill our dancing. I am ok with you saying that "you" cannot express yourself in a satisfying way with beginners, but disagree with that statement being applied in a general way to all advanced dancers. Can an advanced dancer do everything that he/she wants with a beginner that he/she does with an advanced partner? No! But, I will disagree that it "kills the advanced in themselves" as a label applied to all advanced dancers. I guess it goes to what you define as advanced, also.

In terms of defining advanced. If a person says I know 20 moves and you know 10 moves so I am more advanced then you I would laugh at them. That is a superficial definition. To me being advanced is how well one can connect with one's partner and music in a satisfying manner. This does not mean that one does not have preferences, but a preference is very different from saying that doing something actually makes yourself a worse dancer.

There are musicality, dance technique and connection levels.
Subtleness brings up the level.
So if you have lack in some of those parts, I don't consider it advanced anymore.

In dance technique I don't crave for some crazy combinations, only fluidity in relatively simple dancing.
If I have that I can easily transfer it to more complex combinations or elements.