Rick (my tango instructor, who is the man on the right picture. The picture was taken for his wedding. His wife Anna is also his tango partner and my instructor) always says to his students at the end of the class “Guys, listen! Tango is all about the women. Your job is to making sure she looks good, not you. Let her feel she is the most beautiful woman in the world……”
I believe he is right. Good dancers know his partners’ ability in less than 15 seconds when they start to dance. It is crucial to know what she can do and what she cannot. Ladies! Especially some beginners. If some guys ask you to dance and he is only focusing on the fancy moves and you cannot even follow, then you just really frustrated to say I am not good enough for him. No. I have to say that unfortunately he is not that good. If he even cannot make sure you are with him, he does not know what is dancing.
Every time I dance with Rick, I close my eyes. I do not need to see. I only need to listen to him, trust him and follow him, the essence of Tango is connection. Some people even told me that if guys’ signal is clear enough, all the ladies can dance tango, even for the ones never had experience before. Rick always says “I am not impressed by those people who can do fancy moves, instead I am impressed by couples who can connected together.”
Dancing is a kind of performing arts. At the same time, it is also a non-verbal communication. If using communication theory to explain this. The purpose of communication is transferring a message from a source to a destination. The first step is an information source has to encode the message. Then there has to be a media can carry this encoded message to deliver to the destination. In order to understand the message, the destination has to decode first. Once the destination gets the message, it can send feedback to the resource. For example, John loves Mary and they have been dating for couple of years. John plans to propose. In this case, John is the resource. Message is John's love. He has to encode first. He can encode his message to Will You Marry Me? Then he has to find the right channel to deliver the message. This channel can be a letter, a special fancy dinner ending with proposal and hanging a ring on Christmas tree with all other Christmas decorations in Mary's house. After Mary understands his message. She can give her feedback. Yes or No. In the world of dancing, communication source is guys. The destination is ladies. Guys has to learn how to encode the message through body signal to deliver to his partners. Being the destination, ladies has to learn how to decode and act the way according her partners message. We call this feedback. Actually, in this case, channel is the CONNECTION. Once they loose connection, the message cannot be delivered. Guys have to use connection to transfer energy to girls. How to build connection in dancing is crucial. It requires trust. It is actually really hard to trust a stranger. At a ball, most of time, you will be asked to dance with a stranger, or you will ask a stranger to dance. Good dancers know how to build connection in a second. It is commitment. It is understanding.
Learning how to dance is really like learning life. There has to be trust and commitment. If you break the trust and commitment, you will have really really hard time to communicate with people.
There is something I want to tell beginners from yesterday. For most of them, it was their first time to go to dance. They all had great time. Dancing is a lot of fun. Keep on doing, there is so much to expect and there is so much to learn. Dancing not only teaches me how to move, it also teaches me how to respect people and treat people.
Sometimes, I believe living my life is dancing with God. I need to be a better listener to do whatever he wants me to do, because he knows he wants me to look good. Remember, dancing is all about you ladies.
