The Learning Never Ends

As a hobby, ballroom dancing is great because you can get to a point where you can move around the floor fairly quickly. But it is also something where there is always something to learn or something that can be improved. There are good and bad things about that. Under the right set of circumstances, it means that you won’t be bored because there is always something new to work on. But if you tend towards being a perfectionist, it can be frustrating because you can never reach “perfect”. 

It also depends on what type of student you are. If your goal is only to progress through the levels, then the Famous Franchise will push you along and gladly take your money. Maybe you won’t have totally mastered the steps but you can do them well enough to check out and move on to the next medal level. And, with what you do learn about posture, frame and timing, you’ll be perceived as someone who knows how to dance.

That’s the funny about ballroom. It doesn’t take much to make you stand out in a world where so few find the time to learn how to dance. My wife hasn’t taken lessons in years, but we still tend to stand out at weddings or other places when we get to dance. 

The Famous Franchise teaches in levels. You have to get basic footwork down and then they move on to things like frame and posture while also teaching the various patterns at whatever level you are in. They’ll move into things like lead/follow and styling and swing and sway and all sorts of various other parts of dancing. But it can be easy to get into a trap where the focus is just on patterns and the various medal levels. As I said before, you’ll still come out as a competent dancer but have you truly reached your full potential.

The problem with having a goal like “I want to be the best dancer I can be” is that it doesn’t provide a lot of concrete stuff for the studio to work with. And they like concrete goals because they can plan for those and it is obvious when they’ve been met. 

As a student, it is also easy to get trapped into a mindset where you are competent enough and getting enough positive feedback, that it doesn’t seem like you have more to learn. (Even though you do). That’s where things can stagnate and the lessons become more of a grind. I’ve certainly dealt with this in the past so it requires an open mind and a realization that there is a lot more that you have to learn and a willingness to do so.

I put all this down because it kind of reflects my current mind set. Last year the focus was on routines and getting the big award for that. I’ve done that. So what’s next? Well it has become obvious to me that I kind of got the Cliff notes version of many of the patterns I learned when I started with PJ. At that time, she was kind of learning with me and it was OwnerGuy’s way of giving me enough to do a passable version of those patterns.

But I don’t want to just be “passable”. Because PJ has been able to learn a lot in the years since we’ve started, she’s on much more solid ground for teaching and I am starting to see what I’ve been missing. In some ways, it can seem like starting over and that can be a little frustrating. But you have to take the mindset that you haven’t been doing things “wrong” all this time. It is just that now there are better ways to do certain things. 

I’m kind of being vague because some of this is hard to describe. Let’s just say that ballroom engages a lot of muscles and I can see things that I haven’t been doing. I know that they can’t dump everything on you at once or it would be totally overwhelming and it takes time to get the basics to a level where you aren’t thinking about them so you can start to focus on other things that will make the dancing more well rounded. 

The good news is I’m finding that much of it isn’t a major change to what I’ve been doing. Relatively minor tweaks – more rotation in certain spots for example. And, to be honest, some of it is stuff I’ve heard before but it is easy to let things slip if you aren’t continually focusing on it. 

To make a very long story short, the last two lessons have been really great. I’ve also started taking better notes – even stopping the lesson to write something down when it is fresh in my mind. Plus, it is now easier to see what specific things I need to be focusing on to take my dancing to the next level. Its hard to explain but it feels good to have some direction and a better idea of what I need to do. We’ll still be working on routines but this year is just about improving how the dances move and look.