5,6,7,8 lessons from freestyling

Over the last three days I had the privlege of being a guest teacher at the New Zealand AJDA Congress (basically a big dance convention) in Wellington.

As well as teaching dance workshops, I also attended a couple, which were fantastic as I was being taught by teachers and examiners I had trained under as I was growing up. It was inspiring to be able to see these mentors though my now adult eyes.

One dancer/choreographer from Australia took an improvisation and freestyle workshop. It's funny that of the whole room of young dancers who had probably been training for at least five years, the majority were absolutely terrified at the idea of someone putting a piece of music on and having to dance on their own. I remember when I was in their shoes, and I guess the reason I am writing about this is to share the lessons I learnt about myself through dancing outside the comfort zone.

JB - https://www.youtube.com/user/PhlyCrew- took a fantastic session that helped the young dancers discover something new, and reconnected me with what I love- to move and create. Here's a list of some of the things he said, which are fantastic lessons for life, not only improvisation. I have added a couple too.

1. No one is ever going to be as good as me. I am never going to be as good as you. You have to have confidence in yourself as well as humility and respect.

2. You can learn more freestyling by yourself for 5 mins than I can teach you in an hour- when you experience something for yourself that's when the real lessons are learnt.

3. Feeling first, moving second, thinking last.   

4. If you turn off the part of your brain that tells you that you aren't good enough, everyone is looking at you and you are doing the same thing over and over, you can create some wonderful things.

5. Listen. The music tells you how to move, and not just the melody, the bass, the snare, the backing vocals- listen deeply and you can interpret it your way.

6. If you feel like you are doing the same move over and over, stop and change one thing about it to make it different.

7. Sometimes non-dancers make the best freestylers because they don't know any "rules" about movement. You can learn something from everyone.

8. If you say yes today, you have achieved something, and it will be easier to say yes to tomorrow. Saying no the first time only makes it harder to say yes ever again.

Jj