A Mind of a Dancer
Mindset
The acrobatics and grace falling in tune with the music, the hypnotic movements that enthrall our eyes, and the syncopation that a dancer matches within a song. When we watch a dancer, that hidden language, that emotional attachment, captivates expressions every human can feel. We relate the feelings to our own lives. What some forget is while the physical aspect of dance is obviously difficult and amazing to watch, how a dancer expresses solely comes from within the mind.
Dance in its simplest form is a set of steps that follow the rhythm to music. You learn the steps, apply it to music, match it up and voila, you are dancing. The better the movement matches the music and beat, the more appealing it is. Pattern matching seems to fall into human nature. Experts try to argue that intelligence and pattern recognition go hand in hand. Technology gravitates towards finding patterns, and creating algorithms to predict and map out behaviors based on data of us. So if there is a pattern, or formula, we should be able to hack it and find the solution to perfecting dance, right?
Identity
The expression from dance reacting to music at times seems like magic. There are moments where it defies what patterns dictate. Dancing is so open to interpretation that it seems it cannot be simply be plugged into an equation to get the same result. A big part of that is the mindset of the dancer.
Our most complicated computer, our brain, has so many parts that effect so many functions. Obviously, it controls our movements, our feelings, but also our interpretations. There are attributes that definitely contribute to how we interpret, such as our past, what we have learned, and our own patterns (habits). But it is not so simple to explain our expression in dance within a moment, with that certain song playing. Something cries out of in physical form, but is derived from our mind. We take everything we have experienced thus far, and what we want to happen in the future and in that present moment, expose ourselves to a raw vulnerability for ourselves to feel, and any bystander there to witness.
This all relates to who we are, or who we think we are. It is popular currently to talk about mental health, or mental awareness. This is a step forward to acknowledging that our minds play a significant role to everything human beings say, think, or do. That “do” is also dancing. The emotions, good or bad, play a building block into the human psyche. Having the polarizing feelings permit us to interpret these moments. When we find the pattern of music and express ourselves accordingly, our composition, our exposure to that pattern is different because of our story. Our current feelings in that moment are all different. When we try to “hack” the formula to dance, we take away the most important variable of that equation, us. We have too many differences in our mind versus the person before or after us. We deal with so many things, our “soul”, ego, id, and everything in between. Why do we try to solve everything, even what dance is?
Today
We live in a world of ultimatums now. This is an opinion and not a fact, so if you disagree that is fine. We do not have real choices anymore. Either you are a good dancer or you are not. There is no in-between, because we can plug in the numbers and get the result. If you do “x” in “y” then you will be a good dancer. There is no room for ambiguity. It is right or wrong, yes or no. If we follow this ideal, then everyone who wants to be a great dancer will all look the same. We are not factoring our minds. Being aware of our mental state gives us that freedom. It absolves us from thinking we are great dancers, or terrible dancers. Of course if we train and practice hard, we can earn a skill set that makes us proficient at dancing, but ignoring, and neglecting our individual experiences, emotions, takes away who we are.
