Extension of self

Sometimes just dancing is hard enough. 
But then, we go and add props.

Every prop has a mind of it's own.  It doesn't matter if it is swords, veils, fans, canes or any other tool we use.

At the beginning of the year I took a hooping class.  I hadn't picked up a hula hoop since I was a child.   The instructor for that class taught an important lesson in all of this.  As we stood there with our hoops picked up and ready to spin them around...  she told us to let go and let them fall to the ground.
She joked that this was our first real trick.

I happened to find a whole bunch of truth in that, it changed the way that I looked at all of my tools.
I have applied that logic to everything I have picked up again since then.... To pick up my prop and drop it.  Just to remind myself that not everything is going to go as planned and sometimes gravity gets a say so in the works.

The next bit of advice came from working with a static prop.  That advice has been to carry it around with me constantly, until when it is not there, I notice it's absence.
Again a large amount of truth with that one. It makes the prop an extension of my body, part of me.

Now these two pieces of advice may not work with every prop that we use as dancers.  Can you imagine walking around a downtown area with your sword (and face it, some of them are dangerously sharp). It's not for the funny looks that you would get from the public, but instead, having someone make a panicked call to the local police....
What exactly would you do with your veil?  Besides wear that gorgeous piece of silk as a scarf? 
Taking it everywhere would work with a cane...  maybe not the thin bamboo canes with the sparkle tape, but a good solid wooden one...  Take a stroll and swing it around.  It's treated more "normally" than swinging a sword.


This brings me to the best bit of advice that I can give.  If you can't take the item with you, then play with it every chance you get. 
The more familiar you are with your prop of choice the more cool and confident you will look when you are dancing with it.
Give your prop a name, make it personal..  Like a trusted friend.
These tools we use are our dance partners.  If a ballroom dancer stuffed her partner in the wardrobe and only took him out for performances, how polished would they look moving together?

My point.... exactly.

I know who I am when I belly dance.

"I can see you dance.  But, I am not seeing you dance."

These words will forever stick in my head.   They were the words of my first belly dance teacher, who put on music and made me dance for her.  In that moment, I worked so hard at being technically sound, careful with how I linked movements together.  So careful in fact that I disregarded the music as a whole, didn't bother hearing the emotional tone.  I blew it.
She didn't want me to just regurgitate movement to her...  she wanted to see me dance.  To embody the music I was hearing and to transport her to another place.
I was 17.
Some of the deep heartbreaking love songs were quite lost on me. What did I know about true heartbreak or unbridled passion or even the absolute elation that comes with being in love.
The answer, in a word.  Nothing.

There is a saying that women have nothing to dance about until they have lived a little.  This, is not necessarily true, well, not anymore anyway.

All dancers regardless of age have something to say.  Granted, we are not always afforded the places to say them.  Some shows we are expected to be happy-happy-joy-joy and other (far fewer) shows allow us the room and place to really wring ourselves dry on their stages.

Some dancers are not comfortable with moving through the language of the soul or the various emotions we have...  others (like me and a few friends) revel in it.
Some dancers are not comfortable seeing another dancer pour herself out onto the stage others (like me and a few friends) can be disappointed when that happens.

I have long joked with Nancy Asiya that I have had to make a point to switch to waterproof everything, just in case I have to perform after her.  This has been since she moved me to openly weeping and turning all of my make up in Alice Cooper, when she danced her way through heartbreak and the rebirth of herself. 
In that particular piece (which has not been repeated), took me through the wild ride of emotion and left me as an audience member... sitting in my chair agape with gobs of black eye goo running down my face.
I knew what it took for her to lay herself so bare, that watching her dance it... made me feel what she was feeling.
I have in turn, done the same thing to her.

It doesn't happen each and every time we perform.  But, when it does...  I feel that I can see straight through the soles of her dance shoes and into who she is.  Never-mind that she is my best friend, these moments let me see her in a whole new light.

It would be wrong for me to expect every dancer to do this... Some of us are just not wired that way and I have to respect that.  Even though I may encourage another dancer to do let the emotions out of the bag.. I know it isn't comfortable for everyone and not enough performance venues are accepting of it.

I will close by encouraging every single dancer to try at least once in the comfort of your home studio or private practice... to dance your way through various kinds of emotions..  Give yourself the permission to do it behind closed doors.  You will be amazed at who you are when you dance this way.