Bad Dancing?

This week, in my elementary dance classes, we have been reading the story Giraffes Can't Dance.  This is a wonderful picture book about a Giraffe with buckling knees who wobbles and falls every time he tries to dance.  The annual jungle dance is a rather traumatic event for poor Gerald as the other animals laugh and tease him,  calling him a bad dancer.

I posed the question to my students- Is there a such thing as a BAD dancer?  Some said yes and explained that their siblings routinely accused them of being bad dancers.  But the vast majority of the children said that there was no such thing as a bad dancer.  They explained their thinking-

"Some people practice more."

"Some people can do more things but that doesn't mean that those who can't are bad dancers."

Here was my favorite-

"We all dance the way we are meant to dance."

Yes, a second grade child said that.  Smart kid.

In my book there is no such thing as a bad dancer, but this week it was nice to be reminded.  I haven't been feeling well, and missed my daily dance a few times.  The dances that I did do were of the tiny variety.  One day I danced with just my hands.  No leaps or dazzling turns.  No jazz hands, even.  But it wasn't a bad dance.  It felt great, in fact.

Dancing every day doesn't work if you judge yourself.  Each dance is what it is meant to be.

We all dance the way we are meant to dance. 


Wishing you balance,

Nancy

Let the Dancing Begin

In January I fantasized about aggressively promoting my March challenge of dancing every day for 5 minutes.  I envisioned it going viral, spreading like wild flowers.  All I need to do is get everyone I know to forward the info to everyone they know and so on and so on and...

And then February came and I totally forgot about Dance-A-Day March.  That is until March 1st, when it suddenly hit me.  Then came the dread. "Do I have to do this?  I don't feel like dancing." 

I don't have to do this.  I don't have to dance.  But then I would be a real fraud wouldn't I?  I set up this challenge for myself and I told people about it.  This means that I really ought to do it.

So, I did it.

And it was fun.

Really fun!

Just five minutes- not even five- it was probably more like three, but it put me in a great mood. 

It takes a bit of self guilt tripping to make me follow through on this missive, but when I do, my inner five year old gets released and I have a blast.

This Dance-A-Day March thing doesn't need to go viral.  It need not sweep across the internet.  But I am thrilled to have people join me.  The fact that there is a tiny community trying on this challenge for themselves makes me feel connected in a really lovely way.  I feel support for this project and supported personally.  Today again, I didn't feel like dancing, but did, and it was good, but not great.  In truth, I really didn't let loose.  I went through the motions.  Then, much later in the day, a friend posted a song to dance to, her five minutes of dancing song.  So I danced to it.

And this time I really danced!


And it was more than fun!  It was fabulous.  I felt as if I were part of a dancing community.  I can't describe how wonderful that feels.

Here is the song I danced to. Have fun with it!




Wishing you balance,

Nancy