Dancing with your life partner is both a blessing and a curse!
The blessings are obvious: you always have a partner to practice with and it gives you the opportunity to bond even stronger and spend more time together. However, it is sad how experienced dancers often say the same thing: “We can’t train together BECAUSE we are a couple! We fight ALL the time!”
I thought I had the answer to this problem after reading a book about status transactions by Keith Johnstone. In his book, he describes that, consciously or unconsciously, we challenge each others status in every communication. This often leads to the quarrels. Unfortunately, I quickly realized that there is no quick fix for this problem. With this article, I hope to initiate and promote a series of experiments and discussions on how to train dancing together with your partner.
Recommendations by Andreas Olsson and Joana Ekeström (dancers from Stockholm):
Use a practice diary and fill it with:
- A common long-term goal and several milestones. E.g: Let’s say that you want to showcase your skills in competitions. Set a long-term goal such as “In two years time we will compete at the Ultimate Lindy Hop Showdown”. Milestone 1: Enter a competition every second month throughout this year. Milestone 2: Place in the finals of important competitions by next year.
- Discuss and write down each of your (both yours and your partner’s) strengths and weaknesses. With this list at hand, it becomes easier to set up detailed schedules.
- Choose a topic of the month, e.g. musicality, posture etc., on which agree to work on. The topic is probably inspired by step 2.
- Keep track and comment in your practice diary during/after every session. What did you work on, what was difficult? Any aha moments? A side comment by Andreas: Some days, when we feel good, we can take it easier on following these “rules”. But, on frustrating days, we follow it religiously.
Talking about our strengths, weaknesses and goals can provide the opportunity to plan and design the training sessions in a win-win style. Once you created such a “contract”, it becomes much easier to get back on track if the discussions start to heat up and turn into fights.
Recommendations by Keith Johnstone
From: IMPRO: Improvisation and the Theatre
“/…/The actors would suggest a way of doing something, and if they started to explain, Brecht would say he wanted no discussion in rehearsal- it would have to be tried. /…/ I’ve known political theatre groups in Europe which should readily cancel a rehearsal, but never a discussion. My feeling is that the best argument may be a testimony to the skill of the presenter, rather than to the excellence of the solution advocated. Also the bulk of discussion time is visibly taken up with transactions of status which have nothing to do with the problem to be solved.”
Katja and me tried the “Impro: don’t discuss, just try” method last week, and actually found it quite relaxing and powerful. However, there are still many valuable points that can be learned in discussions and arguments. So, perhaps this method can be used sporadically or during a specific period of each training session.
My next experiment is to try both recommendations together. First create a practice diary according to the steps described by Andreas and Joana. Once a framework is established, stick to a “no discussion” policy.
I’m curious to learn how you deal with “dance/relationship fights during training sessions”, so please feel free to try these methods and share your experience or tell us about your ways of handling it.
Cheers,
Ali
