I was reading one of my favorite blogs the other day and she was talking about communication. As in, with one’s spouse. Or with colleagues.
Not surprisingly, she didn’t make the leap to communication in pole dancing classes.
But I thought – this being a pole dancing blog and all – that that would be a really interesting topic. After all, talking with your teacher when you’re super-advanced is different than when you’re super new. And what if you’ve recently changed teachers – maybe you and your new teacher are still learning each other’s languages.
And what do you communicate about?
So, really, quite a lot of stuff in this topic. That’s why I’m dividing it into two parts. In this part, we explore the HOW of communication. In the next part, we’ll go into the WHAT.
How do you ask for help when you don’t know what you need help with? Heck, maybe you don’t even know you need help at all.
This one always reminds me of a recommendation I read years ago to women in labor. It said that a woman, when calling to tell her doctor that she is in labor, should not try to sound more relaxed or more at ease or in less pain than she actually felt. Because, you see, the doctor is listening to the sound of her voice and her breathing to interpret how far along she is.
It’s kind of the same with pole dancing. (And, no, not just because pole hurts like hell, too. Although I was tempted to title this post, “What Pole Dancing and Labor Have in Common.”)
What I mean is, trying to act full of bravado so you won’t feel like a moron in front of your fellow students can come back to bite you in the heinie. Because your teacher needs to see where you’re confused. She needs to see if you rub a sore arm after trying a new move. She needs to know if something isn’t coming together for you.
So a lot of pole dance communication comes from just being honest in showing your responses.
How much time can you take up for your questions?
This is a doozy – especially if you’re anything like me and have a tendency to talk on and on and on, ad infinitum.
You have to feel this one out. A class with three people in it is going to be able to handle questions differently than a class with 12 people in it. How I think of it is, any question you have that applies to everyone is definitely something you should ask and not worry about. For instance, questions like, “Could you show how you got into that move again, please?” Or, “How are you saying we should position our grip?”
Questions that apply only to your own progress, however, need to be handled a little differently.
Yes, questions about your own progress definitely can be asked in the middle of class – but only if they can be addressed in a brief amount of time. For instance, you could explain that you’re getting your legs confused when trying to maneuver into the new invert pose, and could she help you sort that out.
However, if, after a few attempts, you are still just as lost, then that is something you might want to bring up with your teacher after class, or before the next one. For really involved questions – like, when everyone else has moved far beyond you in class and you’re still really stuck – see if you can set up a private session. Private sessions are ideal because it’s all about you and your progress, and you can ask any question you have, and even determine whether you’re in the right class for your skill level.
How do you tell your pole dance teacher when you think you’ve outgrown her?
Ah, I can only surmise on this one, since I am a few lifetimes away from ever having to encounter this problem.
Nevertheless, this being my blog and all, I will tender a few opinions. The first of which is TACT. You will need some. After all, this can be a touchy subject. The best teachers will have been watching your progress for some time and will have seen this coming. They may even help you avoid the entire issue by inviting you to become an instructor at the school. Or by wishing you well and offering help in finding training resources at your advanced level.
Sometimes, though, you’re going to find your teacher is very threatened by your progress. After all, insecure people are everywhere. (And we’re all insecure sometimes.) If you think this is your situation, you can either be straightforward, thanking them all the while for their help as you learned. Or you can take the easy way out (why not? Sometimes it’s the best approach.) and just tell them your schedule has changed and you won’t be able to attend classes there anymore.
Shyness
Okay, this isn’t really a question, but shyness is a big issue in any dance class, and the sexiness of pole dancing can make it even more central.
I’m no expert in shyness, but it seems to me that shyness takes a lot of different forms. One person might feel too shy to do the choreography in front of everyone. Another might feel too embarrassed to ask the teacher a question in the middle of class. So, different types of shyness are going to require different responses.
But one thing that can be helpful is to just let the teacher know ahead of time that you’re shy about some things. That way you’ll have a sense before you even enter the classroom of what the rules are – whether you can opt out of dancing in front of others, or whether you can save your questions to ask the teacher privately immediately after class. Most of all, you’ll know if that instructor is going to be respectful of your needs long before you head into class. And, if you’re too shy to speak to the teacher on your own, see if you can enlist a friend to go with you for moral support!
What have your pole class communications been like?
What are the things you discuss with your pole dance teacher? What kinds of questions do your pole students bring to you? We’d love to hear!
It can take awhile to get used to pouring your soul into your dance when you’re on stage. As much passion and love as we feel for our dance inside, sometimes we get blocked when it comes to expressing that in public.
That’s what this video is all about – what blocks us, and how to unblock ourselves when we dance.
How to Connect with the Audience
If you’re reading this from an RSS or email feed, click to see the video on getting out of your head.
Stage nerves are a universal issue, one all dancers have to deal with. That’s why, today, I’m responding to an email I got on this issue, from my fab pole buddy, Azriel, who asks:
How can I make myself less nervous before my performance?
How can I make it look like I’m less nervous, so that I’m not so stiff during my performance?
How to Get Over Stage Fright
If you’re reading this from an RSS or email feed, click to see the video on dealing with stage fright.
Hope this tutorial helps you feel more assured the next time you take the stage! If you want to explore this issue in more detail, get the So Long, Stage Fright Workbook.
Have a topic you’d like to see in one of these tutorials?
Fabulous! All you have to do is email me and I’ll get your topic in the line-up. I post new video tutorials every other Wednesday.
If you ever spend time on StudioVeena or Facebook, you’ve probably met the totally vivacious Sissybuns.
Well, I had lost touch with her a bit, since I don’t have as much time as I used to for those Friday night pole chats, so it was a total stroke of luck when I found her on Facebook this past week.
It was one of those, “OMG!!! SISSYBUNS!!! I MISSED YOU!!” moments, with her being all, “SKIVSTER!!!”
You know, typical online joy at reconnection.
A Little Experiment
But then we got to chatting, which, as you can imagine, was all about pole, and, as it turned out, Sissybuns was getting ready to perform at her very first competition and was busy working on a routine. We talked about doing a coaching session as prep for her performance, and decided to make it into a little experiment.
I thought, wouldn’t it be fun to make it into a blog post – you’d all get to hear how the whole coaching thing works, I’d get the fun of hanging out with Sissybuns and seeing her wonderful dancing, and she’d get some free performance coaching.
So, that’s what we did. We met up on Skype the day before Sissybuns’ performance for the Miss Xpose 2010 Preliminary, and here’s what happened …
Coaching Goals
What was really cool about working with Sissybuns is she had very specific goals to work on. She had a routine already created and the performance was just one day away, so it was a very focused hour.
Sissybuns was doing a very sexy, very sultry dance and wanted to make sure to convey that feeling throughout her entire choreography. The routine included a couple of floorwork sequences and our goal was to smooth out transitioning back to standing. Moreover, Sissybuns had recently had foot surgery, so she needed to make sure her choreography worked around her sore foot and didn’t force her to worry too much about it.
See Sissybuns rehearsing with a her cast on! She is one VERY dedicated pole dancer!
Sissybuns on her goals for the session:
I was concerned with my stage presence as a whole. I had never performed in front of anyone before and had entered into a local pole dance competition (Miss Xpose 2010) where I couldn’t rely on high flying tricks and stunts to “wow” the crowd because the category I competed in didn’t allow any inverts.
Plus, I was still in recovery from a recent surgery I had had on my left foot less then eight weeks ago. My concern with hiding my obvious injury was making me apprehensive in a lot of my dancing.
We got to work
Once Sissybuns had shown me her routine, we dove right in, starting with her entrance. Originally, she had planned to walk to the pole, but, with her injured foot, walking that distance was affecting her ability to be fully focused when she stepped onto the stage.
Instead, we tried versions of starting already at the pole and starting by crawling to the pole. Sissybuns actually did some really hot crawling, but opted against it in the end, since the floor she’d be performing on was hardwood and would only scrape her knees up before she even got to the floorwork sequences.
So, to get the ideas churning, I demo’d a few standing-in-place, sexy moves to see if any of them suited her. Sissybuns tried them out and found ones that she not only liked, but that also allowed her to shift her weight off her foot, if needed.
Floorwork
Next, we moved on to floorwork. Sissybun’s first floorwork sequence was flawless – beautifully choreographed, smoothly transitioned, and gliding easily back up to standing. The second one, though, got a little stuck before coming up from the floor.
To tackle this, we got down on the floor together and she showed me what position she landed in. I tried to see what ways there were to come up out of it. In the end, what seemed to work was leaning away from her bent leg and then saucily kicking her leg up to bring it around the pole. Sissybuns tried it out and was able to incorporate it into her sequence, now making the transition up from the floor seamlessly.
Steaming it Up
Sissybuns is blessed with the best eyes in the world for doing sexy dancing – she has total Cleopatra eyes. And, as would be expected from someone with eyes like that, she can do sultry like nobody’s business! So, for this aspect of her dance, we worked more on the few places where that feeling skipped a beat.
At first, she’d been too worried about her sore foot to stay fully present in the emotion she was trying to convey as she walked onto stage. When we re-worked her choreography to avoid that walking, it helped. But the other part affecting the entrance was that typical, OMG-I’m-about-to-start adrenalin rush that we all get. To counteract that, we worked on slowing down the start, delaying it until she felt really centered, and then letting the dance begin.
The effect was amazing! That sultry intensity was suddenly there, right from the beginning, which heightened the drama of her entrance.
To make sure to maintain that intensity, we then worked on bringing more sex appeal to the moves and transitions elsewhere in her choreography. Sissybuns was an incredibly fast learner, trying different gestures I suggested, changing speed, emphasizing different parts of a move, and getting those final touches in place that really bring a dance together.
What Sissybuns says about the session
I AM SO HAPPY I DID THIS! The session had a huge impact not only on my competition routine, but for all my future dancing and performing.
Jennifer helped me improve by changing a step here, giving more eye contact there and even changing the whole way I began my routine so I started sure, strong and confident. She showed me how to get my inner lioness to shine and portray the feeling that I was hoping my audience would feel while I danced.
She watched me and let me know how the audience would see me as I danced. She didn’t try to change me or alter my style, but only added to it.
Jennifer gave me the keys needed to give a good performance. I will keep the things she taught me in mind for the rest of the time that I dance, and I believe I’ll be a better dancer because of it.
The performance!
There was a video snafu at the competition, but Sissybuns put together this video of the choreography to show you – you’ll love it!
What Sissybuns says about working with Jennifer (gulp)
Jennifer is not a pole dance instructor. She will make that very clear to you. But what she is, is a performer. Somebody who loves the art of pole dance and watches closely to see what works and what doesn’t. She understands the art of seduction and playfulness, which is exactly what I was trying to pull off.
She focuses on the small things. The things you won’t notice on your own, like what that free hand is doing when you do a spin, or your facial expression while you dance. Sometimes we are so caught up in our tricks and spins that we forget about the performance, about the people watching us … and that’s where Jennifer makes the difference.
Thank you, Sissybuns!
Sissybuns brought off her performance with flying colors! She did a beautiful, sexy dance and made her dream of performing pole dance come true.
Thank you, Sissybuns, for doing this coaching post with me! I had so much fun working with you, and I really appreciate your letting me blog about the experience. You rock, you fab pole dancer, you!! I can’t wait to see what you put together for your next competition!
If you’d like some coaching to bring out the best in your next performance, email me to set up a session. For more information, check out the page on private coaching.
If so, you are not alone – I’ve gotten a lot of requests this month for information on arm and hand movements!
Remember, even though we pole dancers use our arms more for grasping the pole than for dancing per se, it is still essential that we have graceful arm and hand movements.
You’ll also want to see this tutorial I did last year. It gives additional detail on using your arms and hands – plus teaches you the classic belly dance move, Snake Arms!
Have a topic you’d like to see in one of these tutorials?
Fabulous! All you have to do is email me and I’ll get your topic in the line-up. I post new video tutorials every other Wednesday.
