As those of you who know me from Facebook are already well aware, I have been going nuts lately buying costumes. First a sailor suit, then a Spanish dancer, and then a sexy referee costume (including whistle!). I think it’s the joy of having my IUD out. Which is something you’d also know about if you followed me on Facebook (hint, hint – and join the PoleSkivvies group on Facebook, too, since that’s where I give out special deals).
But, for those of you who missed the whole sordid episode, here’s what happened …
NOTE: If you hate TMI, this is where you should click to a different page. (May I suggest one of the lovely posts linked in the sidebar?)
The Uterine Chronicles
This past April, I got an IUD. I figured I’d like it just fine, if I could only get through the insertion. So, when I sailed through the insertion, thanks to a great doctor and lots of local anesthetic, I figured I was home free.
Wrong. As it turned out, my uterus was to spend the next three months trying to figure out what the hell I’d done to her and why there was suddenly scaffolding sitting inside her.
Granted, she eventually stopped making me scream in pain and even managed to allow sex to be mostly enjoyable for almost 50% of the month, but that was all she was willing to give. I quickly grew tired of watching my sex life descend through the following stages:
Happy and Frolicsome.
This stage is characterized by great sex – you know, when you actually want to have sex and then, when you have it, you find you actually like it. Which sets you up to want it again. Soon. Loved this stage. Sadly, this stage disappeared the day my IUD entered the picture.
Anthropological.
This stage presented itself along with the IUD. It is characterized by excessive mental analysis, which is to say that, instead of merry thoughts of sprightly fucking, my mind had an endless thought pattern of analyzing every move. It went something like this: “Hmm, I don’t know about that. Wait … no, that’s okay … I guess that’s okay. Hmm. I don’t think it hurts. No, wait, yes it does. It hurts. Stop it. Now. GET OUT OF ME.”
Deflective.
This stage took up the last few weeks of my life, when I had finally learned through Pavlovian repetition that, no matter how much I might think I want sex, it will be joyless at best and painful at worst. This stage makes for a sulky and mopey Jennifer, one who sounds a bit like this: “Ooh, goody! I’d love to have sex! Oh, wait, that’s right, this will be either painful or unpleasant. Oh, fuck – this is so awful. Oh, forget it – how about I just go down on you and you promise not to go anywhere near this area on me? Deal?”
Current Uterine Status
Last Thursday was the great IUD Removal Day, which became a full-fledged celebration. I woke up to find my man had hidden word-scramble love notes all over the house, so I spent the morning finding them. Then off we went to the doctor’s, and it was quite easy getting the IUD taken out (and, for those of you who are wondering, no, it’s NOT terribly painful – just a cramp and no need to fret about it – and this is the perspective of the woman who nearly insisted on general for the insertion).
Best of all, the minute it was removed, I felt better. A few cramps for the first hour, but nothing bad, and then my uterus started to smile. I did a little hip circle here and there and kept telling my man how happy she was to move again, so we were all excited and went to a little Italian restaurant to celebrate.
But we needed more, so we got fresh figs and cherries and caramels and an extraordinary caramel-and-coffee sauce and headed for home, where my man fed me fruit and sweets and my uterus smiled in delight.
She smiled very much later that night, too, but that is where this story segues into …
POLE DANCING!
Having had that freakish foreign object removed from my body turned out to be a huge emotional release, as well. A feeling of womanly deliciousness returned and permeated my entire body – which, naturally, leads a girl to think about pole dancing.
And I got to thinking that my pole dancing has been a bit … stiff. Like the IUD. With lots of thought and mental effort before each move. Just like sex with the IUD. Sometimes less thinking, sometimes more, but I could see that I hadn’t yet ever felt really comfortable just letting myself move with the pole.
Breakthrough
And that’s when it occurred to me: pole dancing is all about CIRCLES. Twirls and spins galore – all of which are about going AROUND the pole.
Now, I have never pretended to be especially bright, so it’s no surprise that I’ve been pole dancing for nearly three years now and this just came to me, but at least the thought did finally arrive, and I figured I should jump on it.
So, I spent the weekend practicing. The timing was perfect, since Kristina (from Studio Veena and Facebook) dropped by for a pole jam, and she gave me some great tips. After she left, I just drilled and drilled and drilled ways to walk around the pole.
Mainly, I focused on grounded spins and twirls – I wanted to get comfortable with the fluidity of circling the pole, and I watched these pole videos for inspiration (you may need to add them as friends in order to see them):
For comparison, here’s where I was over a year ago:
This Weekend
And here’s where I was by the end of this weekend. Not phenomenal, but I think there’s a definite shift in my fluidity. Hope it shows – and hope it keeps improving – just like my life sans IUD!
I get this. I really do. You want to learn moves, you want to learn posture, you want to learn foot placement, and it’s just easier if you can see it.
But what about the other stuff? What about the intensity? What about the connection? What about the baring of your soul to your audience?
Not everything you need to learn about pole can be SEEN.
The main thing that makes dancing look like dancing is not the moves.
I’m going to repeat that, because it’s important: The main thing that makes dancing look like dancing is not the moves.
The most important things you can do for your dancing cannot be seen.
They have to be felt.
There is a road map for learning dance moves.
Learning the moves is actually the easy part of dancing. Even the most advanced moves are a lot easier to learn than, say, figuring out how to mix your moves together and make it into an exciting performance.
Moves are all straightforward: build this muscle, practice this hold, do this. Repeat. Again and again.
The hard part
It’s putting your soul into your dancing that is the hard part.
Dancing cannot happen without self-exploration. If you do not know yourself, if you are not comfortable with your feelings, with your sensations, with your being, you cannot achieve the heights you are capable of in dance.
Wherever you are, learning move after move, pose after pose, is not what will teach you to dance.
Push yourself.
Learning new moves will always feel exhilarating. It is exciting as hell to be able to hold yourself in a new way on the pole.
But go beyond that this time. Don’t settle for just being able to do the moves. And don’t settle for mimicking someone else’s idea of emotional intensity.
Figure out your own feelings so you can forge your own, personal dance style.
Sure, it takes more work. And, no, you can’t learn it from just watching someone else do it.
But you can learn it. You just have to go within first.
And once you do, nothing will be able to hold you back!
Coaching to bring out your personal dance style is what I do best – when you are ready to push yourself into the hard part of dancing, the real self-exploration, give me a shout.
At least, to me it is. My definition of a good cook has always been someone who can grab whatever random ingredients are in the kitchen pantry, whatever odds and ends are in the fridge, and put together an absolutely delicious meal, without a recipe.
Dancing seems much the same – a good dancer, to me, is someone who can take a whole assortment of moves and put together something people find delightful to see.
The only difference is, you can’t just go to the supermarket and buy your pole dance moves.
Connection
What I aim for in pole dancing is that trusting confidence that comes from knowing your body is so familiar with these movements, so comfortable and at ease with the motion around the pole, that thought is no longer required. All that’s necessary is pure connection to the music, and the free-flowing joy of letting your feelings and passions move through you.
To me, dance doesn’t start until mastery has already taken place.
Maybe That Seems Harsh
But it isn’t.
I know I was belly dancing long before I had mastery of any of the moves. I did routines. I improv-ed. But the difference between that and the point I reached, much later on, when I could just give into my feelings and respond purely to the music, is so dramatic, that I have a hard time calling both “dance.”
Of course, I know that this wondrous final stage of dancing, in which you get to move so freely and uninhibitedly, only comes about from years of effort dancing and dancing and dancing, at whatever level you happen to be.
I know that. And I love seeing myself and all dancers, of any style, progress through that.
But I miss having that pure ability to move freely. Yes, I can still do that with belly dance, but belly dance doesn’t touch me the way pole dance does. It used to. But now I want that feeling, that cascade of motion and sureness, within pole dancing.
And I’m a long way off.
Practice, Practice, Practice
So I keep working on it. And practicing. And building strength.
And, mostly, I keep cutting myself some slack.
Because there’s no endpoint here – as long as I can move, I can keep working and improving. And the more moves I gain comfort with, the more I will find that freedom.
Because you don’t have to master every move in order to have that pure release of dance. You only have to master enough that your body doesn’t have to stop and pause, your mind doesn’t have to stop and think.
So, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe that purity of dance doesn’t have to come after years and years. Maybe, just maybe, it comes in stages.
Bit by bit, step by step.
Until one day you wake up, hear a song you love, and give in to the desire to move your body on the pole.
And you find your body is ready to meet you there – no holding back, no nervousness, no doubts.
But, really, it doesn’t matter how advanced a pole dancer you are, you can do a great pole dance. Really.
Here are the five things you need to do it:
1. Smooth Transitions
This may surprise you, but, to me, transitions are the most important part of a pole dance. They connect the moves, they give the sensuality, and they are a great place in which to convey mood.
Luckily, there are many, many transitions that are easy for beginners to master. Think of graceful pivots, smooth turns and pirouettes around the pole. Think about sensual ways to move beside the pole, and transition from floor back to standing.
A standard part of any pole dance workout should be the transitions – not only because they are beautiful, but because they need to be second nature. You need to learn to move with the pole naturally, without having to think about it. When you practice transitions, you learn the ways your body can fit around the pole and how to move with it. This allows you to improvise more easily during a performance, and that’s a huge help should you ever confuse your footing or get off balance.
Most important of all, a good transition puts the perfect finishing touch on a dazzling pole move. There’s nothing worse than seeing a beautiful move followed by a lousy transition – it makes the entire dance thud to a stop.
2. Dance Ability
This one is actually related a lot to doing transitions, because, if you stop to think about it, transitions are really all about dancing when you’re not on the pole. So, you can either learn how to dance without using the pole and translate that into your transitions, or you can learn a huge array of transitions and you will find you can dance beautifully. It all feeds together.
But, no matter how you do it, you still need to be able to dance. It may sound odd, but being able to dance in pole dancing is more important to an audience than being able to do a bunch of extraordinary moves. Dance ability will tie simple moves together gorgeously.
3. Moves You Can Do Well
Here’s where we get to the pole moves. When you workout, you can do whatever moves you like – and you should. That’s your time for practicing and learning new things. For a performance, though, you want to focus on what you know how to do really well. That’s because you want your movements to seem effortless on stage – and that’s not possible until you’ve mastered the move itself.
So, choose moves for a performance that you already know and that you can do very well. Sure, if you have time to prepare, you can work in a new move – but have a backup plan. If the day of the show arrives and you still can’t do it reliably, scrap it. Better to dance at a less advanced level than look clunky at a higher one.
4. Appropriate Music
And, no, I don’t mean music with no sexual content. (Where would be the fun in that?) Here I’m talking about music being appropriate to your skill level. Some music is really hard to pole to – it can be very, very fast and you can’t keep up with it, or it can be very, very slow and you can’t do your moves with sufficient control to match the pace.
Be selective with your music – it’s not enough to like it; you have to be able to move with it. When it speeds up, you need to be able to speed up. When it gets slow and sensuous, you need to be able to hold your moves to that rhythm.
5. Safe Technique
No one can pole dance beautifully if their shoulder is coming out of socket. Learn to hold your body in the correct position and all your moves will show the benefit of it. This includes listening to your body and taking rests when needed – your body can’t build muscle or gain flexibility if you’re too tired. And safe technique also means looking for a pole dance teacher who knows how to teach you proper conditioning. Good technique begins with good training.
A Sure-Fire Crowd Pleaser
There you have it – the five essentials to any good pole dance performance. With these in your repertoire, you’ll be sure to steal the show!
***
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Usually, you’ll find two types of stripping in pole dancing. Either you have professional strippers, who often aren’t really stripping at all – they’re just dancing naked (or near enough). Or, you have pole dancers who start out with a little flirtatious bit of striptease, then instantly lose the flirt and get on the pole.
I want to focus on the latter, because I find their approach is tied into a few odd stripping myths that come into play in pole dancing. So, permit me if you will, to address them here:
Myth #1: Costumes are a nuisance.
Um, no, they’re not. They can actually add a ton of pizazz to your performance. That would be why so many performing artists like to wear them. They only become a nuisance when the costume isn’t suited to your routine. And there’s this thing called REHEARSAL to let you adjust for that ahead of time.
Honestly, I think costumes get a bad rap in pole because there’s such a focus on advanced moves. The thing is, there are plenty of ways to do costumes without them getting in your way. Cirque de Soleil, which you may have heard of, does a lot with costuming, and they have even been known to do an aerial stunt. Or two.
Myth #2: You can’t do anything on a pole with a costume on, or you will actually die.
Good lord. Where does this come from? It’s like urban legends for pole dancers. Yet this myth seems to be the main reason why any costume you ever do see on a pole dancer comes off in the first five seconds.
So, let me spell this out for you: you can wear a costume AND be on the pole AND not die AND still:
Spin.
Ah, spins. Remember those? Have you ever noticed how audiences love spins – how they ooh and aah as if they were watching a fireworks display? That’s because spins are beautiful. They are also easy to do with a wide variety of costuming. In fact, beautiful costuming can make spins even more glorious. (Think boas, veils, and trailing scarves.)
Do inverts and holds.
Yes, I said inverts. And holds. Okay, so maybe you can’t do every invert or hold in the world in every costume you can think up, but you can probably do a few. And I bet they’ll look really cool.
So, if you’re wearing a costume with a skirt that doesn’t give you a lot of inner thigh grip, nix on the Superman, but try a lovely Scorpio or Butterfly.
Do handstands.
Handstands are a great way to show off your gymnastic ability while not worrying so much about costume mishaps. You could probably even manage some handstand maneuvers while wearing gloves. Not saying I could, mind you, but I bet you could. So practice a few things and see what you think up.
Myth #3: Stripping is about what’s under your clothes.
It pains me that this even needs to be said. No, no, no, no, nooooo.
Stripping is short for striptease. TEASE. That means you play with the idea of taking off your clothes – but you don’t do it. At least, not all at once.
Now, I understand that in the clubs it really has a lot to do with being naked or thereabouts. I get that. Heck, if I’m paying for a lapdance I want to see some flesh, too.
The thing is, when you’re giving a pole performance outside a club, they are not paying for a lapdance (unless it’s a lap class and you’re giving a recital, but that’s a whole other post). They are paying for the show, and that means a little razzle dazzle.
Frankly, the reason this is even an issue has a lot to do with myth #2 about costumes killing you. Most dancers figure best to just get the costume off quickly and not risk it.
Unfortunately, that profoundly diminishes the fun of the show.
How to Strip While Pole Dancing
To remedy this situation, I now present to you a quick primer on stripping for pole:
Wear a costume with some layers.
A top and skirt. A trenchcoat. A hat. A veil. Whatever you choose, give yourself something to take off.
Dance at the beginning of your show just to display your costuming.
That means, not to take it off – rather, to show it off. Flounce your boa. Twirl the belt on your coat. Slide your finger up the slit of your skirt. And, oh, yes, DANCE. Don’t just do moves – dance.
Take your costume off, piece by piece, throughout your performance.
THROUGHOUT your performance. That means I don’t want to see you starkers five seconds into your song. Yes, I grant you, very gymnastic routines may require some time stripped down to the bare essentials, but even then, there is plenty of time for dancing while removing parts of your costume. The longer you delay, the more of a rise you get out of the audience (you may read into that what you will).
Integrate the clothing removal into the pole moves.
There’s no law saying you can’t remove an article of clothing just because you’re already on the pole. And there’s nothing so annoying as a dancer who seems to race through the striptease – as if her costume were some grand annoyance – just to get to the “real” part of the show. Your show is your show – either integrate it all, or don’t do anything extra to begin with.
To rehash …
Costumes are fun.
They won’t kill you.
Stripping isn’t about being naked.
So, please, work a little striptease into your pole dance, and see what fun you have!
***
Looking for an old blog post? Or something on your favorite topic? Find old posts by category in the “Best of” links in the lower right sidebar. Or just type what you’re looking for in the Search, then scroll down until you find exactly what you want!
