Few people are content with the level of dancing they have achieved at any one moment and many students want to learn more, simply to increase the pool of people they are confident in dancing with. Many people have told me “I want to improve my dancing to a point where I can dance with everyone”.
However, at the end of the day, from the moment you learn some basic moves you can already dance with everyone. More experienced dancers should have a plethora of ways to make almost any dance interesting to them. Even if you do the same few basic moves over and over again, a more experienced dance partner can use this opportunity to try out different styling, to connect with the music or the lyrics, or to simply enjoy a less complicated dance before they go back to their usual dance partners.
In the constant search for more extreme moves to impress their dance partners, most people do not realise how they are becoming more experienced themselves and are starting to intimidate beginners with their skill. Many people assume that they need to work hard to ask more experienced dancers for a dance while beginners will always want to dance with them. They are often utterly shocked when they are first refused a dance on the basis of being too good a dancer. This is however, part of the same natural process that created their own ambition and many people find that the better they get the fewer people ask them for a dance simply because their dance style is too intimidated.
This is sadly the salsa curse most people go through and I have often seen the promoters, DJs, dance teachers, band members etc. dance the least out of everyone in a club because their level of dancing is assumed to be so good that few people have the courage to ask them for a dance.
The first lesson to learn from this is: Do not expect to dance with everyone. There will always be a few people that do not want to dance with you whichever level of dancing you have reached and whatever may be their underlying reason. The sooner you accept this simple truth the less stressed will you be when someone refuses a dance invitation and the less pressure you put yourself under to try and get to a level where everyone will dance with you as such a level ultimately does not exist.
Secondly, try to go out of your comfort zone every now and again and dance with new people irrespective of their level or even ask someone for a dance who you know to be much better than yourself. You will be surprised to find how happy most experienced dancers are to dance with you, irrespective of your level of dancing.
Thirdly, don’t forget about the less experienced dancers at any point of your salsa journey. If you dance with some beginners from time to time when you are an improver, then they will continue to dance with you even as you get very advanced. However, if you only ever stick to people of your own level then chances are you will reach a point where your moves look so impressive that a large number of people will be intimidated to dance with you if you never danced with them before.
