Leading

It's important to me to be a strong lead. I'm starting to get the importance of a strong frame - that structure's how you communicate. I think I tend to be a little limp on my right arm, I think my shoulder is letting my elbow droop. I've been told that the structure comes primarily from my back, not from my shoulders. I'm still thinking about that - which is of course not the point, the point is to do it for a few hundred hours and not think, but I think about everything. I'll probably Google "dancing strong lead" after I post this and geek out.

It's also interesting that leading is boiling down to communicating what you're doing with your core - your center. Of course, the center is also a big deal in Aikido. I guess I shouldn't be surprised - both of these are arts that are all about moving a human figure (or two, I suppose) around on the planet, in gravity, staying balanced while in motion, moving with a purpose. Both of them have that tension between structure and flexibility - you're not stiff, but you've got structure. You need structure to make something happen. But you need flexibility, controlled flexibility to create the motion.

I'm starting to feel how to communicate to my partner, but there's a lot involved. My posture. My poise. My back and elbows. My footwork. I seriously need to get over my tendency to try to dodge around my partner's feet. Not only is that wrong, it's weak leading, but it muddies the signals she needs.

In Aikido I sometimes have a bad habit of moving around or sort of glancing off my partner's center, when I should be moving my center through theirs. On the dance floor I'm not as definitive and decisive as I'd (and my partner'd) like me to be. Part of that is I don't know what I'm doing yet, in fact I often don't know what my options even are. It's hard to be definitive when my brain runs off the little island of what I know - like Wiley Coyote ten feet beyond the cliff edge, holding up a little sign reading "Now What?". But part of it is just that attitude I need of "Now, I am doing THIS". Decide and act. Unapologetically, decisively, unambiguously. Maybe dance will help my Aikido. I'm sure Aikido will help my dance.

I'm also not spending enough time just dancing between lessons. Lessons tend to pile on as much new information as I can take, or a little bit more, which is fine and wonderful and good value and responsible teaching. That's all good. But because I think about everything, and because I ultimately need to stop thinking I need hours of dancing just for practice. I think I'm going to try to find another student to just drill with - do the new thing I learned about 20 times in a row till my body starts feeling it. Or maybe I'll discuss this with my teachers and figure out how to get some drill time. As it is now, I get back on the dance floor and am trying to think what to do, instead of being in a place where I'm just moving.

Having fun.