Dancing a life discipline

Let’s find out together how dancing can bring discipline into your life as it did in mine. I would like to start with the meaning of the word discipline. Discipline is respecting a set of rules that can be established by you or someone else like teacher,mentor, or organization with the purpose of accomplishing a goal. Now we all know dancing is an art and a skill,  but what we don’t realize  is that dancing brings in perfect harmony our minds, bodies, partners, and music .The mind represents the knowledge, the body represents the actions, the partnership represents the interactions, and the music represents the emotions. When you learn to dance, these four factors will be developed, enhanced, and engaged all together.

Now that we know what discipline and dancing is,  let’s see how dancing can help you to have more discipline in your life and help you to achieve your own personal goals . It is very important in life to have a goal or multiple goals. Learning how to dance can be a goal , and by choosing this, you will open the door to learn how to accomplish any goal. For example, let’s say you want to learn the Rumba, the origin of all Latin dances. You will have a team of teachers  that will guide you and help you reach your goal. It will be a system and a plan of action to follow represented by the dance steps that you will learn.

The system is made out of three components: private lessons, group lessons,  and practice time. Private lessons represent individual attention, identifying your strengths and weaknesses, and developing new habits that will get you closer and closer to your goals. Group classes represent your interaction with others through different dances, enhancing and developing your communication ability through dancing . Practice represents the chance to dance and apply everything that you have learned to music. How fun is that? You can practice anywhere, a studio party, the subway station, your living room… What an amazing ability to have to be able to just let go and dance anywhere you want.

Do you think by following the system and the plan of action your teachers have set for you will get you to your goal of  learning to dance  the Rumba? You bet you will. I guarantee you that. This will never fail. More than that,  let me show you how it will work with any goal that you want to achieve in your life. First think about a goal. Once you have chosen one,  search for someone that has accomplished the same goal and use that person as a mentor or adviser. Set up meetings (this is like your private lessons), read books , watch videos and communicate the information you learn with others (this is like your group classes), then take action and apply what you have learned,  (this is like your practice).

Now, you have a mentor/teacher, you build your knowledge , communicate with others what you have learned (interaction) ,  and apply the information representing your actions. By believing in everything that you do,  you will add emotion. All this sound familiar? Yes, it is. These are the four factors that dancing brings in perfect harmony. Mind, your teachers giving you knowledge. The people that you interact with. Body, the actions that you take towards your goal. Music, a state of emotions that  manifests itself through  believing  in everything you do.

Congratulations,  now you are a dancer and the master of the dance called LIFE .

By mircea marta