Why I still dance

There are a lot of good reasons to dance.  Dance is good exercise, social and beautiful. But I have been dancing tango for well over a decade, and those are not the reasons why I keep coming back for more.

When you are single, every once in a while you become discouraged.   You worry you will never meet the right women/man.  That you are not good enough, pretty enough, smart enough, young enough, or whatever other insecurity that lives in your soul.     Worse, sometimes you will see beautiful people that you know would never date you - even if they wanted to dance with you. Sometimes that alone is enough to discourage you.  Luckily that doesn't happen all the time.  This post is about a much nicer experience on the dance floor.

There are three ways I generally lead a tango.  I can dance for the audience, making every step look elegant, but sometimes feeling awkward.  I can dance for myself and my partner - perhaps being less visually striking, but feeling fantastic.  Or I can dance for romance.  This is not an attempt to win romance, but instead to feel it.  Note, it helps that I am a pretty good dancer, but this worked even when I was a novice.  On my very first tango lesson, Paul Pellicoro inspired a tiny version of this feeling, which got me hooked on tango. He did it without even touching me - using just the sight of his feet, the meaning of his words and the sound of tango in the background.

When I dance for romance, for the length of that song, there is a woman that loves me.  She loves me as much as any woman has ever loved a man.  Her every step, every movement she does to please me, knowing that my every step, every movement I do to please her.   We are not just the focus of each others attention, but the entirety of it.   Our every thought is of each other, our hearts beat as one, we feel each others breath, and we support each other.

For the length of that song, I know I am worthy of any woman.  While the music plays, I know I can win someone's love, I just have to find her.   Even after the song has ended, I know that if I can feel that way once, I can feel it again - and be worthy of her when I find her.

And that is why I dance.