Content or Connection?
Color it agism.
The older I get the less my conversations are about content and the more they are about connection. I tend to listen more for the intangibles, attend to body cues, invest more effort in making eye contact, place more value in a smile than the words spoken. My take away from such encounters is a treasured feeling rather than a thought.
Tango is a conversation.
The same transition has occurred in my dancing. Tango for me, used to be about content: how many steps I could squeeze into 3 minutes to impress the hell out of my partner or at least keep us both from getting bored. Now it is the contact, the connection, the feeling that I take away from the dance.
Tango is a conversation, replete with grammar, vocabulary, expressive and receptive communication. Yes, this is expressed through movement rather than speech but in many respects, this intensifies the communication rather than diminishes it.
This is no doubt why there is the protocol in Tango not to talk while dancing; talking dulls the ability to listen, to be attentive, to be sensitive and responsive to the music and your partner. It takes you out of your body and heart and into your head.
Communication is 80% non-verbal.
In regular day-to-day interactions, more is communicated by tonal inflection, body positioning and facial expression than words. Words often as not, can be a distraction, used mindlessly to fill in space, to deflect or distract attention or to deceive.
Your body always speaks the truth.
It is hard to lie in tango. Tango can’t be danced without deep and honest communication. The genius of Tango is that the dance structure (the embrace, asymmetrical step patterns, shared axis, irregular timing) requires that both bodies be attuned at a physical, emotional and energetic or psychic level at all times.
Hard skills or soft skills?
Certainly, there are the musicality and stylistic elements that form the structural content of the dance. Poor technique, generally speaking, makes for poor communication which makes for disappointing dancing. But not necessarily. I am often amazed at how my partner can be a total novice and we can flawlessly execute a relatively technical dance.
How does this happen?
Presumably, my partner brings with her to the dance relational skills and receptivity (soft skills) in addition to some musicality. She stays in her heart and body and out of her head. She is able to listen and read my intent, trust my lead and stay in the magic of the moment. That seems to be primarily what is required to make the dance work.
On the other hand, I may have a very simple dance with someone who is very skilled but the mood is such that we just want to be in each other’s presence. Or there are the other times, more than I care to remember, where I have not been able to dance at all with a very skilled partner because I have not felt emotionally connected and stayed in my head rather than my heart and body.
What is connection?
Again, perhaps a stage in life response but I am more interested in relational dynamics than performance or athleticism. Certainly, watching Tango from the sidelines the visuals impress me, but all that dissipates when I get up on the floor. My focus instantly transitions to what connects me with my partner what I can do to intensify that connection.
How do I do that?
In addition to the content – the hard skills – I add the soft skills: listening, respecting, reverencing, relaxing, having fun, being curious, creative, present, open, trusting, vulnerable, risk-taking. And I am always adapting or adjusting my dance to the information that I am continually taking in from my partner, the music and the dance floor.
I leave the dance with a feeling of deep communion. That is the deepening aspect of the dance that keeps me coming back week after week.