The most vivid memories that stick with you are the ones where you can recall the pure emotion you felt in that moment. One such recollection: sitting in my older cousin’s room as a child with some of his friends. A 90s Kit-Kat commercial came on and they all joyously sang along. I felt the excitement; I knew the jingle. So I hopped up into their circle, singing and clapping and bouncing along with them. They immediately stopped and silently stared down at me. Without knowing why, I got the hint: my attempt at merriment with them was unwelcome. That was my first encounter with dance-associated shame.

What continued to follow me throughout life was a confusing cycle where my family constantly picked on my seemingly horrible dance skills while others praised some hidden propensity within me. I got pulled into ballet lessons for 3 years because some scouts came to my elementary school and noticed some kind of aptitude. But when my family pulled me into the dancing fray at family functions, they made a spectacle of jeering at me like some kind of experiment. It became a Pavlovian trigger: dance in front of family, prepare for the ridicule. A script I could never alter, no matter how hard I tried. “You have no rhythm.” “Why can’t you do it like [insert family member’s name]?” “Hahahahahahahayousuck.” I learned early to stop trying and initially compartmentalized it as hating dance instead. I pretended that music didn’t move me.

Except I knew I didn’t really hate it. I was just sick of being laughed at for it.

At my middle-school prom (yeah, we had one of those), I wanted nothing more than to dance with my friends in a non-judgmental space just for us. But keeping up a performative self of avoiding grooving meant I didn’t have much practice. I waited until it seemed my mom had finally stopped lurking and left, then awkwardly tried to boogie down the mini Soul Train line of student spectators. But after ducking away at the end of it, my mom materialized out of nowhere and grabbed me. “I was watching you. See, this is why you need to practice,” she said. Embarrassed once again; still not up to par with her standards. But recognizing that I didn’t want my dancing to be for her standards. Because at that point, I couldn’t recall any memory of me dancing purely to enjoy myself, just a burning desire to perform “dance” in a way that my family would accept and not humiliate me for it.

I finally got that breath of freedom in college. Before then, I’d never really gone to parties. But here, it was spaces crammed with familiar sweaty student bodies and good vibes, far away from my family hawk-eyeing my movements. Like those old-school dance parties they talk about on social media, before social media was really a thing. Packed together, fogging up the windows, not even hydrating properly, encouraging any spectators to join in without judgment. It was liberating. Whether you were showing off, head-bopping from the wall, or taking cues from the latest popular music video shenanigans, everyone did their thing with camaraderie. There was unity in us all wanting each other to have a good time. I even felt brave enough to enroll in a highly coveted Hip-Hop course on campus, just for the fun of trying and freely messing up in a class atmosphere. Nobody taunted my dancing skills here.

Despite my attachment to the college-party life, once I graduated, I didn’t move to clubs or anything like that, because after a couple attempts, I found I hated the real-world club experience. It just wasn’t the same outside, no longer surrounded by the same good vibes and familiarity and pureness. And so, I found myself missing dance again and the freedom of being able to move without feeling like I was under a microscope. At first I substituted with the Just Dance series, where I found I could solo-groove in peace now that I’d moved out of my mom’s house. But it wasn’t enough. So I started attending more Hip-Hop classes (shout out to Hip Hop Dance Junkies!). Sure, part of it was a rebellious move against the constant “You have no rhythm” mantra of my family. But trying to extinguish the love of music and movement deep inside me for so long had done nothing to quell the stubborn blaze, shining fiercely below the surface as if someone only needed to pay attention to see it gleaming through my eyes like a window.

And just as no one ever judged me at the college parties, no one ever judged me in class either. In fact, the opposite. People complimented me. People said they watched me to make sure they were doing the routine right. Folks said “Wow, you’re so good,” and I couldn’t believe it. It felt so alien and contradictory. Why was I good enough for everyone else but my family? Could my mom even pull off the choreography we learned? This wasn’t some backyard Black cookout dancing; this required memorization, drills and muscle memory. All my life my family had made it seem like it was so effortless and natural for everyone else but me, but I would have paid money to see our roles swapped and see how they fared with the moves I was learning.

I got introduced to Tango on a work-trip excursion to a milonga in Argentina. After hopping into some fun mini-classes that night, I tried to take it even further back in the States. From the very first class, the teachers immediately noticed some kind of capability in me; I heard them muttering together as they watched me dance with another student. The school owner even seemed to take an interest in coaching me for the duration of my attendance. It was he who pushed me to join him and select other students at a milonga in the city, and encouraged one of his very attractive student teachers to take me into a back room for “one-on-one practice.” Swear to God it was just dancing, but it was absolutely one of the most seamless, sensually connected dance experiences ever.

The challenge to dance continued to follow me and remind me of its calling. At a rooftop social mixer, I pulled out a slip of paper from an icebreaker bag that read, “Have a dance-off”. I groaned. But I was surprised to find others around me grimacing at the fact that they’d avoided such a challenge because they didn’t want to do it either! They were just as apprehensive about dancing in front of a bunch of strangers. So what did I do? Told myself, “You got this, you’ll never see these people again,” and freestyled with my opponent in front of everyone for a good 30 seconds. And I was glad I did it. Yet again, folks made a point of coming up to me afterward to congratulate me, saying I did so well and they would have been terrified, juxtaposing everything my family had told me my whole life. Was the Pavlonian response of expecting to be snubbed diluting?

And now, this chapter of dance in my life is a Salsa journey. The one dance I never thought I’d be able to learn because the counts are so different from other dance styles, and it always looked so fast, so complex and insurmountable. But from the very first class, I wanted to keep going. It was such good vibes from the students and teachers alike. We were a bunch of beginners bumbling around, messing up and laughing together, but not at each other, simply because we were having a good time with the same goal in mind: to master this. When people tell me I’m good or that I’m a great partner or they have a fun dance with me, I inwardly beam with happiness because I still never feel that great. But I can see my progress in competence.

Sometimes I’ll watch more experienced dancers and feel my anxiety rising thinking I’d give them a boring dance because I’m not on their level. But I try to remind myself that while getting gud is the ultimate goal, not to forget the “having fun” part that I lost sight of for much of my life. Because ultimately, dance should be joyous. And you forget that when you’re so focused on performance and impressing others and not “failing”, rather than dancing with them. So I try to remember to keep my focus on my own connection with the music and my connection with my partner, because while I’m likely being watched (because someone is always watching you in Salsa), my goal has never been to dance for flashiness or to look sexy or to wow other people. If I have a good time with my dance partner, then that’s enough for me.

It also helps that people are not watching you just to tell you that you suck. They are watching for an opportunity to join your good time.

I love that I laugh a lot during Salsa, especially when mistakes are made, because they’re inevitable. If we fail a move, I encourage them to try it again; see if we nail it this time. I laugh because I’m comfortable and at ease. That freedom of dancing to feel good; I found it and I don’t want it to slip away again. And I’ve learned a life lesson that you should be dancing with those you vibe with, the ones you are good enough for, and if you don’t vibe and it doesn’t feel good, then don’t. Move on and find your tribe, (and your joy again).

~Tael

P.S. To those who’ve believed in me, thank you 🙂