Imagine a milonga where every leader is fully dedicated to serving the needs of the follower, keeping her comfortable, taking care of her balance, holding her in a safe, comfortable embrace, providing a clear, sensitive lead that never exceeds her abilities, giving her time to recover when she needs it, shielding her from danger on the dance floor, and being supportive of her one-hundred percent of the time, especially when she misses a cue and strays from what he intended for her to do. Every leader in the room is dedicated to giving any follower that he dances with an enjoyable, fulfilling, and pleasantly memorable experience.
Imagine that for a moment.
Imagine a milonga where EVERY follower feels special and knows the value of her role in the dance, where EVERY follower feels valued, respected, and appreciated regardless of her level of experience, regardless of her technical abilities, regardless of her age, size, or general level of attractiveness, regardless of her social connections. The leaders express delight when they have the opportunity to dance with her and file their tanda together with joy, passion, and playfulness. The leader does everything in his power to make the follower feel like the focus of their shared experience - as she should.
Imagine that for a moment.
Do you think that followers who received that level of experience might want to come back for more? Would they come back to your milonga? Would they want to dance with those leaders again? Or leaders who subscribed to the same philosophy?
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My first tango teacher drummed this lesson into the heads of the leaders in her classes, that the prime responsibility of the leader was to make the follower feel safe and comfortable and accepted. Give her an embrace that makes her feel safe and secure and respected. Give her a lead that's clear and patient so she never has to wonder about where she is going or where she has been. Be supportive and patient, so she never feels that she has let you down. Take responsibility for floor craft and watch the traffic on the dance floor, so she doesn't have to worry about having other dancers crashing into her. Get her out of danger when it arises, even if you have to put your own body between her and careless or rambunctious people.
This philosophy has served me well over the years, but it took me a while to adopt it fully.
Everyone understands the importance of protecting the follower from danger. That's a no-brainer. I wanted the ladies who danced with me to have a nice time. As I learned more about the embrace over time, I gave that more attention as I switched from follow to follower at the milonga.
But I have to admit, I wasn't fully ready to accept that my whole role was to make the follower feel good about the dance. I mean, what about me? When would I be able to express myself? Did I have to give up the advanced techniques that I had learned and practice? Did I have to hold back and slow things down when I really wanted to go crazy with a piece of expressive music.
The answer is, yes, I did have to scale back my ambitions at times. But I realized over time that this is not a sacrifice.
Think of it this way. I go to a milonga and dance fifteen tandas. I have a choice. I can focus on the needs of each follower and have fifteen awesome tandas where everyone had a great time - and they'll all want to dance with me again. Or, I can go in and try my most complex stuff and have mixed bag of tandas ranging from good to OK to barely tolerable to complete train wreck. Over time, I learned where my true preferences fell. I wanted to shoot for the highest success rate possible, every tanda, every follower, every night.
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I had a great mentor when I started out in tango, a fellow student who was a few years ahead of me yet who always encouraged me. He set a great example. On occasions where there weren't enough followers in class, this guy and I would end up dancing together. (We're both pretty tall.)
His lead was AMAZING! Even though I wasn't a follower, I knew exactly where he wanted me to do. Every instruction was clear and well-timed. The embrace was comfortable - no pushing, pulling, no twisting of wrists, no compensation with force. He never impeded my movements or knocked me off of my axis. And he was always super-supportive and encouraging in his comments.
That's the kind of leader that I wanted to be. It took me a while. I had to practice, and I had to accept some things that I didn't want to accept in the beginning. But the rewards for making ladies comfortable and treating them well have been astronomical.
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So, to any leader who has bothered to read this far, I would encourage you to re-read those first few paragraphs. I'm sure that you are doing lots of nice things for your followers already, but would you be able to do some things better? Can you shift your focus more toward enhancing the follower's experience of the dance? Can you derive your own sense of satisfaction from the satisfaction that you give to your partner?
Take this as an exercise. It's not something that you can accomplish without some trial and error. Your ego will argue with you at first, I can promise you that. But try setting the follower's experience as your standard and moving toward that objective. You may be surprised where it can take you in the long run.
¡Buena suerte amigos, y muchas gracias!
Daniel
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