I believe the official name for this is transference and countertransference. This is a common theme with massage therapists, psychologists...etc. Basically, the intimacy of the professional relationship can induce very strong feelings towards the teacher/therapist/mentor (and vice versa)....This may or may not be sexual, or even positive. Sometimes the person in authority may remind the client of someone negative in his/her past. In my opinion, good boundaries are essential in this occupation. Just because someone is touching you, does not mean you have a relationship with him/her. And, not to bring up a "touchy" subject - just because a client is experiencing transference does not mean you can take advantage and sell them a huge contract.....in my opinion......

Tangogirl-

That's really quite close, actually. Most psychoanalytic institutes would agree that the transference is developed as a result of ambiguity and uncertainty about the feelings of the analysand for the analyst. The problem is that there is always uncertainty in all relationships (just how much DO you like me?), and I have never met a dance teacher who wasnt pleasant and friendly and interested toward her student; how easy it would be to misinterpret that set of attitudes! And how easy it would be for a teacher to exploit a student.

These considerations are most serious in a situation where the teacher has a lot of power over the student; in the dance situation, that doesnt seem to be quite the same problem. Maybe Anonymous (I wonder if all these Anonymous'es are the same person- and THAT is the problem with "Anonymous" as a handle)should just ask his teacher out for coffee.

Jerry

Talking about "power over the student", I always felt pressure in buying ticket to attend instructor's host party.

To Cooked and all
If you feel presure in buying tickets or more classes, it simply means that you are bing pussed in doing something you dont want to do.
You should learn to say a big NO to your teacher. Its nothing to do with being a mean person.
Believe me, some teachers are very manipulative.

a bit above 3000 us$ I realised how strong my crush was but because everything seemed to be going well (lesson wise, I simply accepted that I couldnt ask her out) I signed up for more lessons (which I felt I needed, she did not try and sell these) so by the time we got into our huge fights I had spend around 4.5k us$ in just above six months...
I have another apointment tomorrow with one of the studio owners tomorrow to see when I am going to at least get an explanation for her behaviour because that is too much money to just let it slide.

Ok since some of you wanted to know if anonymous is actually the same person as the other "Anonymous" (notice the capital 'A') then I am letting you know that is not true. So I decided to give myself a new name... anonymous California. I'm the one who started this post:

ok to begin with... I'm glad I heard from a lot of you how you felt dance instructors are good manipulators and charmers and find a way to give you more lessons by charging you with high fees. I came here on this site because I wanted to know if this was a business strategy they decide to use.

i'm going to post my other story below this one... so please continue:

Ok... after purchasing the first few dance lessons and then finally paying for one that shot up to $3,000.00... I only had a couple of days to cancel my lessons... coz basically.... I fell for my dance instructor and I knew she was feeding on my infatuation for her.

So I took all my might... went into the studio and decide to cancel... and you won't believe what happened!

We had a calm argument for 2 hours straight... she kept reassuring me that if I quit then that won't be good at all. I thought she was feeding me all of these flattery remarks. But I said no and that I wanted to cancel. I felt she wasn't respecting my decision. Then at the end of the conversation... and you won't believe this.... her eyes started getting red... then we shook hands after canceling... and as soon as I got up to leave.. she said bye.. and she was definitely crying hard. She couldn't hold her tears that she just cried and cried and cried. SO I tried not making it personal.. and just left....

Now my question is... I don't know why she cried but could someone give me a good explanation as to why she cried? I know she enjoyed working with me... but my goodness... I've never seen anything like this!

And you know what a man feels when a woman cries? He feels BAD... really bad... like he's some kind of jerk! That's how I felt... and she cried in front of all of the dance instructors. I was like.... oh god!... I'm heading out. I aint a jerk!

Opinions?

And you know what i think? .... Crying is a form of blackmail! No way am a guy like me going to fall for that kind of crap!

I just don't like it when someone like her gets sooo sensitive! I mean whatever happened to equal respect? All of a sudden the guy is the bad dude!

I dont know, none of us know what the two of you said etc... We dont know her.
I have a friend, a very sweet girl who cries under stress. Some people do.

I'd go talk to her again and nicely gently inquire as to why she was crying. Not get drawn into any trade talk but insist on finding out that. Hell just ask her out :P
"You know I have feelings for you and it caused me real pain to see you cry. I dont want to see you sad, but you have to understand I must look after my own feelings too and I can't spend a lot of money on lessons that will only hurt me because of unrequited feelings. But I'd be really happy if we could still see eachother outside the studio..." "How about (lunch/dinner/theatre somtehing anything)" or "How about I pick you up after work some time?"

Damn... and there I was telling myself dont give people dating advice anymore.

But:
I am proud of you. You did the right thing. I think...

You think I did the right thing? Financially wise... yeah I would agree. But emotionally wise... i just couldn't figure out why. I think some women know how to manipulate men into thinking they should do this or that.... making the man realize he isn't making wise choices for himself.

I don't feel the need to talk to her in person and gently inquire as to why she was crying. Why should I ask her out? Remember, I signed a contract that states that members agree not to associate with club personnals outside of the club. I could get sued... I am liable. It's not worth the risk.

These rules or laws were created to help protect club personnals and members from getting into any frenzy debate or arguments.

Didn't you have a contract like that?
and what happened? Are you meeting with the manager today to discuss why your female dance instructor and you are in an emotional argument?