hi
I am 18 years old and It has always been a dream to dance gracefully like the pros.
However I'm a size 14/16 (UK) girl, not a slender woman like professionals seem to be.
I'm not a very confident person and not the most graceful and I'm too nervous to start lessons as I'm afraid i will fail, or be seen as a joke around all the slimmer women.
Has anyone else been in this position that could give me a few words of encouragement and advice?

Dear Unsure,
everything you have written seem to be reasons to start dancing, not reasons not to.
Like every community, the dance community ahs its fair share of idiots, but by and large my experience has been that people respect eachother's dream.
At least among social dancers size and age are pretty much irrelevant, but your practice will help your body stay fit more than anything else (especially as it is probably the one type of physical exercise that feels the least liek exercise).
And the better a dancer you are the more confident you'll become.

Stavros is right! Social dancers come in all shapes and sizes. The professionals have fantastic bodies because dancing is what they do for a living, often dancing up to six hours a day. A healthier and more fit body is one of the benefits that comes after hard work and long hours put into dancing- it's definitely not a prerequisite!

I'm in my 40's and wear a UK size 16. I've been dancing (and competing) in the USA for about 9 years now. None of my teachers or coaches have ever discouraged me from learning and developing as a dancer. Now judges are a slightly different story, but since your goal is to learn to dance gracefully that's not an issue at this point. Just get out there and learn to dance -- one positive side effect is that as you learn to make your body do things and move beautifully, you will develop positive feelings about yourself even if you don't shrink much in size.

You go girl!! I have been involved in the ballroom world for 7 years now with my children (if only I had been allowed this opportunity!!)and what I have seen on more than one occassion was a not so slender gentleman being the one everyone watched because he had such great energy and had done his homework as far as practicing and becoming compfortable on the dance floor. I have seen several girls in the same size catagory who were by far the favorites to watch and cheer for. If you love to dance--then do it!!!


Angela Gunderson
The Ultimate Dance Bag
angie3@instant-dance-kit.com

First off, I would say stop looking at the pros and thinking that they are the be-all-end-all of dancing. They are great dancers, hence the title "pro." They can move like I will probably never be able to. They are incredibly fun to watch most of the time. But, if you start your dancing life, aspiring to be just like them, you are setting yourself up for heartache. Watch them and be inspired by them, but don't try to be like them until you've been dancing for a few years.

After a couple of years of dancing you may come to the realization that you don't have what it takes to get to that level, but you can hold your own in the middle or lower levels of amateur competition. And you just might find that you are quite happy with that.

You might also find that competition is not your bag at all and be quite satisfied with the weekly dance parties at your studio and for that you certainly don't need to worry about being a size six (US) and weighing in at 100 pounds.

As for using these as excuses for being nervous about starting lessons, it's time to get over it. Have you ever gone to the local dance studio and joined a group class? Take my word for it, you have nothing to be nervous about. Take a couple of months worth of group classes and you'll be the one that all the new students come to after class to get help with whatever step the teacher taught that night. And you're a size 14/16. Big deal. In most classes you won't be the biggest woman there, if they're anything like the group classes I've been to.

So, it's time to stop worrying about nervousness and confidence (or lack thereof) and get yourself down to the closest dance studio and sign up for your first group class. Then, after a couple of weeks, sign up for another. And so on and so on.

One word of caution, don't let them talk you into any high priced private lessons or series of private lessons until you've been dancing for at least two or three months. By then, you'll begin to see where your talent lies and where your ambitions are leading. And those silver-tongued devils (teachers) will use all kinds of flattery to get you to pull out your pocketbook and write them a hefty check. Tell them I told you not to and if they have a problem with that, they can take it up with me.

Now, get yourself a pair of dancing shoes and get busy.

thanx a lot for your replies
I sure hope you're all right
I've signed up for my first group lesson next week!!!

Oh awesome! Have a great time and let us know how it goes and what you think.

Hey!

I'm a mid 40's man. I can tell you that I was in the situation you were in and I know what to do!

Get busy dancing!

It's for everyone who wants to do it.


Darcy

Pros move like they do because of training and a huge amount of practise. All that time practising is a major reason they are slim. Like fred Astaire said, nobody is a natural dancer, they all became good through traing and practise.

The places we dance, the guys seem most concerned about attitude. The ladies with the best attitude seem to be the ones that end up on the dance floor the most.