To dance is to experience the feminine flow of energy more fully! It is the divine dance of the masculine and the feminine in perfect union. Let the dance begin!
Cesar Romero, my salsa dance teacher, innately understands this and is a loving conduit to connect feminine energy with the feminine body. I have the tendency to want to dance rather wildly and freely. “ No, no”, says Cesar, “ I believe there is a place for that, but let me teach you another way; one that will allow you to experience a fuller expression of feeling and a stronger human connection. By containing and the directing these wild energies you will be like the artist who takes the full spectrum of light and directs it into the unique expression of art in order to connect with and touch the human heart; you will be like the beauty of water contained in a magnificent fountain.”
As I learn lessons about containment of my energies through dance, I am learning other valuable lessons as well. For example, I am learning to be very present with each step. If I don’t, I just can’t dance. I am finding compassion for myself as I learn to be patient with my ineptitude. I am starting to feel the music flow through my body, and I am also experiencing the power of surrendering to a partner who wants to lead me.
I have always wanted the masculine partner in my life to be strong, but I am learning that “my always knowing” blocks a greater, richer knowledge. In a strange twist of logic, by allowing myself to unite with my partner’s strength, which happens through surrendering to his lead, I am becoming much more fully expressed and joyful. Cesar is always telling me things like, “Feel me! Feel my body! Feel my strength…give me less strength / more strength…why aren’t you following me? Do it now! I need to dance with a woman who trusts me to take her where she wants to go. Trust me. See, I’m right here. I’m still right here,” and as he twirls to catch me, says “still here!…trust me to always be here for you.”
I, in turn, beg him to be patient and not to be too hard on me, which he has no trouble doing, embodying both extreme patience and masculine gentleness. He has probably spent an hour or more teaching me to take a single step backwards with arms lifted in a sexy surrender; ninety-nine percent of the time without any complaints what-so-ever. But complain I do! “Cesar”, I grumble, “Why is this so hard for me? Why do I need a man to teach me how to be a woman? Why wasn’t I taught this before?” Certainly 12 years of being in my mind at the University and medical school did not help me in these matters!
Cesar explains, “As dancers get more and more proficient and contained, they have the ability to express greater and greater amounts of freedom. It is my job (as the masculine) to know what my partner loves and yearns to express, and to lead her into that expression. I’ll have my time to express myself also, but that’s not my main purpose on the dance floor.” He is not expressing a Latino-macho kind of masculinity as he dances, but according to one of my mentors, David Deida, is embodying a “third-stage” kind of masculine energy.
David Deida describes the different stages of masculine-feminine polarity and relationships very clearly throughout his writings and teachings. A first-stage masculine man is a John Wayne type who is plenty forceful and masculine, grabbing his woman to take her where HE wants to go. He wants steak for dinner, so by-golly that is where they are going; and he will drive the car, thank you very much. As women, there are attractive things about this kind of a male, but we ultimately felt pretty unfulfilled and unseen. We usually leave this kind of relationship to find a more reasonable, “sharing’ “second-stage” male.
The second stage male doesn’t grab any one, but respectfully asks his feminine partner where she would like to eat. Fifty percent of the time they go where she wants to eat, and fifty percent they go where he wants to eat; perhaps having her drive; requesting of her that, in all fairness, when he has his fifty percent, could they please eat steak ...and might he possibly be allowed to drive the car a bit too? According to David and to my own personal experience, this fifty-fifty partnership might be okay in a working relationship, but leads to a weakening of the masculine-feminine polarity in a love relationship. This loss of polarity results in the feminine yearning for a greater fullness and expression, and for the masculine feeling derailed; and in the sexual arena, there just isn’t passion or sparks. Is there another way, we 50-50’ers ask?
Enter the third stage male Deida describes, who is powerfully connected with his own path, but who also has a deep appreciation and understanding of his feminine partner’s yearnings. With great masculine direction, he takes her where SHE needs to go, allowing her to surrender into her embodied feminine light and the fullness of the love that she longs to give…to him……and definitely, he will be driving the car, with great skill. Sex and relating in third stage relationships has all the sparks flying as the Shakti embodied feminine and the Shiva embodied masculine surrender into the celebration of vast union and Oneness.
As I dance with Cesar, I find that I am experimenting with some of these third stage dynamics, unveiling my feminine desire to surrender to the masculine, and experiencing a masculine partner who wants to lead me more deeply into my own expression; all while keeping it on the dance floor, in the form of a Salsa Lesson!!
When I first began to take lessons, I told Cesar that Wednesday’s I would not be free to dance, because that was my afternoon and evening with one of my spiritual teachers and groups. He laughingly replied, “Well, after learning to dance and becoming “Salsa”, you won’t even need a spiritual teacher again!”…. which, strangely enough, my teachers seem to agree with. “Prudence,” they explain, “How you do anything in life (dance!) is how you do everything in life. And so it is….
So, my dear sisters and future Salseras! If it sounds like a big love affair, it is!! One that is waiting for you! Hear the music, dance like true beauties, lose some weight, enjoy exercise!.... and be part of the very sexy salsa scene in LA, where all that counts is your love of expression and your ability to connect on the dance floor.
Cesar embodies a love of this art form, with his whole body smiling as the dance starts to flow between him and his partners. He is an extraordinary teacher and one of the best dancers in LA. I assure you, if he can teach “the doctor” to dance, he can teach anyone!!!... and it is just so-so-so much fun!!
Package of 10 lessons: $500 ($50 each)
Single session: $75
Telephone: (310) 892-7719
This information is for educational purposes only, and is not intended to treat or diagnose any health condition.