Where do you go for feedback as a dancer or athlete? I don’t feel like I get enough meaningful feedback on my movement right now. This came up in conversation with another dancer yesterday.
Bellydancers tend to be very generous with compliments, and will tell you that performance was wonderful even if it doesn’t meet your own standards. Others’ feedback is… sweet, but suspect, maybe.
I can feel possessed by some muse, which at least means the performance will have some passion in it, but then end up technically falling short of what I want. Sometimes you notice that, others not. You can even feel technically correct but find your proprioception is off (that is, you don’t feel your own body accurately). Your own feeling about your work isn’t always perceptive.
Photos can either make you look amazing or catch just that moment when your hand is in the weird position between here and there. I will say, at least, that the “ATS photo finish” is a great tool for group improv – if you’re not all in basically the same spot in every photo… you’re doing something wrong! Looking at a mirror during practice flattens things out – great for technical practice, but if you don’t learn to feel the technique in your body, this does nothing for you when you step away from the mirror. As I learned!
This week, in fact – I was quite good technically in the mirror as I worked on the piece I performed Tuesday. I get less perceptive about where my body is in space when there’s adrenaline involved. All I’ve yet found useful is video. Recording – practice and performance – at least gives me some sense of what I’ve just done. It can be painful to get used to (or get re-used to).
Take me. I’m noticing now, as I come back to dancing more regularly, that my proprioception is way off. I’ll be shocked to look at video and realize my arms were there or that I was doing that ridiculous thing with my head again. Or I’ll see those noodle arms (as mentioned in my edit of the post from earlier this week – not to smack myself around for sloppy arms).
The things I’m talking about, though, only tell you about what you’ve done. It’s much harder to get an indication of what your audience sees (the camera tries, but it’s a poor substitute). When you’re learning – which everyone is always – it would be so much better to get detailed feedback from others. Our tribe used to do this for each other in practice, and probably Die and I need to step away from dancing together to do the same now.