Getting Discomfortable with Ecstatic ​Dance

 

While I was in Bali in December, a friend recommended I try something called Ecstatic Dance in Ubud. Given that I’ve been wanting to take more dance classes after the fun of secretly dancing with closeted guys in Serbia, this seemed like a perfect opportunity. Ecstatic Dance, it turns out, is not a dance class per se. It’s not about learning how to do a specific dance, it’s about learning how to dance however the fuck you want, basically. 

Once I found a class I could actually get to, I immediately recruited my up-for-anything sober friend Katie from episode 30, who also loves dancing and trying new things. We hopped on our scooters and rode for an hour from Canggu to Ubud (which was an adventure in and of itself), and arrived at a community movie theatre populated by hippies and vegan desserts. As we walked into the auditorium, people were already writhing around in strange ways and I was immediately nervous and apprehensive. Ecstatic Dance traditionally takes place in the day time, with all the lights on, and no drugs or alcohol — none of the defense mechanisms we use to make dance less awkward. Talking is also not permitted. This video does a good job of showing what it’s like:

As the class started, however, I found that it was surprisingly easy for me to “dance like no one was watching” in front of a group of open-minded strangers, in fact, I was almost disappointed by how not uncomfortable I was.

But then, the teacher insisted we actually try dancing with other people, and I discovered how truly uncomfortable Ecstatic Dance can really be! What followed was an hour of self-consciousness, an inability to connect, and a whole lot of self-doubt. It was a perfect microcosm for the difficulties and insecurities of trying to connect with strangers in general, a subject that is close to my heart as I venture off on a year of traveling alone.

The class made me wonder if the discomfort of dancing with strangers (or anyone really) is connected to my assumption that dancing is always related to sex. Part of me wants to challenge that belief so I can relax and just dance, but I recently did an informal Instagram poll about it and 63% of the respondents agreed that dancing is inherently associated with sex…

Additonal music: ONE MINUTEN 6 by Gabriel Pereira Spurr