Tango Quarrels

OK, soo...the big Big Tango problem I am thinking about today is why do tango partners fight. It is hard enough to find the right partners for a dance. Getting a regular longer term partner is even more challenging. But even if you are lucky enough to have a long-term partner (a spouse, a friend, a significant other), you still have occassional quarrels, conflicts, fights, wars. And they mostly occur during practice sessions.

These quarrels are usually short lived, mostly over silly things, often largely rhetorical, but they always hurt, sometimes overflow into the next day, and cut short the pleasure and duration of the dance session. Practicing tango is a frustrating thing. The steps are difficult, technically complex, need body strength, require simultaneous mental, physical and emotional effort. So you dont get them the first time, or even the fifthieth time. Enter frustration, and blame.

Moreover, tango dancers have huge egos - clearly disproportionate to their self perceived talents. So each partner thinks (s)he is doing the right thing and the other is to blame for errors. But god forbid if someone points out my errors. Men are more thin-skinned and have fragile egos. They just dont want to hear they are doing things incorrectly (when 90% of the times they are at fault). They dont like to hear a follower say - "you lead that wrong" or "bah-humbug". So, followers, please say it in a way that does not hurt his little ego. "Ah that was quite interesting, what did you want me to do there, Ohhh yes, blah, blah".

Another reason for quarrels is the unclarity (or is it flexibility) about the respective roles of leaders and followers. How much lead is needed at any point, and how much initiative is the follower supposed to take? The degree of lead changes as you evolve in your dance skills, and it changes with different partners, and different types of steps. Most of the time one is trying to figure this out, and work it out during dances. But with regular partners in practice session, this is a topic worthy of discussion. It can give you insights into where each partner needs help.

And then there is the memory problem. You did the workshop, and learned the fancy figures/steps. Now a week later you seem to remember the steps differently from your partner. But ofcourse both of you are 100% sure that it is done a certain diffferent way. You try it your way and the other way, and both are wrong. And there is no way to go back to the teacher for a refresher, and you don't have a video of it. Aargh. The solution - make videos of the final demo of the steps by the instructors. Most instructors allow that. Review those videos when needed.

Here is my mantra for leaders wanting to avoid quarrels - ALWAYS accept responsibility for any error, regardless, period.
Now say this aloud. "I did not lead that right, let me try again". And hug her.