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Of Weight and Wait

The more I learn things about this dance the more I do find myself getting frustrated. Yes I can move better, yes I can hold my own weight, yes I can do about 99% of moves but can I do it in a way that is beautiful, inspiring, musical, effortless? Likely not.

The body is the tool, we receive the energy and direction through the chest, telling us:
- Speed
- Time
- Direction
- Force

which translates from top to toe. Energy received up top, sends down all the way to the toes and that is why you never look at the feet, because it will tell you nothing. Everything is a movement generated from the chest. Everything. And yet again you hear, disassociate, disassociate, disassociate. Truly, this is the core of it, because if you can't do that, then everything will be reactionary and lag, rather than being complementary and together.

Privates with Ariadna & Fernando, truly one of the first great couples that I encountered by hearsay in 2010 and then again with lessons in 2011. Finally made it to the shores of KL.

Points to Note

Preparing the balance
- Begin with toes spread to feel the ground. The ground is your best friend - "it will never cheat on you"
- Balance the weight across the foot and centered around the middle, watch the heavy lean inward to the insole
- Chest rises up like a hot air balloon, bringing the rest of the body with it. When the heels come down stretch the opposite forces from chest to heel
- If you want to tense, tense up the middle of the chest, nowhere else. Shoulders down, hands relaxed, the chest inflates and presents itself, rather than collapsing inward. Watch the arc of the lower back cocking up (pelvis tilted inward rather than outward)

Ochos
- The inside hip is cocking up too much during the rotation, let the hips level and ground down, since the standing foot is flexed and shortening the distance, bend the inside knee slightly to compensate
- Top half of the body is wavering off the center point with the rotation begins, keep it stable and level, relaxing the shoulders which are bunching up to compensate for the weaker core
- Rotation always happens from the top half, disassociate, wait, then let the energy spiral from the top all the way to the bottom

Walk
- When receiving energy, lean forward to compensate for the stretched leg back, there is a slight difference in receiving it further back than further forward which makes the movement jerkier

Energy and transfer of weight
- When you step in to the right, go with the weight, finish it. The moment you start anticipating the next step is when the imbalance starts because you are not connecting and finishing the dots

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