[Tango-L] Surrender: Trying again

[TangoDC.com]

Hey Caroline,

Just a word of caution, in the hope that your partner isn't misled by 
any of this:

What a follower feels in a man's lead, and what a man feels, are often 
two different things. And pure pleasure in the dance is often weighted 
towards the follower.

My girlfriend has several years' more tango experience than I do. But 
until I explained exactly how many things are involved on the leader's 
side-- how much (conscious or unconscious) analysis we do, plus 
navigation, plus keying into the music and creating room for our 
partners' free expression, plus maintaining connection to everything-- 
she had no idea that we can't just release ourselves into the moment. 
Ideally, that's what we'd like to do, sure; but we also have to make 
sure we don't release ourselves into a wall.

Plenty of men, of course, surrender to the moment quite freely-- and 
bulldoze the line of dance, tailgate other couples, cut across lanes, 
ignore the music's phrasing, fail to "arrange" the song into linear 
movements and circular movements... Yay, good for them. Score one for 
oblivion.

In the meantime, I'd like to defend your partner's ego a bit, and 
reassure him that followers make it sound quite easy, when it is, in 
fact, not. Once my girlfriend understood that I can't enjoy the dance 
the way she does-- with total abandon-- because I've got 
Responsibilities (the social burden of which Sergio/Nau spoke), she had 
a much more tender attitude. Almost a compassionate remorse. Her 
pleasure was tinged by a certain sadness, derived from the knowledge 
that she was able to enjoy all I was giving her, while I was not.

Now, I might be putting words in her mouth, but I believe this 
self-awareness, this interior reflection, actually enhances the 
experience, and makes it more poetic. Suddenly she's more conscious of 
what's really going on-- and it's not so "just let yourself go" anymore. 
As a result of her knowledge, she responded with a kind of tragic 
vengeance against fate (to put it in silly but perhaps accurate terms), 
and refused to break the connection. She maintained it, with a steadfast 
will I haven't seen before, like a host who refuses to sit down at the 
table until every one of her guests has been served.

She became, to some extent, self-denying.

Now, maybe I'm missing the point, or maybe I'm speaking from a position 
too far beyond this initial surrender to realize that some people are 
too constipated to give of themselves freely. But in any case, I think 
we've got to acknowledge-- fully-- how much the leader has to manage 
(i.e., so that the follower doesn't have to even know about it) before 
we start talking about how easily he ought to surrender himself to 
satisfaction.

Sometimes when I hear followers talk about the pleasures of tango, I 
feel like they're telling me how to pee, without understanding that men 
have to Aim. This isn't to discount the followers' point; I just wish 
sometimes that they wouldn't put everything in terms of free-flowing 
pleasure, and realize that there's a lot of ordering, shaping, and 
Apollonian work going on, which is (at its rare best) made completely 
invisible to them.

Jake Spatz
Washington, DC


Caroline Polack wrote:
> According to dictionary.com, surrender means:
> To relinquish possession or control of to another because of demand or 
> compulsion.
> To give up in favor of another.
> To give up or give back (something that has been granted): surrender a 
> contractual right.
> To give up or abandon: surrender all hope.
> To give over or resign (oneself) to something, as to an emotion: surrendered 
> himself to grief.
> Law. To restore (an estate, for example), especially to give up (a lease) 
> before expiration of the term.
>
> For me, surrender means to relinquish control, to let go.
>
> My father said something very interesting when I was talking about my tango 
> partner's struggles in learning to dance the tango. I was talking about his 
> stiff self-conscious awkwardness, which runs so contrary to that essential 
> "l'air de tango."
>
> My father said, "he needs to learn how to let go."
>
> And that's precisely it. To surrender. My partner is very uptight, not just 
> in tango but in just about everything. If he would learn to let go of 
> himself, or  in MIchael's words, to embrace himself, then he would be the 
> quintessential leader. He does have the passion but no idea how to freely 
> express it because he's so locked up within himself as if he's putting way 
> too much pressure upon himself.
>
> For me, when I think of the best leaders I've danced with, I've noticed a 
> commonality between all of them which is an apparent lack of ego or bravado. 
> Instead of thinking about themselves, they just surrender to the music and 
> to the pleasure of having a woman in their arms, no matter if she's 
> experienced or not. They are the kind who would never let a woman feel 
> incompetent or humiliated but instead as though it's been a sublime 
> privilege to share this wonderful thing called tango with them. The worst 
> leaders are the ones who don't pay attention to a woman's skill level and 
> instead try to guide her into doing moves that are obviously beyond her 
> knowledge of the choreography, thus shaming and humiliating her. They are 
> the worst because they are only focusing on themselves instead of making it 
> a wonderful experience for them both. In other words, they didn't surrender 
> to the experience but to their own egos with complete disregards for the 
> women's.
>
> Caroline
>
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