Would Dance Lessons Benefit your Marriage?

Have you taken dance lessons with your spouse? What was your experience?

At a conference I attended, I met a woman who willingly shared her story after I mentioned the concepts of this blog. She described how dance lessons with her husband reflected the bigger picture in their relationship.

Explaining that her husband’s personality was easygoing and somewhat timid, she indicated these characteristics were displayed in their lessons as they are in life. With her encouragement in the lessons, he began to assert himself in his leadership role. As he grew more comfortable doing so in the dance, she started noticing a change in him overall. To her delight, he began to be more bold and assertive in their relationship.

If you want to grow in partnership with your spouse, consider dance lessons. The experience provides an opportunity to try out something new … more than just new dance steps. A couple I know applied their experience from dance lessons to their give and take in disagreements. “It made a difference with our first fight,” said the husband. “We do a better job of communicating in conflict.”

In a post on his Complete Life Fitness blog, coach Stuart Palmer writes about an observation of couples he and his wife have instructed in dance: “… we continue to see that couples who dance together generally have better relationships and deeper intimacy. Not only that, but just about every couple we’ve taught proclaims that learning to dance together parallels learning to have a better relationship.”

Have dance lessons with your spouse impacted your marriage, for better or worse? Please share your experiences!

Copr 2011 MarriageDance

Five Reasons to Learn to Dance with your Spouse

In case you need some encouragement for learning to dance with your spouse, here are five great reasons:

1. Dancing is a celebration documented in scripture. As Christians, we celebrate Christ’s birth on December 25, but we have reasons to celebrate all year. Through Christ, our God has blessed us with generous gifts of life, freedom, victory, peace and much more worth celebrating.

2. Enjoying a new recreational activity together can rekindle the romance that brought you together in the first place. Social psychologists at the State University of New York at Stony Brook found that to be the case. Read more.

3. Dancing is a great way to speak the love language of “physical touch.” If this is a primary love language of you or your spouse, dancing will add a new spark to your relationship. Don’t know your love language? Find out here.

4. It’s not as difficult as you may think. Men are usually more hesitant about dancing than women. But in dance workshops I held this year, men were pleasantly surprised to learn that not only could they dance but they actually enjoyed it. Learning a few fundamentals about how dance works, rather than just dance steps, made the difference for them.

5. If you’re still not convinced, watch this fun video for reason number five. Thanks to Sheila Gregoire for sharing it!

What other reasons can you add?

Copr 2009 MarriageDance

A Challenge to Leaders: Facilitate Brilliance

“As a leader your job isn’t to be brilliant. Your job is to facilitate the brilliance of others,” said Ron Carucci, a consultant and teacher in the field of organizational behavior. His comment was made in the context of business. However, I find the thought applicable to this discussion of partner dance as a metaphor for Christian marriage.

Having difficulty making the connection? Consider this passage from The Message:

Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, exactly as Christ did for the church—a love marked by giving, not getting. Christ’s love makes the church whole. His words evoke her beauty. Everything he does and says is designed to bring the best out of her, dressing her in dazzling white silk, radiant with holiness. And that is how husbands ought to love their wives. They’re really doing themselves a favor—since they’re already “one” in marriage. (Ephesians 5:25-28)

Husbands are instructed here to emulate Christ who evokes the beauty of his bride. In other words, a husband – as leader of his household – is to facilitate his wife’s brilliance.

I’ve frequently heard dancers describe roles in this way: The woman is the picture; the man is the frame. While a frame provides structure and protection for the work of art it encloses, it also offers a complimentary element that focuses a viewer’s attention on the art itself. The frame helps facilitate the art work’s brilliance.

In a recent workshop discussing the Ephesians passage, one husband concluded: “When she looks good, we look good.” Another commented: “As I elevate her and she looks more beautiful, I am elevated as well. Leading lovingly is the best thing I can do for both of us.”

Bill McCartney, former football coach at the University of Colorado and head of Promise Keepers, put it this way. “When you look into the face of a man’s wife, you will see just what he is as a man. Whatever he has invested or withheld from her is reflected in her countenance.”

He has the opportunity, as a leader on and off the dance floor, to facilitate brilliance.

Copr 2009 MarriageDance