194. Emotional Intelligence for Dancers: A Pathway to Success Part 1

[00:00:00] Welcome to passion for dance. I'm your host, Dr. Chelsea and my mission is to create happier, more successful dancers through positive mental skills. I'm going to take on a big topic today and talk about handling emotions as a dancer. It's competition season. Those pre-performance nerves are likely to come up. We are bound to deal with frustrations or disappointment, when we struggle with choreography, don't place, where we wanted, or don't get the summer intensive we'd hoped for. 

My goal here today is twofold. I want to help you understand your emotions. And understand how those emotions impact your ability to focus your movement and your connection to the audience. Then we'll talk about identifying your own emotions, both positive and negative, and how the ability to identify how you're really feeling changes, how you show up in rehearsals and how you perform. We are supposed to communicate an emotion to our audience, but we can't do that if we don't understand ourselves. 

Also, this is part one of a two part series. So make sure you're back next week for an [00:01:00] episode, all about how to manage those emotions once you know what they are, how can you change it to stay calm under pressure. Before we get there, we have to understand how emotions impact us as dancers and how to identify what we're really feeling. 

Welcome to passion for dance. I'm Dr. Chelsea, a former professional dancer, turned sports psychologist. And this podcast is for everyone in the dance industry who wants to learn actionable strategies and new mindsets.

I know what it feels like to push through the pain, take on all the criticism, and do whatever it takes to make sure the show will go on. But I also know that we understand more about mental health and resilience than ever before, and it's time to change the industry for the better. This podcast is for all of us to connect, learn, and share our passion for dance with the world. 

Okay. Let's start with understanding the role of emotions and performance. Your emotions impact your ability to perform in three key ways, your ability to focus and concentrate your actual movement, [00:02:00] quality as a dancer and your connection to the audience. First emotions play a significant role in a dancer's ability to concentrate. That might be staying focused in practice or when you're performing or standing backstage. We always have to be able to focus if we're going to execute our skills, when it matters. Many dancers, experience, anxiety or fear when learning something new or waiting backstage, and that anxiety can scatter your focus. But it's the positive emotions too, 

when you experience feelings like joy or pride that can actually enhance your focus can make you more engaged, more connected to the moment. If your goal is to stay present in the moment on stage, it's a lot easier to do that. If you are happy or grateful before you step out under the lights. 

Now when you are experiencing negative emotions, like frustration, anger, or fear. It makes it really hard to concentrate. Consider a dancer who is worried about being perfect at an audition. I think we've all been there. We want to be [00:03:00] our best selves, 

but that perfectionism means that all of our thoughts are on being perfect, which means you can't focus on what do you hear in the music, the feedback you might receive, the choreography itself or what muscle you're trying to engage. Your focus becomes simple, but unhelpful. I have to be perfect. Don't mess up. Which pulls your focus away from the present moment, your actual dancing, and it's going to make mistakes a lot more likely. It's what happens when a dancer feels anxious before performance and fixates on a single potential mistake? 

What if I mess up this turn? And that fixation pulls you away from the whole flow of the routine. It happens when we're trying to learn choreography too. 

Those negative emotions will prevent you from being able to focus on the movement and learning becomes so much more difficult. You might've noticed that before. If you're having a hard time picking up choreography that can lead to frustration, which makes it harder and harder to learn. 

The second connection with our [00:04:00] emotions is how they impact your actual quality of movement. 

As an artist, our emotions directly influence our physical expression of movement and our control. Consider how your negative emotions can create this undesired tension or tightness in your body. Usually when we feel things like stress or anger, our body gets tight and then those tight shoulders stiff arms, it all results in poor quality of movement, probably leads to even more frustration. 

However, if you understand a negative emotion is happening. And you were able to acknowledge it and then regulate your emotions so that you can shift to a more positive place. Then you get to experience emotions like confidence and calm. And that can allow for smoother, more controlled movements. Think about dancers who tend to dance too quickly or too bouncy when they first start a routine onstage. Teachers will say things like stay grounded, stay in the pocket. But if the dancers are experiencing negative emotions like frustration or anxiety, staying grounded becomes [00:05:00] nearly impossible. 

You can only stay in the moment and allow your movement to flow with control when you were not overwhelmed with nerves. 

And here's the thing about our emotions is a dancer as well. Sometimes we're supposed to 

portray a negative emotion, like a sorrowful character or the intention of the choreography is supposed to be aggressive and intense. So managing your emotions so that you can still remain in control and connected with the emotion of the routine is key. The emotion of a character or the emotion of a piece is different from your own negative mood state taking over. 

And that will disconnect you from the story. It's about knowing where you are really at putting yourself in the right state of mind for that story. But maintaining control. 

And the third way that emotions influence us as dancers is of course our connection with the audience. Audiences responded to authenticity, the best pieces of choreography that truly connect are coming from genuine emotional expression. [00:06:00] Not when it's fake. 

When dancers genuinely embody the emotion of a routine, whether that's joy or heartbreak or triumph and audience feels it too. When your emotions are not in alignment with the routine, it often doesn't connect with the audience. And if you're competing, it's confusing to judges. I was actually just watching dancers at a competition recently. 

And especially this one routine, I found myself kind of cocking my head to the side and saying, I don't understand their message. Uh, they look angry and intense, but that's not what this song and costumer saying to me. As a dancer, we have to understand our own emotions to be able to express them clearly to our audiences. And make a more authentic, genuine connection. I'm not sure what message they were trying to send or what the intention of that choreographer was. 

But somewhere along the line, there was a disconnect. 

 So bringing this part together, dance, isn't just about executing steps. Of course, it's a medium for storytelling and emotional communication. By learning to regulate our emotions, we [00:07:00] can improve our focus, enhance quality of movement and build deeper connections with the audience. 

All of which enhances performance onstage. 

I want to pause for just a second and say hello to any new listeners and thank you for being a part of the community. If you're new to the show today or found us recently, I have a special resource for you. It's simply the new listener resource and it has my best recommendations for other podcasts or books to inspire you.

As well as all my current free resources that you can download, which includes things like the competition confidence checklist or journal prompts that might help you today. It's actually a simple Google Doc because I'm constantly updating it and sharing new things for dancers and dance educators. And I wanted a way to give you all the links in one place.

So you can grab your copy today and it will always update as new things are [00:08:00] happening this year. You can get it at passionfordancepodcast. com. You'll see it right on the homepage. That's passion for a dance podcast. com. Welcome to the community. I'm so happy to have you. Okay. Let's get back to the show. 

 So now that we know these three ways that emotions impact our dancing. Let's shift to the next section and talk about identifying emotions. To be real for a minute. Many of us are not very good at identifying how we actually feel. We just know we're cranky or mad, but we can't narrow it down from there. 

We might just feel off or upset, but understanding how you are actually feeling is the key to changing your emotions, managing them, making sure you're in a helpful emotional place before you perform. 

In the section I want to highlight, I'm going to call them helpful emotions and unhelpful emotions, because it's not the same for everyone. And it's not just about positive and negative. Again, sometimes the choreography calls [00:09:00] for a level of intensity and being mad might actually be helpful. Helpful emotions are those that enhance your performance by aligning with your goals and your needs of the moment. The most common, helpful emotions though, tend to be positive things like confidence, excitement, determination, and joy. When you're feeling confident, it boosts yourself belief. 

It can help squash any of that self doubt that might be creeping in. Feeling confident can encourage you to push yourself a little out of the box. Go stand in front at an audition. Try that challenging choreo without holding back attempt a new trick and fully commit. And being excited is almost always helpful as a dancer. 

It gives you that sense of energy and enthusiasm that usually translates to a really dynamic performance. And of course a sense of determination is also usually a helpful emotional state. Before you perform and in practice. Determination is part of resilience. It helps you push through fatigue or challenges, especially in those long rehearsals. 

When your body is [00:10:00] sore, you've been cleaning for hours. Being frustrated is going to make it hard to keep pushing. But being determined. Can help you show up and execute when you need to, but we have to learn how to recognize what you're feeling so you can notice. Okay. I'm frustrated right now and decide to shift into a more helpful sense of determination. And finally joy is often a very helpful emotion before performing. 

It can bring more authenticity and natural expression to your movement, especially in a lighthearted, joyful choreography. 

Feeling joy while performing a high energy hip hop or fun Broadway jazz will not only improve your quality of movement, but it helps the audience feel the same joy. It will enhance your overall performance. 

 And then there are those unhelpful emotions and being able to identify those in yourself is the first step to changing them. Unhelpful emotions are any that if unmanaged can distract or overwhelm a dancer, preventing you [00:11:00] from reaching your highest potential. 

I think the most common unhelpful emotion I see as anxiety. A moderate level of arousal or anxiety that sense of buzzing in your body or your heart going a little faster. I can be good, but that buzzing can be labeled as excitement. And that's where we shift. I'm not anxious. I'm ready. I'm excited. It's the excessive worry about mistakes or judgment that gets in the way it scatters your focus. And it could lead to the dancer who rushes the choreography or blanks on it completely. 

Frustration is another common unhelpful emotion, especially during practices or rehearsals. I see this one impact us the most. Frustration, usually stems from perfectionism or when repeated mistakes happen because you're distracted and unfocused. 

It's a cycle. When you feel frustrated, it impacts your movement. You're distracted and your body might be physically tighter or you have less power. So then it [00:12:00] hurts your performance. And if you're in rehearsals, it's not going to look the way you want it to. 

And you're going to have to go again, which adds to more frustration, which is more distracting, more tension. You see the cycle. 

And another unhelpful emotion is fear. Usually in the sense of fear of failure or perfectionism, but it prevents a dancer from going full out, taking risks while you're learning or being emotionally vulnerable and genuine with the choreography. 

While those are the most common. Here's the distinction between helpful and unhelpful emotions that I want you to hold on to. Helpful emotions create a mindset and a physical readiness that improves your performance. It helps you show up as your best onstage. Being excited before performance increases your energy and your ability to dance. Helpful emotions also feel empowering, allow you to be creative and connect with your fellow dancers and your audience. Unhelpful emotions pull you away from your goals. They create mental noise and distraction or physical reactions, like tight [00:13:00] muscles that disrupt your ability to flow and move the way you want to. 

Unhelpful emotions often feel really restrictive and draining. It is hard to be frustrated all the time and these unhelpful emotions can make you trapped in a negative feedback loop where all you see are more things that cause more frustrations. 

 Being a happy and successful dancer is not about never having these unhelpful emotions. 

That's unrealistic and really important. I'm not saying you will never have them. Instead it's about recognizing your own emotions and then deciding to take control over your experiences to be in a helpful mood state more often. We're not going to squash the negative emotions or prevent them from happening. 

We're just going to learn to recognize them and manage them properly for the moment. By recognizing which emotions are helpful for you, you can harness positive emotions like confidence and excitement. To help you be present onstage, have a joyful performance and reach your goals. [00:14:00] 

And this is really just the foundation next week. I'm going to continue with part two and share those proactive strategies to learn how to manage your unhelpful emotions before they take over. 

I want you to be able to cultivate a mindset that supports your own growth and resilience and your own genuine artistic expression on stage. Emotional regulation is a skill. And with practice, every dancer can harness that skill and shine on and off the stage. 

 Come back next week for part two, and please share this episode with a dancer in your life who could use the reminder or learn a little about how to identify our emotions. Because our emotions are necessary as an artist, but you don't have to be stuck with the unhelpful emotions all the time. 

Let's all learn to cultivate more positive and helpful emotions in our lives so that we can have our best experiences on stage and in class. Thank you for being with me today and keep sharing your passion for dance with the world.

 Thank you for listening to Passion for Dance. You can find all episode resources at [00:15:00] passionfordancepodcast. com. And be sure to follow me on Instagram for more high performance tips at doctor. chelsea. parati. That's P I E R O T T I. This podcast is for passionate dancers and dance educators who are ready to change our industry by creating happier, more successful dancers.

I'm Dr. Chelsea, and keep sharing your passion for dance with the world.