Top 11 reasons why all men should learn to dance

All in all, I’ve taught quite a few dance classes this year. For example, at the beginning of the summer, I visited a local school and introduced a class of Eighth Graders to swing dancing and last month I taught a group of a hundred and fifty teenagers (eesh!) at a youth retreat in Julian.

As a general rule, when I teach dance lessons, the girls are really enthusiastic about learning whereas the guys are usually more reluctant. I’ve noticed that this reaction is not limited to teenagers. I’ve seen the same thing when I’ve taught  “young adults” and I’ve even seen the same reaction among real grown-ups too! For example, towards the beginning of the year I taught Nightclub Foxtrot at a local parish event and, when it was time for the lesson, all the men were suddenly rather absent… Where had all the “leaders” gone?

In this post I would like to outline the top eleven reasons as to why every man should learn to dance. Anyone who knows me well will know that I think all guys, without exception, should know how to dance. In Medieval times, a knight’s training was considered incomplete if he could not dance. It was true then and I think it’s no less true today… 🙂

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Survived The Teenagers!

Last night I spent the evening teaching Pam’s Youth Group how to swing dance (my voice has just about recovered!).

We wanted to kick things off by showing them a clip of swing dancing so they could see this style of dance in all its glory. We ended up showing them a clip from Swing Kids. I had wanted to show them another video but I couldn’t find it…until this morning:


I literally cannot watch this video without smiling 🙂

Liturgical Dance

UPDATE: I saw this on Brandon Vogt‘s Facebook page…

A good friend told me a story this weekend about a priest he once knew. The local bishop was visiting this priest’s parish for Mass, but before Mass began the whole assembly was treated to an elaborate liturgical dance. It was the real-deal: hand-scarves, dresses, music, tambourines, hand gestures, and more.

When the dance was over, the bishop slowly turned to the priest and whispered in his ear: “If they come up and ask for your head on a platter, they’re going to get it.”

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