Questions and Answers from Members

When people talk about passion in dance. What is it? Where does it come from? How do I create it?

• Jean Dorff Passion for dance and for that matter also for other areas is in my humble opinion coming from a sense ‘where you truly belong’ 
  So passion is not learned its given. 
  The trick is how to align your passion with what you do…if you do that right it leads to ‘fulfillment’. 
  It doesn’t quite answer where passion comes from other than ‘from within’ and it always poses the question: ‘do you allow your passion to lead you on your walk of life in this case on your path of dance.’ Successful people did exactly that.

  Passion is relatively meaningless when not put in actions…the right actions will fuel and fulfill passion..
  
  
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  Michael Herdlitzka “passion” in the philosophical meaning has to be controlled, otherwise it may/will become destructive .. understood as “enthusiasm” you have got it, when you really love to do something .. if not, you cannot “produce” it .. as I see it dancers have the same challenge as actors with “passion on demand” .. an actor never having truly loved will have great difficulty in playing a lover’s role authentically .. a dancer does not have to be “really” in love to perform a “genuine” piece of Rumba .. but she/he has to relate the own true experience of love to certain choreography .. then the impression of “passin” will emerge ..

   
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  Ekaterina Lapaeva A short poem from myself on the subject.
  
  It is your innate animal,it is your flower seed.
  Has seen the day.., has seen the night..
  Which one you daily feed?..,
  The one will lead you to your right;
  Which can be dark..,which can be light..!
  It is your fire…,will…, desire..,
  Your fervour…,lust…, and your vampire.
  Your starting point of all creations,
  One of your largest motivations.
  It’s in your truth, your dreams and actions,
  It’s in your nights of suffocations..
  Dressed up as love or hate emotions
  Or an explosive feeling portions.
  Your philanthropic, misanthropic zeal..,
  Your urgency, your hunger and your meal.
  It is your mania…, intensity…, your inclination; 
  One very powerful gutter..,in seven letters, simply – 
  Passion!

   
• Luisa Lau It deals with something you were introduced to like dance. . . 

  You like, find it interesting, challenging,
  Wanting more from it or having satisfaction repeating and perfecting it ..
  Develop that desire to excel In it, loving the difficult challengers just doing it,even though people think you are crazy. . 
  
  It is inside us. . A desire,lust and love. . with focus and proper guide to develop what we have passion in, it can be successful if not carefully enhanced can be rather dangerous. .

   
• Joanna Leunis Passion: isn’t that a need to express certain feelings? Feelings of anger, of frustration, of surrender, of trust, feelings of lust, of love, of sensuality. As dancers we use movement as a tool to express what we feel inside. Feelings that we might not express in everyday life but we dare to produce while we dance.When these inner felt senses are activate it produces a particular mood and atmosphere which could radiate PASSION.

   
• Mihai Dima First, a possible definition for passion: a positive feeling for a specific activity, associated with an unlimited desire to perform it.

  What is the origin/cause of passion? 
  I would say that passion could become alive in a person, when she/he gets across an activity which provides some actual/present or potential future reward/pleasure (positive feeling). The reward could be some already aquired ability to learn fast or to perform relatively good (which generates for example a good feeling of self confidence), the admiration provided by other people, …
  What if I did not come across such an activity? How to became passionate about a specific activity?
  In general, if someone is able to perform an action in a succesfull way, it is very likely that he/she will be passionate about it. If she/he is not able to do it succesfully, then has to train hard enough (at very low, if not zero, passion levels) in order to get good skils about the specific action. This requires persistence and strong character which, in this interesting way, appear to be linked to passion.
  Is passion useful?
  In my oppinion passion can represent a stong and key source of energy for outstanding achievements, because it helps to overcame all obstacles on the way to the top. In technical terms, a passionate person likely has already some abilities and is willing to “pay the price” for succes. These results in fast developements of the abilities, which further intensifies the passion (which increases the initial desire to work/train) and thus generates a positive feedback, which increases the moving speed on the way to top achievements.
  Least but not last, persons with at least one passion are happy. Conversely, in order to be happy, a person should find and follow at least one passion in life. Interestingly, persons with several passions are not necessarly happier than someone with only one, because the former have a quasi-permanent dilema: to which of the passions should dedicate their effort? Good problem!

   
• Ruud Vermeij From dictionary : ORIGIN Middle English: from Old French, from late Latin passio(n-) (chiefly a term in Christian theology), from Latin pati ‘suffer.’

   
• Ruud Vermeij Great clip about part of suffering from one of the greatest dancers in Ballethttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5EmVY7Qej0

  Sylvie Guillem – Evidentia

  www.youtube.com

  Sylvie speaks about doubt and emotion in her documentary ‘Evidentia’.

   
• Ruud Vermeij http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSj-cN7ReG8

   

  What is Passion?

  www.youtube.com

   
• Peter Townsend Do we need to suffer to be passionate?…… I like Sylvie Guillem’s idea that we need to be doubtful…. If we are passionate, maybe we are always searching, never finding ‘it’….. Always doubtful… Taking risks…. mmmm…..

   
• Benoit Papineau Passion is the urge to reconnect with a thing, an action or a substance that has been experienced in the past and that has given a great sensation of pleasure or fulfilment. when the thing, action or substance produces the sensation that it is impossible to live without it, it has become a passion. On the contrary, i am forced to disagree with everyone that claims that passion can not be learned. we all had to learn about that thing. act or substance that make us passionate, through direct contact. therefore, passon, like everything else, must be learned. passion is learned through pleasure or fulfilment caused by direct contact. Passion is a combination. it is something we know, combined with our known urge for it.

   
• Mihai Dima One more question: can we transmit a passion to other people? I would say “yes”, through our example, but only if we have it (if we are passionate about something). From this perspective, we can create passion in others. This should be one part of the mission of a teacher/professor/mentor, whereas the other part should be “to inspire people” … great challenge!