Changing Lives through Dancing by David Woodbury
Arthur Murray Santa Monica
I’m not a medical doctor, but I have seen dancing heal a lot of broken hearts and bodies.
I’ve had students who had truly bad physical hearts. They had experienced strokes, high blood pressure, fainting spells, open heart surgery(s). Many were on a handful of medications and they could not breathe well.
As a young teacher, I experienced seeing and witnessing many dancers who we just at the brink of giving up. Then, as they began to dance, their stamina would improve. They could increase from a half lesson to a full lesson. They could go from 1 minute of dancing to 5 minutes of dancing. Illness seems to affect the memory. After dancing for a stretch of time, my student’s memories began to improve. So much for some that some could dance routines and remember sequences.
I had a brilliant student with vertigo and epilepsy. She was amazing, a graduate from Columbia in NY. I was honored to teach her for 9 years. One of her many fantastic qualities, was that she could take her school figure tests with music alone. That means, for her levels of graduation at Arthur Murray, she would, by herself, dance a pattern sequence, or many sequence patters, alone, with music, unassisted.
During her tests, students and staff, management and owners would sit and watch her performing her patterns, then perfectly dancing the freestyle portion of the dance steps together with me.
One her Gold Star International Standard exam, she danced all her patterns perfectly alone. The reason this is so phenomenal, is that just one school figure filled a sheet of paper in 8-point font! Now, she could barely walk at times, and walked around the studio in her little sweaters and low black work shoes. But when in her dancing heels, off came the sweater and she performed perfectly, then slowly walk to her seat, put on her sweater and return to her ‘normal’. It was miraculous what dancing did for her. She changed my life and I remember her each and every day.
I had a student, for this blog let’s call her Ethel, who was a Full Gold Arthur Murray amateur competitor. Ethel had a stroke that paralyzed her left side, left mouth, left arm and part of her left side. She was able to walk.
As soon as Ethel could come in, she came back in for lessons. She had to put her left hand into her belt to hold it up. Now, I had taught Ethel for years, and she had a sailor’s mouth. We spoke to each other as only dance partners and friends could speak. I said to her, How are you today?, and she then as strongly as she possible could, she cussed at me. But I saw her left hand move a bit! (She was trying to swing at me!).
Weeks later, as we continued danced, I would complain about her dancing and she would get so mad that she began to enunciate some very choice words to me, fully using both sides of her mouth.
After a while, we began to put her hand on my shoulder in normal dance position. I asked to her lift up her left arm on her own and stop pulling down on me and she successfully was able to clobber me with her left hand and I clearly heard some unholy words come out of her mouth.
Well, as about a year rolled around, we were once again going to a dance competition together. Ethel’s mouth and her vocabulary were working perfectly with clean enunciation. The strength had returned to her left arm for dance position and even arm styling. As we left the competition dance floor from our first solo exhibition, Ethel quietly put her left arm around me and gave me a squeeze without saying a word. That was one of the best dancing moments of my dancing career. It was one of the best moments of my life.
I had known and danced with someone who was whole, then partially paralyzed, then back on the dance floor again through the magic of dance. Her heart had given out, but she had healed, and she danced again.
My last story for this blog is about another advanced student, Rena. Rena was a Gold Bar Student and went to big dance competitions all the time. Then, she was stuck by a cab. The surgeon pulled her through. Rena returned to the studio as soon as she could. Her hip surgery had taken off two inches from her left side and she had a pronounced walk. But, when Rena began to dance, the height difference DISAPPEARED and she danced beautifully with not a trace of a limp or a wobble. She would blow everyone out off the dance floor with her performances, bow, then hobble off the floor. Many would cry as they watched her and saw her courage and how she had healed. She had a great story (with no swear words!)
That’s the last story for this blog. If you heart, body, soul, spirit are broken, crushed, wounded or hurt in any way, I implore you to try dancing. There is a wonderful power and healing from moving with the music. Not only have I seen the magic, I experience this magic all the time still in my own life, and I see it every time I enter our Arthur Murray School.
My next blog will feature two of my favorite stories. My experience of teaching a blind student, then a profoundly deaf student. Can’t wait to share these stories with you all.
This blog sends love and all the joy of dancing to you.
Thanks for reading. Keep on Dancing. Don’t give up. It will get better.
Love to you all,
David Woodbury – Co-Franchisee of Arthur Murray Santa Monica, CA