The Trouble With Switching Roles
Posted on: July 27, 2012
- In: leading
- 20 Comments
I got so disgusted with my leading last night. See, here’s the problem…
Normally, I’m a follow. So when I try to lead things, if the person following me doesn’t follow me just perfectly, I tend to revert right back to my normal role. Then I start following my follow and doing whatever she was inadvertently backleading.
I know I need to just press manfully on with what I was trying to lead and give the follow a chance to pick up on it. But in order to do that I have to overcome a whole bunch of training. See, followers are trained to be responsive, and that’s not such a helpful skill when you’re trying to lead something.
I’m sure it’s exactly the same thing, in reverse, with leads who try to follow. As soon as their leader gives them any sort of opening, I’m sure it’s very easy for them to just jump in and start leading things without waiting to be led. Am I right?
Now, it just doesn’t make sense that as a leader, the only people I can lead are the ultra-accomplished, super-responsive followers. I should be able to lead normal followers or even beginners. I really want to be able to do this. But beginners who try to follow me just end up getting confused.
Yet I don’t want to overcompensate and turn into some kind of roughhousing armbreaker. Just as, I’m sure, leaders learning to follow don’t want to turn into passive noodle-armers.
Anyone else having this problem? Does anyone out there have any good advice?
20 Responses to "The Trouble With Switching Roles"
July 27, 2012 at 2:48 pm
Speaking from personal experience you have an exceptionally light touch as a follow. In my experience with most novice follows a light touch isn’t always conducive. –
Josh
July 27, 2012 at 3:32 pm
I guess that’s my problem – I work hard at being light as a follow, and then I have to work on being the opposite as a lead. This dancing stuff is hard!
July 31, 2012 at 3:18 pm
I’m a novice follow, and firm (but still gentle) and clear is best for me.
As for the backleading, sometimes I know I’m guilty of it (for example when someone is off beat and it’s killing me inside, or they try to dance through a break), but sometimes I don’t realise I’m back-leading or anticipating, and I wouldn’t ever learn to recognise it if my lead gave in all the time.
I’m also learning to lead, as I believe it improves my dancing, and empathy for my partners. I struggle most with follows in class who are doing the steps they’ve been told to and their partner may as well not be there. Giving it away for free – sheesh 
July 27, 2012 at 2:56 pm
Consistent leading. You’ll have to stay in the lead role for a while and dancing with a wide variety of follows before muscle memory starts to get ingrained.
I’d imagine, from the few times I’ve tried following, that switching roles several times a night doesn’t really help to build up the strong foundation one needs that comes with consistent practice, since both roles have such different requirements.
Maybe do a 2/3 ratio of leading to following for the next month or so and see how that works out. For every 3 dances you go out, lead for 2 of em, all night, then follow all night on the 3rd.
Also don’t hesitate to ask other leads in the community you’re comfortable with for any tips.
July 27, 2012 at 3:36 pm
David, that 2/3 ratio thing is terrifying, but it sounds like a really good idea. Think I’m gonna try that Sunday. Thanks 
July 27, 2012 at 7:42 pm
If you lead a movement with your body, you will be very clear even to a beginner, and will avoid becoming an arm breaker. Do the movement you want them to do with your own body. Want the follow to move away from you? Move away from them. Body leading is the most clear form of leading unless you are a really advanced lead. Finally, if you work in being light as a follow, why do you believe that you have to be opposite as a lead? That just shows that you do not understand what it takes to lead. But that misunderstanding will go away as you become a better lead, which takes practice and experience.
July 27, 2012 at 8:09 pm
You know, I kind of suspected that being “light” isn’t exactly the problem – thank you for clarifying that.
I think the main challenge for me right now is just picking something to lead and sticking with it, rather than doing a lot of compromising and changing things at the last minute. And that’s more of a mental than a physical problem.
August 2, 2012 at 2:47 pm
It’s the clearest form of leading for advanced leaders too! It’s just that you can make it 1000x more subtle when you get really good.
August 2, 2012 at 3:10 pm
Actually, that is a common misconception.
For advanced leads, a body lead is not necessarily the clearest lead. A body lead may be the easiest to lead certain things clearly, but it does not imply that it is the best or even the most clear lead.
This misconception comes across because many teachers want their student leads to body lead because it is an easy way to lead clearly. So they harp on this concept to no end.
The students discover how powerful the technique is, how often it works well, and then assign it as a cure all end all in leading.
But at some point they run into a high level dancer who tells them (or they discover on their own) that like anything else in dance, one technique is not applicable to everything, or the best for every situation.
As an experiment go grab a top lead and ask them to lead something on you using a body lead or another leading technique.
Chances are that if you close your eyes you cannot tell the difference.
If you ask them which one was _easier_ for them to lead, they would likely say the body lead was. And this is often true.
But the top dancers use more than just body leading, because they know where it will fail them, or when they need to use an arm lead so that they can clearly lead something that they are not doing in their own body.
There are movements that are not easily lead with a body lead. And other movements where body leading cannot be as clear as say arm leading.
So, a better way to say this is that body leading is the easiest way for leaders to be clear in their leading. But it is incorrect to say that body leading is the clearest leading.
August 2, 2012 at 3:15 pm
But not a misconception wrt the 1000 times more subtitle! That is totally true in whatever a lead chooses to lead with!
March 10, 2013 at 2:49 pm
I agree it is the clearest form of leading but whether a beginner follow necessarily responses does often boil down to their ability to match connection. As an experienced lead i still occationally find follows with spaghetti arms that are nearly impossible to move in an open connection.
July 28, 2012 at 10:08 am
Lol! “Manfully!” ><
I learned to lead after following for many years. I really did feel that I had to change some fundamental things in order to see the leading in myself that I wanted to see.
1. Centering – I try to feel more grounded when I lead than when I follow. I still want to balance the mobility and elasticity we learn in following, but with a confident, DELIBERATELY PLACED centeredness.
2. Follow Through! This was the most useful improvement to my leading. It wasn't that I had to be more forceful, but rather, to continue and FINISH movements. Complete things, move into them with the full movement in mind.
3. And someone said it – generate energy/movements from your core, not your arms. 'How' you do that is a whole topic unto itself, but investigate that.
July 31, 2012 at 4:56 pm
Nice! The follow-through part was one I hadn’t considered.Those are all great suggestions, thanks!
July 28, 2012 at 10:18 am
It sounds like there are two things that you are at a cross roads with.
-Choosing things to lead and sticking to them. You need to have confidence that you want to do something, that it fits, it’s the best choice and that you should follow through in it. It’s the difference between answering a question with a statement or another query.
-Realizing that there are many paths to and from a movement and being open to all of them. This is what following sort of encompasses. Many leaders will not recognize this and will insist on doing the same patterns over and over again without regard to the follows suggestions of an alternative. Because you’ve spent so much time following you’re likely picking up on these suggestions, and treating them not as suggestions but as demands. Sometimes it’s great to yield, but other times you need to go back to the first point.
Lots of follows who learn to lead do the second and so feel hesitant in their leading. This is different than the feeling a of a beginner who just has no firm idea of what to do or are inconsistent in their performance. I find that I love dancing with people who figure out how to balance the two.
July 31, 2012 at 4:54 pm
I think you’ve summed up perfectly what I’m struggling with. I like your points about answering a question with a question, and treating suggestions as demands. It occurs to me that a lot of us women tend to do these things in “normal” life more than we should – maybe learning to lead could help us with assertiveness in general, and not just in our dancing. Seems plausible, doesn’t it?
July 29, 2012 at 4:17 am
If you know someone who is both an accomplished lead and follow, ask them to dance and ask to switch roles throughout the dance (purely through connection). Maybe a bit confusing at first, but it might help you to become more aware of the differences between the two, and will force you to consciously break out of the follow role and signal very clearly when you want to lead something.
I also think that paying attention and reacting to your follow (instead of “I’m going to lead this, follow’s ideas be damned”) in this way is actually a good thing! When dancing with a vocal follow, connection becomes much more of a two-way street – lots of fun!
July 30, 2012 at 1:11 pm
You’re right – I don’t want to be a little dictator with my leading, but I want to be clear and not wishy-washy. Such a fine line!
August 6, 2012 at 2:47 am
Yeah, I can have the problem too. But I think all decent leads are actually ‘following’ to a certain extent – they work with where the follow’s weight is at, their abilities, posture, etc – rather than just shouting at their partner.
But I’m actually now of the opinion that the only way to really get really good at leading (and to fight off that impulse to just ‘follow’ while leading, instead of actually remaining the lead) is to follow less and lead more. I used to think you could do both roles equally and still be decent at both, but I kind of think you have to stick with one, or do one primarily to really make your instincts work the right way.
July 27, 2012 at 2:28 pm
I’ve found as a lead learning to follow closing my eyes keeps me from jumping into those openings, though its a little odd to explain to others.
July 27, 2012 at 3:30 pm
Oh, totally – I did that a lot when I was learning to follow, and I was never sure why it helped so much, but it does!