Salsa City Forum » News and Chat » Dating and Salsa

A lot of people here have expressed their opinions about what they think could be right or wrong. Since there is a lot of claim about Salsa dancing being a hobby, in a clear effort to make it seem rather harmless, let’s dissect it a bit. How many “hobbies” do we know which actually involve an stranger touching your body sensually?

I think it’s rather deceptive to label Salsa dancing as a hobby. All of you are very well aware of how closely Salsa dancing (and other sensual latin dances) connects to acts of seducing the opposite sex.

Those who try to justify their feelings of attraction towards their dance partner as it being just “dance attraction” and absolutely void of any sexual attraction and desire, are either fooling themselves or are afraid/embarrassed to admit to it.

It’s also interesting how many male dancers come here and tell other to “be a man and let your girl come dance with me!” In the fear that they might lose their own stock of often naive women who are unaware of this predator’s real intentions; which is seduction, and very well motivated by sexual desire.

What a ridiculous and nonsensical claim to say, if you trust your woman you wouldn’t mind her doing anything she likes. Fact of the matter is, we’re all human and people in a relationship are bound together by a mere delicate set of emotions and memories. Even the most dedicated and loving person, placed in an environment of pure fun and sensuality (with strangers) is not immune to its effects. Bad friends, wrong crowed, wrong locations all do contribute to how a person lives and changes his/her way of life.

Sorry for resuming this very old post but I have to say it’s the only one I found so far with sensible answers from people that are truly into salsa dancing or dancing in general and can potentially understand the issue that I have, especially if they have non dancing partners.

I have a long-term girlfriend who has just started a couple of months ago to take salsa lessons. She had been a closet dancer for years and now that she started she really loves it and takes every opportunity to go and dance salsa, bachata and everything else that is available.

I was completely fine at first and in reality I was the one who pushed her to do it, because I know of her passion and because I thought it would be an healthy way of being distracted and enjoying herself given that at the moment we live apart (we have been on opposide sides of the world for one year almost and for another 6 months).

One day after talking to her I decided to watch some videos of both L.A. Style salsa and bachata (damn YouTube!!) and I felt shocked to say the least and jealousy started to take hold of me.

For the past week I’ve been trying to come to terms with it, talk to her about it as much as I could, talk to people who dance (I don’t know many) and search on the internet about similar situation.

After a week of analysing myself I am truly convinced that is not a problem of trust in my gf. Please believe me that I fully and completely trust her and the idea that she might cheat on me after a passionate dance is not something that I am worried about at all(and in any case if these things have to happen not dancing will not prevent them from happening). What sparks the jealousy that is driving me insane is the idea of my gf in a passionate and sensual dance with some other guy. I believe everyone that says, it’s just a dance, it’s just 3 minutes of deep connection that finish as soon as the dance finishes. Still the idea of these 3 minutes of deep intimate connection simply kill me.

As I’ve said we have been discussing it a lot with my girlfriend and I’ve been very open about it but we are not able to find the right solution for it. The only two solutions we have are:
- for her to stop dancing
- for us to break up cause I cannot live all my life with this burning jealousy that turns my stomach completely upside down

Both solutions are not good for me. I would never ask her to stop dancing cause she loves it and it makes her truly happy. Taking it away from her will not be fair on my side and will only make both of us unhappy and our relationship weaker. We both believe that we need to encourage each other passions and not limit them and I don’t want to change this idea.

Breaking up is also the last thing we both want to do. We are both deeply in love with each other and the idea of breaking up is devastating.

I even discussed with her if maybe we could find a “compromise” (don’t people say that love is about compromise) that would involve her dropping the more “dirty” dances like bachata or similar and keep dancing the other (LA Style dancing I think with a bit of autoconvincing I can live with). She was prepared to do this but then I asked her if this would reduce the enjoyment that she had in dancing and she said “yes”. So once more this is not an option for us.

Given that you guys have probably seen this situation many times, I really hope that you can give me an advise on how to deal with the situation and find a third suitable option.

So far the best suggestion that I’ve seen is to take some salsa classes myself to learn “what it means”. I am definitely open to this and I am looking into it now but I doubt it will solve my problem. I know I’m not a natural and doing something just because your partner loves it is probably not a good solution in the long term. Besides this will definitely not stop the fact that she will dance with all the other guys when we go dancing together (also given that I will be one of the worst this will be the only way for her to learn something... ).

I really hope you will be able to help me.

Thanks!

My vote is for you to take lessons too, as an investment in your future. You don’t have to dance as well as her, you just have to dance as well as someone.

Interesting perspective from Edie the salsafreak: http://www.salsashrink.com/edie/edie6.htm

I think that if you had a few lessons yourself, then you would see & understand that the dancing Salsa is 99% of the time platonic and between friends... Salsa is a great way to make new friends...! Occasionally these friendships do develop into new romantic relationships, but no more often than relationships formed through people meeting through other social activities.

And as for the three minutes of dancing itself, and the “connection” - I never, or almost never, think about romance, would you be thinking of romance if you were dancing with a friend or family member? It’s a laugh and you enjoy it, but there really is no more to it than that.

Salsa is a great way to relax, de-stress, enjoy music, enjoy dancing & meet new people... hope you will join us!

Hi, I’m very happy to have found this thread! My husband & I have been happily married for over 18 yrs. I began taking an interest in salsa dancing about 10 yrs ago. My husband thought it was fun, but simply wasn’t interested in really learning how to lead etc. Finally, I started taking lessons over a year ago. He’d been to a few of the salsa socials and thought it was a great way for me to workout & have fun. As in everything, there are pro’s & con’s to be weighed. Personally, I hardly ever bachata. If and when I do its with someone who already knows I DON’T DANCE CLOSE. If someone asks me to dance that I don’t know. I ALWAYS tell them. It has worked nicely and neither my husband or I have had any issue’s about my going dancing.

Tornado has the right answer. I’m surprised no one is responding to him (or her?) at all. Again, all of this talk about “trust” is annoying; no one who loves you would ask you to extend your faith towards them every Saturday night. Sadly, the anonymity of today’s city allows for these sort of situations to crop up.

Also, for a lot of you talking up Salsa as the ‘be all and end all’ “hobby” LOL, replace the word Salsa with any other competitive sport, and see if your paragraph makes the least bit of sense after you re-read it. Try ‘Olympic Weightlifting’ and see how it goes.

The only other venue I’ve seen such demands of trust be extended are swingers and porn. “It’s only just sex”. Yeah, right.

Also the last statement Tornado mentions is very applicable to more slimy domains, like politics, but it’s not like the club scene can’t be a slimy scene anyways:

Don’t like die with dogs and not expect to get fleas.

Or more importantly

You are a reflection of the company you keep.

A lot of ppl (including myself I’ll admit) are afraid of confrontation, lest they lose somebody special to them. Needless to say, they’re putting themselves into positions which ensure they will lose their faith in their SO (spouse, girlfriend, bf). If you’re not willing to stand up for your own beliefs and values, expect them to be trampled upon.

The beaches in Hawaii are great during the day, but at night I now crave Salsa and Bachatta.

I have freestyle danced to everything from the Beatles, to the Doors, to Michael Jackson and Devo, and even danced semi-pro in a Philadelphia nightclub cage 20 years ago. This past spring my new room-mate from So-Cali (a 9 year salsa/tango dancer) introduced me to the Ballroom and Latin dance scene. I fell in love with it (and her) immediately.

YES, I admit that sometimes she dances Rumba or Bachatta way too close to a very experienced ‘non-salsa class member’ and I have to bite my tongue, but this is her world and I am only a clumsy beginner, so if it makes her happy to dance with a good lead, then it makes me happy.

We have discussed the closeness and undulating of their bodies at times and she simply replies, “YES, sometimes I feel THEM pressing into me, but to me its like dancing with a log! If they come too close, I push them away unless they are a really great dancer, but I never go home with them.” (Well, maybe once or twice she admitted.)

She looks so happy and beautiful out there on the dance floor, how can I get mad?

If she needs to be rescued, she knows where I am...

So the compromise is made. I certainly don’t want to spend the rest of the night brooding and arguing during the drive home, so I just dance with all the pretty girls I can (mostly beginners like me in Bachatta) and get my own blood boiling.

In the end, we both leave together and we both had a great time dancing.

Keep in mind that although we are just friends and room-mates, that chemistry found on the dancefloor did one night follow us all the way to the bedroom... So we both were winners! :)

“We have discussed the closeness and undulating of their bodies at times and she simply replies, “YES, sometimes I feel THEM pressing into me, but to me its like dancing with a log! If they come too close, I push them away unless they are a really great dancer, but I never go home with them.” (Well, maybe once or twice she admitted.)”

Oh lol, it’s like a giant warning sign right there. Trust me bud, if she needs rescuing, she’ll call her experienced “non-salsa class member”.

The whole premise behind social dancing is to get guys to lead and show authority (e.g. Be competent at dance, and have him enforce his competence to get a girl to follow) to get girls interested in them. I never realized we’d come to a point where guys would willingly give up reins to a flimsy safety net like “faith in love” to let their ladies dance close salsa with anyone. It’s like putting meat in front of a hungry dog and hoping it doesn’t eat it. Not a reasonable course of action at all.

Hi, my names is Katy and I live in London. I love salsa and its been my Passion for 3 years. However, the problem I have is my boyfriend. We’ve been together for a few months. He isn’t into salsa at all and he can’t control his feeling that when I go dancing other guys touch me. Does it sound possessive? I tried to explain to him what salsa means to me and that since I’m in a relationship I don’t flirt with others and that most of the people don’t dance for the sale of touring someone and flirting. He even tried to learn salsa but he can’t stand it. I love him, that’s why I limited my salsa parties for him and he’s more happy with me going every few weeks. But I still feel like there’s something missing. I don’t feel comfortable dancing, thinking of him being jealous but I won’t give up salsa completely. What should I do, does this relationship makes sense if I love him? If he’s jealous he should try to dance with me sometimes but he just hates dancing!