Something my students hear from me ALL. THE. TIME.:

“Engage your core! Stretch up!”

Two of the most important things in dancing is stabilizing your core and maintaining posture. And actually stabilizing your core helps you maintain good posture.

I say this to my students almost every day, because until you build up perfect habit of good posture and core, you need to be reminded of it. Because when I teach dance, I teach little bits of technique at a time. I take you through stages. I create small individual habits at a time, and eventually build on more. The brain gets overwhelmed trying to focus on multiple things at once. So even if I taught my students good posture on day (which I usually try to start building this habit at the very beginning of their dance journey), whenever I teach a new technique to them, a lot of times they focus on the new technique and they lose their posture.

Why?

Because most of us spend our days hunched over a desk. When I was in school working two jobs and taking overloaded credits, I spent almost 12 hours a day hunched over a desk. In order to have good posture in your dancing, you must have good posture in your everyday life. You have to constantly remind yourself. And trust me it will help you later in life as you age as well.

It is amazing no matter what I am working on with a student or what the problem that we’re currently trying to solve is, a lot of times if I remind them to engage their core and stretch up, it immediately fixes a lot of their issues. If you don’t have good core and good posture, then nothing else in your dancing is ever going to feel good or work as optimally as we would like.

So what should that look/feel like when we dance?

Pull your belly button towards your spine. Don’t feel like you crunch or contract your abs. That will actually curve your spine and make you hunch over. Rather you want to feel like you just straighten your spine. Your spine has a natural curve to it, and we want to elongate and flatten the spine as much as possible. Exercise : stand with your heels and back against a wall. Notice the curve in your spine/gap where your back doesn’t touch the wall. Pull your belly button towards the wall/your spine, and notice how you back flattens against the wall. That is what you want to feel when you dance

Don’t feel like you crunch or contract your abs. That will actually curve your spine and make you hunch over. Rather you want to feel like you just straighten your spine. Your spine has a natural curve to it, and we want to elongate and flatten the spine as much as possible. Elongate the spine. Going back to my ballet teacher from when I was a little girl: “Feel like there is a string at the top of your head pulling up towards the ceiling.” Think tall.

Going back to my ballet teacher from when I was a little girl: “Feel like there is a string at the top of your head pulling up towards the ceiling.” Think tall. Head Weight : Thinking of the string at the top of your head also pulls your head back to be in line with the spine. We normally stand with our head slightly in front of our spine. Your head weight is very important in dancing, as it can throw you or your partner off balance. You want to keep it out of your partner’s dance space especially in smooth/standard, so stretch it up and back to be in line with your spine.

: Thinking of the string at the top of your head also pulls your head back to be in line with the spine. We normally stand with our head slightly in front of our spine. Your head weight is very important in dancing, as it can throw you or your partner off balance. You want to keep it out of your partner’s dance space especially in smooth/standard, so stretch it up and back to be in line with your spine. Flatten your back: along with flattening our spine, feel as though your entire back is flat. Focus on your shoulder blades. We normally stand with them slightly “pinched.” For those of us who are skinny, like me, they stick out like back wings. It’s not attractive. You want to feel as though they spread out to the sides of your back. Exercise #1: Stand with your hands down by your side. For most of us, when we stand with our arms hanging down, our palms are on the outside of our thighs facing in. Take your hands and place them so your palms are facing the front of your side. Notice your shoulder blades spread out! Exercise #2: Remember the sit-and-reach from gym class. Try just putting your arms out in front of your but don’t really “stretch”, just sort of leave them in neutral. Now try to reach as far as you can. You will feel your shoulder blades spread out. Notice this gives you a little more rope in your arms and frame. Ever dance with someone and you get caught under their arm trying to do a turn (like cradle to hammerlock?), most likely someone wasn’t stretching their arms from their back. Pro Tip: Pro female Smooth/Standard dancers don’t arch their back to create shaping, actually their back is very flat and elongated. It’s an illusion.

along with flattening our spine, feel as though your entire back is flat. Focus on your We normally stand with them slightly “pinched.” For those of us who are skinny, like me, they stick out like back wings. It’s not attractive. You want to feel as though they

Core Exercises for Dancers

I think core exercises are the most necessary exercises a dancer needs to do to supplement their dancing, and it does not require a gym! Although yes there are fancy ab machines, you don’t really need them to create a stable core. I train abs about 3-4 days a week, and I usually only do body weight exercises. Every once in a while I will do kettle bell oblique side crunches.

Here is my go to ab workout:

Here are some other great ab resources for dancers!