[Callers] Moving past self-flagellation

[David Chandler]

​As you and others have suggested, there are two parts to one's response -
what you say to yourself, and what you say to the dancers. I think the
latter is more important, and it is of course affected by what you say to
yourself. Being able to respond humorously, recognizing that like everyone
else you make mistakes, apologize for them and then move on is very useful.
What has bugged me most about callers are those who get angry at the
dancers (some of whom may be slow to understand the nuances of what a
caller says, although usually it goes back to the caller's instructions) or
visibly at themselves. Who wants to spend time with a person who is
preoccupied with being angry at you or themselves for being human?

To the extent possible it can be useful to switch into a problem-solving
focus. During the dance you want to figure out quickly what went wrong
and/or what can be done to salvage it - make a correction, stop and start
over, switch to a different dance... After the dance is over there is time
for the post mortem, which seems to be what you are concerned about - what
did I do wrong, what could I have done differently? Focusing on how
terrible and inept you are takes away from problem-solving - you can't
change what has already happened. Of course I admit that this is easier as
one gets older (and has more mistakes to put into perspective). If it helps
perhaps you could keep a catalog of the mistakes made by all the callers
you respect. You're in good company!

David​


On Mon, Nov 6, 2017 at 11:10 AM, Maia McCormick via Callers <
callers at lists.sharedweight.net> wrote:

> So after a gig, I find myself haunted by one or two missteps from an
> evening — the rolling start that was a little muddy, the thing I didn’t
> teach clearly enough so the dancers never quite got it — even though the
> dancers adjusted and all had a good time, and I still had the hall’s trust
> and goodwill at the end of the evening.
>
> Is this a familiar experience for anyone? Assuming you’ve already learned
> the lesson to be learned there, how do you move past it and stop
> self-flagellating?Would love to hear some people’s thoughts!
>
> Cheers,
> Maia
>
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