You CAN Cry while you dance

Kimberly Han
2 min readJan 5, 2021

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I became an Argentine tango instructor at the age of 19. I couldn’t have known that I’d also become a mediator for couples blaming each other for not executing dance moves perfectly, or a cheerleader for students to help them build confidence to connect with total strangers.

Found this photo on a google image search

As time went on, I moved into finance, then technology, then building communities globally, and back to coaching; not so different from what I used to do as a tango teacher. All the while, I never stopped dancing.

If I wasn’t dancing tango, I’d be dancing zouk, or salsa, or contact improv, or ecstatic dance, belly dance or simply dancing on a mountaintop with the sunset as my dance partner. I danced to the sunset every day since quarantine started until it began to snow. Dance has been my therapy, my love, my medicine, and my passion.

Today Esther’s newsletter on eroticism said “we can’t cry when we dance.” This was the third time I’m seeing this claim, which I disagreed with months ago when I heard her on the Tim Ferris Podcast. The first time I heard her say this, I stopped walking on the treadmill, and decided I’d write to Esther “at some point,” coming from a fan and a fellow dancer.

A group of 4 people and I meet every week to discuss her online course “Rekindling Desire,” and there it was again! In one of her lessons, she said it. again: “You can’t cry while dancing.” One group member was also a dance instructor, and we had a passionate discussion.

Both of us have cried and witnessed a LOT of crying while dancing! Tango or otherwise.

Found this photo on a google image search

In fact, one of my most healing moments was on the ecstatic dance floor 1.5 years ago, heart broken, and sobbing and ugly crying all the while dancing, moving, breathing, sobbing more, for a full hour. I was completely in my process and several people came up to me afterward to thank me for my courage, and also that my expression gave them permission to do so as well. I left feeling more aligned, more clear, and in less pain. I’m a proponent of dancing, AND I’m a proponent of crying, but I know for certain you can both dance AND cry at the same time.

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