We’re a MOVEMENT movement

The idea for Dance in Transit started two years ago with several guerilla dance attacks on skytrain platforms and trains and outside stations.  We played music and danced and tried to encourage passersby to participate.  In a city as reserved as Vancouver and a country as cautious as Canada, this was no small feat.  We didn’t manage to draw huge crowds, but we believed in the idea of building community and engaging people in the joyful act of dancing.

So we put on our thinking caps, did some research, and worked (and worked!) on formalizing the Dance in Transit concept into a moving dance party.  The 2017 Dance in Transit project is the largest and longest dance event in Vancouver history.

We encourage you to jump onboard and dance with us.  It will be your most unforgettable summer ever!

Do you know HOW good dancing is for you?

For centuries, dance manuals and other writings have raved about the health benefits of dancing, usually as physical exercise. More recently we’ve seen research on further health benefits of dancing, such as stress reduction and increased serotonin level, with its sense of well-being.

Most recently we’ve heard of another benefit: Frequent dancing apparently makes us smarter.

A major study added to the growing evidence that stimulating one’s mind by dancing can ward off Alzheimer’s disease and other dementia, much as physical exercise can keep the body fit. Dancing also increases cognitive acuity at all ages.

Scientists studied cognitive activities such as reading books, writing for pleasure, doing crossword puzzles, playing cards, and playing musical instruments. And they studied physical activities like playing tennis or golf, swimming, bicycling, dancing, walking for exercise, and doing housework.

One of the surprises of the study was that almost none of the physical activities appeared to offer any protection against dementia. There can be cardiovascular benefits, of course, but the focus of this study was the mind.

There was one important exception: the only physical activity to offer protection against dementia was frequent dancing:

Reading – 35% reduced risk of dementia

Bicycling and swimming – 0%

Doing crossword puzzles at least four days a week – 47%

Playing golf – 0%

Dancing frequently – 76%. That was the greatest risk reduction of any activity studied, cognitive or physical.

What could cause these significant cognitive benefits? Neuroplasticity created by increased complexity of neuronal synapses. Like education, participation in mentally engaging activities lowers the risk of dementia by improving these neural qualities. Our brain constantly rewires its neural pathways, as needed. If it doesn’t need to, then it won’t.

The key here is emphasis on the complexity of our neuronal synapses. More is better. Do whatever you can to create new neural paths. The opposite of this is taking the same old well-worn path over and over again, with habitual patterns of thinking and living.

The focus is creative thinking, to find as many alternative paths as possible to a creative solution. Those who spent their lives trying different mental routes each time, creating a myriad of possible paths, still have several paths left.

As the study shows, we need to keep as many of those paths active as we can, while also generating new paths, to maintain the complexity of our neuronal connections.

Why dancing? And what kind of dancing?

Why dancing?

We immediately ask two questions:

  • Why is dancing better than other activities for improving mental capabilities?
  • Does this mean all kinds of dancing, or is one kind of dancing better than another?

The essence of intelligence is making decisions. The best advice, when it comes to improving your mental acuity, is to involve yourself in activities which require split-second rapid-fire decision making, as opposed to rote memory (retracing the same well-worn paths), or just working on your physical style.

One way to do that is to learn something new. Not just dancing, but anything new. Don’t worry about the probability that you’ll never use it in the future.

Take a class to challenge your mind. It will stimulate the connectivity of your brain by generating the need for new pathways. Difficult classes are better for you, as they will create a greater need for new neural pathways.

Then take a dance class, which can be even more effective. Dancing integrates several brain functions at once — kinesthetic, rational, musical, and emotional — further increasing your neural connectivity.

What kind of dancing?

Do all kinds of dancing lead to increased mental acuity? No, not all forms of dancing will produce the same benefit, especially if they only work on style, or merely retrace the same memorized paths. Making as many split-second decisions as possible, is the key to maintaining our cognitive abilities. Remember: intelligence is what we use when we don’t already know what to do.

We wish that 25 years ago the Albert Einstein College of Medicine thought of doing side-by-side comparisons of different kinds of dancing, to find out which was better. But we can figure it out by looking at who they studied: senior citizens 75 and older, beginning in 1980. Those who danced in that particular population were former Roaring Twenties dancers (back in 1980) and then former Swing Era dancers (today), so the kind of dancing most of them continued to do in retirement was what they began when they were young: freestyle social dancing — basic foxtrot, waltz, swing, and maybe some rumba and cha cha.

If you watch dancers on a dance floor, you almost never see memorized sequences or patterns on the dance floor. You mostly see easygoing, fairly simple social dancing — freestyle lead and follow. But freestyle social dancing isn’t that simple! It requires a lot of split-second decision-making, in both the Lead and Follow roles.

Who benefits more, women or men?

Who benefits more, women or men?

In social dancing, the Follow role automatically gains a benefit, by making hundreds of split-second decisions as to what to do next, sometimes unconsciously so. Women don’t simply follow, they interpret the signals their partners are giving them, and this requires intelligence and decision-making, which is active, not passive.

This benefit is greatly enhanced by dancing with different partners, not always with the same one. With different dance partners, you have to adjust much more and be aware of more variables. This is great for staying smarter longer.

But men, you can also match her degree of decision-making if you choose to do so.

Here’s how:

  1. Really pay attention to your partner and what works best for her. Notice what is comfortable for her, where she is already going, which signals are successful with her and which aren’t, and constantly adapt your dancing to these observations. That’s rapid-fire, split-second decision making.
  2. Don’t lead the same old patterns the same way each time. Challenge yourself to try new things each time you dance. Make more decisions more often.
  3. The huge side-benefit is that your partners will have much more fun dancing with you when you are attentive to their dancing and constantly adjusting for their comfort and continuity of motion. And as a result, you’ll have more fun, too.

Get Engaged!

Those who fully utilize their intelligence in dancing, at all levels, love the way it feels. Spontaneous leading and following both involve entering a flow state. Both leading and following benefit from a highly active attention to possibilities.

That’s the most succinct definition for intelligent dancing: a highly active attention to possibilities. 

The best Leads appreciate the many options that the Follow must consider every second, and respect and appreciate the Follow’s input into the collaboration of partner dancing. The Follow is finely attuned to the here-and-now in relaxed responsiveness, and so is the Lead.

Once this highly active attention to possibilities, flexibility, and alert tranquility are perfected in the art of dance partnering, dancers find it even more beneficial in their other relationships, and in everyday life.

Dance often

Studies make another important suggestion: do it often. Seniors who did crossword puzzles four days a week had a measurably lower risk of dementia than those who did the puzzles once a week. If you can’t take classes or go out dancing four times a week, then dance as much as you can. More is better. 

And do it now, the sooner the better. It’s essential to start building your cognitive reserve now so don’t wait — start building it now.

-From Richard Powers, Stanford Dance

Dance is not just a hobby or passion–it’s a lifestyle

It’s also a good workout.

In addition to unleashing creativity, dance is a way to alleviate daily stresses and bring happiness to those who embrace it.  Dance is an escape from reality; you can lose yourself in the music & movement.

It’s never too late to benefit from dancing, and you don’t have to be a professional to reap its rewards.

Enrolling in dance classes after work is a great way to incorporate dancing into your life. Soon, you can be dancing down the pathway to happiness.

Psychology Today says dancing makes you happier than working out the gym or going for a run. A study conducted at the University of London involved patients dealing with anxiety disorders. Patients dedicated time to one of the following therapeutic environments: an exercise class, a dance class, a math class, or a music class.

Out of all the activities, the dance class was the one environment that reduced anxiety a significant amount.

Another benefit of dancing frequently is that it stimulates the mind and sharpens cognitive skills at every age. Dancing stimulates different brain activities at the same time, including emotional, rational, kinesthetic, and musical. This increases the way your brain functions in a positive way.

So—dancing is a fun activity with a wealth of health benefits that keeps us in shape, makes us feel good, and makes us smarter! What could be better than that?