This blog is about changing perspective. Specifically the way the world views pole fitness but in my mind, even more important, is changing the way WE view pole. Let me explain. We are all part of a wonderful community that encourages, challenges and enhances our fitness prowess. But how do we gain the best experience while ensuring we are achieving the best results?
Many times students have come to me to ask when they will learn a particular trick. This is a common experience among instructors in pole. Often these moves are three or four steps further than where the student’s learning is. As in all sports, there is a natural progression to get to certain moves.  In pole fitness we can use the example that you can’t go from an extended butterfly directly to an iron X without some learning in between. In fact, when I was a student I too was impatient and wanted to learn more and more tricks. My instructor Serena would always tell me that we would get there. But she also ensured I focused on getting the moves I knew at point as perfectly as I could before moving on to the next. After a few months of hearing this, I started to realize that she was right. What was the point of knowing a lot tricks but none of them well? What exactly had I accomplished other than being ok at pole? Didn’t I want to be great at it?
It is only natural to want to expand your repertoire as quickly. However, remember it is also important to make the moves you are working on as clean and fluid as possible to ensure a solid foundation. Our curriculum is built to create a learning plan that will move you in the right direction so you can achieve even the loftiest goals. I never imagined that I would learn what I have in a relatively short amount of time. It gives me a great sense of accomplishment when my instructor tells me what a beautiful dancer I have become. At the end of the day, I realized that learning something to the best of my abilities is far better than knowing it a bit and moving on to the next moves before mastering the previous ones.
Remember that pole is not a destination but a journey, a really fun one at that!