14 Years of Zouk. Same Dancers on the Sidelines.

Bit of a reintroduction first, for anyone who landed here fresh. This is my first dance blog since June 2019. So I’m kinda back…ish!

I’m Hoi. 14 years of Brazilian Zouk under the belt. Tango was my first dance love, well before I discovered Zouk and it completely stole the show. The last 3 years or so I’ve been focused on Hip Hop and Afrobeats (fell in love with both, different energy, similar rules, they work together). And across the last 15 years I’ve dabbled in and out of basically everything you can think of. 1 year of Tango. 9 months of Salsa. 3 months of Bachata. A couple of months of Kizomba. 3 months of West Coast Swing. Plus any random class I could get my hands on just to see what’s out there. If a school offered a taster on something odd I hadn’t tried, I’d rock up.

A warning before we go further. I write how I feel and how I think, in a fairly raw manner. If you find any of this offensive, that’s fine. If you find any of it entertaining or amusing, also fine. I’m not running for mayor.

Covid was the biggest game changer

Covid was the biggest game changer for me. On paper it looked like a nice break. In reality it broke me, it broke our dance business, and it broke half of the Brazilian Zouk community who quietly moved on after 2020 and never really came back. I moved on too, for a while.

Even now, I keep it low key. I dance casually. I enjoy writing about dance and about other bits of life much more than I enjoy the politics of running a scene. There’s a reason I’ve stepped back from centre stage, and trust me, it’s a good reason. Burnout.

I’m still alive though. Still dancing. Still watching. Still thinking. Still scribbling.

An interesting conversation

I had an interesting conversation recently with a few dance friends about why Brazilian Zouk is still struggling in London. And yes, the year is now April 2026. Possibly across the world too, but I’ve not travelled anywhere near as much as I used to, so I’ll leave the global claim to someone with a fresher passport.

Just to be clear, I’m not attacking London or its dancers. I’m writing from a fair amount of observation and interaction with dancers over years of congresses, camps, workshops, socials, parties, and plenty of exploring other cities and countries along the way. Probably a bit more than the average dancer or person has had a chance to rack up.

The question that kept coming up that evening was the same question I’ve been chewing on for years. Why are dancers struggling to grow? Why are they not investing in themselves, or in the dance, or in the community? Why do so many still, in my own words, suck at dancing after years of showing up?

My honest answer?

I don’t know. Not a single clean answer anyway. It’s a multi-faceted problem.

The multi-faceted problem

Let me list the usual suspects.

Time. Priorities. Money (dancing is a bit expensive, ish, but it’s still my cheapest pastime by a long way). Practice. Ignorance. Inflated ego. Not having access to good teachers (sometimes, not always). Lack of practice (this one is 100% in the mix). Aptitude. Confidence to grow. Willingness to grow. Consistent practice.

Yes I wrote practice three times. On purpose!

Because practice is the common denominator under almost every one of those items. Then on top of practice you need willingness to explore. Which means willingness to make mistakes and to learn from them. Which means willingness to sit with discomfort and not quit. Practice isn’t doing the same shit over and over without thinking. You have to think, always. It’s exploring the framework, the foundation of the movement. Trying, inspecting. Cause and effect. If I do this, what happens?

And here’s the funny thing. Practice, exploration, mistakes, they all arrive together. Is it really a mistake when you’re exploring a movement or a sound? Like any trade, any profession, you need to know your tools and when to use them. In 360 degrees. In multiple layers, vertically and horizontally. At angles you didn’t even know existed until you tried.

I won’t go deeper into that rabbit hole here. My old blogs dive into it properly, and I’d rather point you there than retype a decade of notes. The 2016 London rant (how to avoid becoming a terrible dancer in London) still holds up. So does understanding dance growth, plateaux and bad habits, the key to effective Zouk practice, and what to practice solo. Go read those if you want the engineering of it. This post is the observation.

The same dancers on the sidelines

Here’s what I still see. Simple, frustrating, repeatable.

The same dancers standing on the sidelines. I don’t know whether they still go to class. I don’t know whether they practice at home. But they don’t change. After 5 years. After 8 years. After 11 years. Same dancer they were in year one. No progress. Same posture, same footwork, same lead, same follow, same wall-watching.

Life has a really really funny way with people like that. If you stay the same and stay complacent, you get left behind. Darwin’s law, survival of the fittest. It applies to dance scenes just as much as it applies to jobs, relationships, and running any kind of business.

I’m not a fan of wasted time. Not a fan of sitting idly either. I enjoy a relaxing drink and a good dance as much as the next human (probably more). But do I still practice? Yes! A lot. Every single day. There are skills that erode if you don’t use them, and skills are lifetime maintenance. The body and the mind have this wonderful self-cleaning system that reduces effort on anything you haven’t touched in a while. Muscle fades. Reflex fades. Recall fades. Even emotional baggage that isn’t being used quietly thins out.

Efficient. Brutal. Fair.

I’ve been there too

This isn’t a follow problem. Leads are on those sidelines just as much. I’ve watched plenty of leads do the exact same thing for years. Stand on the edge, look busy on the phone, slip off for a drink every time a song kicks in (nah, just me, most dancers don’t drink, so they don’t even have that excuse lol). Equal opportunities stagnation, lead or follow doesn’t matter.

And I really really know how hard the start is. That learning curve is frightening. You don’t know many moves. You can’t feel the musicality yet. You feel awkward. You freeze up when the music starts and worry the other person will think you’re rubbish (some might, honestly, but most couldn’t care less, they just want to dance).

I was that person. Too afraid to ask anyone for a dance. Repertoire that could fit on a Post-it note. You know what I did? I practised alone on the side. Always have. Rarely with a partner, even now.

Most people think partner dance means you need a partner to dance and practice. Not true! If you can’t dance by yourself, how do you expect to dance well with someone else? Same principle applies in life. Take care of yourself first if you want to take care of anyone else.

So if you’re stuck on the sidelines because you’re scared, here’s the uncomfortable answer. The way out isn’t waiting for the right partner, the right song, or the right mood. It’s practising on your own until your body knows what to do the moment a song kicks in. Alone. In your living room. In the corner of the floor while everyone else is dancing. Nobody cares what you’re doing over there. Trust me.

Pushing forward is the point. Not hanging in there waiting for a charity dance. Which, honestly, I hate giving. No real value in them for either side. But I’m only human, so I still hand them out sometimes (only sometimes).

What daily practice actually looks like

I’m still practising things I learned 10 years ago. There is just too much to practice. Too many angles, too many layers, too many ways a single movement can be delivered. Pick one or two things. Keep working on them. Every angle. Every day. Put it to use the moment you dance.

Sometimes it takes 3 months to integrate a single detail. Sometimes 6 months. Sometimes years. This is why any craft you learn takes a lifetime to master, if such a level even exists. What we know and can do today is the tip of the iceberg. Below the water is so much more. So much much much more.

So yeah, sometimes I sit there watching the idlers while sipping my drink and nibbling on my snacks. Dancers who don’t get it, wasting their time waiting to be asked. If they improved, they’d get more dances. They’d enjoy the art more. They’d enjoy themselves more. It’s a vicious cycle they’ve built for themselves, and no one else can climb out of it for them.

We welcome the new, we don’t forget the old

We welcome new dancers. Always. And it’s not because we’ve forgotten the old ones.

I love dancing with older dancers who are still at a similar level to mine (and still improving), or dancers who are constantly improving and changing their dance. Why? Because the dance isn’t the same twice! Every time we connect, there’s something new to explore. A new texture, a new idea, a new bit of musicality they’ve been working on. That’s fun. It’s all mindset. (There’s a book called Mindset that I recommend in my books list, and yes it applies to dance too.)

When I dance with someone who hasn’t improved in god-knows how many years, it’s the same experience every single time. Boring. Can’t connect. Can’t do much. And worse, to try and do more raises the risk of my own injury. I’ve strained my back too many times over the years forcing through bad connection to bother doing it again.

Do younger, hotter, prettier, better-looking dancers get more dances? Yeah, they do. Is that fair? Well, fair or not, it’s the reality of a social dance floor. My counter is simple. If you’re one of those dancers, use this window to improve really really quickly. Looks fade. Dances don’t have to.

And just to be clear, I don’t have time for pretty dancers who are bad for my back. If they don’t improve, I’ll seldom dance with them again. Not out of spite, just out of injury risk. I enjoy dancing through someone’s journey, I don’t enjoy reliving the same day over and over like a dance version of Groundhog Day (if you’ve ever seen the movie, great classic, must watch, one of the few I actually recommend rewatching every few years, because you only want to relive it if it’s actually good haha).

Closing thoughts

So there it is. A scribble I’ve been meaning to put down for a while.

If you see yourself in any of these sidelines-for-years lines, you already know what to do. You don’t need me or another teacher to hold your hand through it. Pick one thing. Work it. Come back next month different. That’s it. Nothing fancy, no shortcut. I know there’s more to life than dance. But if you want dance in your life, you need to give it the love, the attention, and the craving it takes to grow. You’ve got to water that plant, you know?

If you’ve been improving, keep improving. I’ll see you on the floor and I’ll happily take a dance. If you’ve been stuck for 5, 8, 11+ years, I’m not going to lie to you and tell you it’ll magically click one day. It won’t. Back to basics (for everyone, that’s your foundation), run before you can walk, stop waiting for the dance to come to you. Go find it, or get better so the dances find you!

One more thing while we’re here. If you know you’re on the sidelines, why aren’t you changing? If you don’t know you’re on the sidelines, you’re probably the punter (or the fool, as the saying goes). You don’t need me to point it out. I’m just an old troll.

I’ll keep practising. I’ll keep writing. I’ll keep dancing casually, with or without others around, and every now and again enjoying the ones who are on the progressive journey with me.

Hoi x