Our New Website

There are big changes coming to Oxygen Tango! The first is our awesome new studio space. The second, is this website! 

Please let us know if you notice any problems or missing features, or have a suggestion for a future update! :) 

“There is nothing so stable as change.”

— Bob Dylan

I just love this picture! 

Thank you!  

Your Happy Tango Admin

How To Create A Partner: Ten Ideas

Sixth Article in It Takes One to Tango Series

“I’d like to, but I don’t have a partner.”

I have heard this sentence so many times and I would like to tell everyone the following:

“If you don’t have a partner, create a partner.” 

Here are some things you can do in Tango to create a partner:

1. Learn the other role. Now you have twice as many potential partners.
2. Buy some sticks and practice with them, at home or at practica. Imagining a partner is the first step to creating them.
3. Help a beginner- or anyone you think is “not as good as you” in Tango. Practice with them. Put some real good quality energy into it - try to understand them, help them, visualize them improving. Now you have a partner.
4. Invent a project that requires two people for it to be accomplished. For instance, let’s say you want to reconstruct 30 seconds of a performance you like on YouTube. Or, you want to take a particular workshop with someone. It is far easier to find a partner when you have a specific thing you want that partner to do with you.
5. Talk to people who have partners and ask them how they established their partnership and what specific things they do to sustain its creative momentum.  
6. Whose dancing do you admire? Ask them what kind of music they like, and which videos they watch. Then listen to that music, and watch those videos. Studying Tango in detail gets you closer to the wavelength of people who work regularly with partners.
7. Practice on your own! This creates a powerful intention.
8. Try to find TWO or three partners instead of just one partner. Paradoxically, this might make it easier to find a partner.
9. Spend time socially in groups eating and drinking before or after Tango events. It is easier to find out who will be a synchronous partner, when you know them in a variety of contexts. Stick around til the end of the Practica, and join the group of people going out to eat, or say, “Hey, anyone want to go grab a bite with me?”
10. Be around as much as possible. Just being around allows people to learn about each other, and ideas for creative partnership to develop.  

There is so much love and creativity out there, and so many people who want to be part of exploring it together with you. Let's get over our little shynesses and get into the real problems and adventures of creating together. Love, Mitra

New Skills for Conscious Community: How Non-Violent Communication Can Help

BOOK REVIEW BY MITRA MARTIN

Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall Rosenberg, Ph. D. 

If you have ever found yourself saying, even just inside yourself, let’s say, while scrolling through the Facebook, “These people are SO annoying.” “I can’t stand her.” or just sighing, "Man." Or if you ever find yourself plotting microrevenge, “I won’t invite them again” or whatever...you need this book.

Here are some situations - on and off the dance floor - where what I learned from reading this book helps me find more peace: 

• When I am sad or scared - learning how to give myself empathy

• When I am with someone who is upset - learning how to give empathy in a constructive way

• When I am stressed out and working with someone who is stressed out - learning new patterns to replace reactive or resisting ones

• When I am feeling happy about something - learning how to appreciate without being manipulative

Those things happen almost every day, especially when we are living and working as part of an active, dynamic, growing, changing community! So I find plenty of times to practice and plenty of times to be grateful for what I'm learning here. 

Reading this book helped me realized how tricky language is, and how easy it is to unwittingly commit microviolences that make life more of a bummer than it needs to be. It doesn’t have to. All we need to do is to learn.

The book's incredibly user-friendly, too. It has excellent summaries and pithy callouts, it has useful reference lists and even very challenging self-quizzes! The writing is clear and humble and enriched by Rosenberg’s personal experiences generously shared. There are transcripts of actual conversation between people, with commentary, that are revelatory and really easy to relate to.

I am so grateful for the tremendous introspective work of Marshall Rosenberg, expressed in this book; for his calm and lucid writings and the recordings of his workshops and lectures; for the gentle force of his vision now expressed in organizations founded through and through on the pillars of peace and freedom, on the basic idea finding ways to get everyone’s needs met. He died last month. I think humanity has no idea yet how much he contributed to its possibility for success. 

NVC is not just about words. It’s about kindling the underlying feeling, the mood of peace, stillness, and a true devotion to finding creative ways to serve everyone. And that’s actually more important than whatever words you say. Sometimes, it’s about learning that voicing your inner experiences of others is more functional than keeping it all inside. 

Fundamentally, I believe it is about enlarging your heart - a truly deep project - so that you can function creatively even when you’re really stressed on the inside. I hope this book will inspire you. Love, Mitra