Dearest readers,

Happy Tuesday! In today’s blog, I want to express my heartfelt appreciation for dance, and how this art form has shaped my life and identity in the most profound way.

Before I was a dancer, I competed in rhythmic gymnastics for 10 years, and I achieved my long-time dream of making the 2012 Junior Olympic team. Shortly after that career highlight, I suffered a knee injury that ended my gymnastics career abruptly. I was depressed for nearly two years following, not knowing who I was without the sport I had dedicated my life to since age 5. This was my first experience with mental health challenges, and I decided to go to therapy at age 16 to heal from the psychological trauma of the injury. I worked with a keenly empathetic therapist, Zoe Gillispie, who helped me rebuild my identity from scratch, overcome my depression and anxiety, and find a new passion.

I knew I wanted to remain an athlete, as movement was, and remains, an integral part of my life and identity at large, and it’s something I happen to be good at. The exploration post-gymnastics took me to synchronized swimming, diving, and lyrical/contempory/jazz dance, and contortion. I quickly realized I was not cut out for water sports, despite my affinity towards water and hydrotherapy. While other styles of dance intrigued me, I did not resonate with these movement styles, as I never had the long limbs and lines that are tacit requirements of these styles. I had potential to become a contortionist, but I was not naturally flexible and had to work twice as hard as other contortionists to fold my body in half. So, no-go for that one.

One month before my 17th birthday, I discovered Latin ballroom dancing. It was love at first dance, and I took my very first private Latin lesson on Valentine’s Day of 2015– how very poetic. I fell in love with this fiery, passionate, sizzling dance style, and little did I know that I’d pursue a career as a ballroom dancer.

Well, fast-forward to 10 years later, I am still dancing my heart out. I have competed and performed on the DanceSport circuit and once had aspirations to become the next World Champion Latin dancer. I trained hard, just as I had in gymnastics, spending 6+ hours a day at the studio drilling technique and choreography. My hard work paid off– I improved rapidly, in large part because of my training as a rhythmic gymnast. My body was coordinated, strong, and flexible, and it was just a matter of learning a new language of movement. Latin dance is the hardest thing I have ever learned, even harder than gymnastics, I’d argue. It is as intellectually challenging as it is physically demanding. We talk a lot about “body mechanics” in Latin dance– how all parts of your body, your feet, knees, hips, back, move in conjunction with each other. Everything in your body is connected. We strive to move like a leopard– feline, graceful, sensual, powerful, beautiful. This art form… it is so freakin’ beautiful. And when you add a partner to the mix, you can create some really cool shit. That’s how my first teacher described it: you can do more with two bodies than one.

Unfortunately, my competitive ballroom career did not pan out as I expected. I struggled to find the right dance partner, which is infinitely harder than finding a boyfriend, and the Bay Area does not have many male ballroom prospects– they’re either too young, too old, or not committed enough. These days, I do more teaching than performing, which is, in some ways, more fulfilling. You’re empowering others with tools and skills to feel confident in the way they move, and that confidence translates directly to your life off the ballroom floor. Dance has been a bridge to many beautiful connections and friendships in my life. It blasted me out of my social anxiety and I wouldn’t be the performer and artist I am without dance as a thematic metaphor that guides me through the tumultuous tides of life. Mental illness was the hand I was dealt, but dance plays an important role in keeping me stable and mentally healthy. When I’m feeling perturbed or angsty or dysregulated, I strap on my dance heels and improvise to my favorite songs from the comfort of my living room. It’s a way for me to find solace amidst uncertainty, for dance has remained the one constant in my life– besides writing– that anchored me to sanity when my mind betrayed me. Dance is my best friend, my truest love, and I cannot envision my life without it.

I look back on my life and all the opportunities and connections dance brought into my life. I danced my way through college, one of the most volatile times of my life. I established my identity as the “sexy Latin dancer” on campus and earned the respect and admiration of my UCLA peers. I founded my own dance club, Bruin Burlesque, during my third year of college, and thus sparked my entrepreneurial spirit that inspired me to found three companies in my twenties. The club lives on to this day, and in April, I was invited back to UCLA to be honored as the founder of Bruin Burlesque at their annual cabaret. What a gift that was. I felt so loved, so fulfilled, to see my vision of the club come to fruition.

In 2021, I began my fitness career as a dance cardio teacher at Bay Club Redwood Shores. I loved sharing my unbridled passion for the art form with my community, and I loved making dance as accessible and fun to beginner dancers– indeed, my speciality is working with beginners. I started teaching at a professional ballroom studio as well, and I choreographed first dances for wedding couples, and got good at it really fast. To this day, I operate my own wedding dance choreography business, and it has been a joy to be a part of a couple’s celebration of love. Also at this ballroom studio, I met a wonderful lady who took my dance class, and she happened to be a yoga teacher. Thus sparked my introduction to yoga, yet another life-changing practice that lies on the top shelf of my toolbox for emotional regulation. Seven months after starting yoga, I decided to become a yoga teacher, and in 2022, I began teaching yoga.

My reputation as a dance and yoga teacher grew in the Bay Area, and the opportunities to teach kept popping up effortlessly. Yoga is what brought me to the corporate sphere– I weaseled my way into the tech world by teaching yoga at Oracle and Google. While doing my teacher training, I was struck with inspiration– what if I put all these vinyasa flows I’m learning to music? And make yoga feel more like a dance? Yoga2Music was born, and it’s a new style of yoga that combines dance and yoga into a unique practice, where the music plays a huge role in guiding the pace and energy of the class. I currently teach Yoga2Music at a few different gyms and studios, and am presently working to trademark this brand and grow it into the next “Zumba”– yoga edition. That is the vision, and if you’re curious to see what Yoga2Music is all about, stay tuned for the online course.

While teaching at Oracle, I connected with a teacher at the neighboring high school, D-Tech, and they have a unique program called Intersession. Three times a year, students take a two-week break from academic coursework and take 2 electives of their choosing. I wanted to teach dance and yoga at the high school, and so, it happened. Sharing my passion with kids has been one of the most fulfilling things I have ever done. You are inspiring and empowering young, impressionable minds, and there is a lot of hope when working with the kids. They are the future, and you are playing a role in shaping their confidence, skillset, and identity. Yet another way dance has led me to great opportunities.

In recent years, I have taken a step back from ballroom to explore other styles of partner dancing: salsa, bachata, and zouk. As a young woman in my twenties, dating has become a prominent facet of my life, and I have met many romantic partners from social dancing. Most of them were duds. But some of them were really special. I’d wager to say that being a Latin dancer adds to my credibility as a dating partner, because who doesn’t love a girl who can move in a sensual way? Well, I’d revise that statement to say, you never have a shortage of male attention, but you often attract the wrong types of attention, because you are overly sexualized by men, and the dancing distracts them from who you are on the inside. I guess this is the one “downside” of being a dancer. Dance is a part of me, and I used to identify strictly with the art form. I realize now that I am more than dance– I am Belicia Tang. An artist, creative, intellectual, entrepreneur, and deeply sensitive being with a lot of love to give this world. Dance is a big part of me, but it is not all of me. Still, I couldn’t imagine my life without it.

I will end this post with a poem I wrote, entitled, “A Love Letter To Dance”.

A Love Letter To Dance 

Today I danced for me and only me

Donning sweatpants, flip flops, and a loose gray-tee 

Braless and barefaced with windswept hair

I chose a spot in nature overlooking the crystal waters of the levee

The breeze laughed and sun smiled

God was having a fabulous day today

I moved to the melody that stole my heart

Music as the conductor

Body as the instrument

Birds and bees as spectators

Nobody to behold my great escape act

Transcendence is what I call it

Letting the music carry me to the great beyond

I cried to the lyrics of John Lennon

Oh yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away

Now I need a place to hide away

How true his words rung in my ears

I let my body give form to the message

A rumba, the dance of love

No need to film

No need to choreograph

No need to teach

I danced to save my soul

I was a teenager again, a plain-faced duckling learning to become a swan

I touched my body with desperation

Face contorted into glorious agony

No such thing as mistakes

No such thing as perfection

Just me and the music and movement

Married to the pursuit of expression

The highest form of love and devotion there is

I used to dream of dancing on big stages

To a roaring audience of thousands

Today, I discovered a new form of magic

Dancing in its purest form

No costume, makeup, spray tan, judges

No people to watch

I was just moving

Just moving, to my favorite songs

I am grateful for my body and its gifts

Perfect in all its imperfection

I may not be a size zero

But man, I can move

I am grateful to 17 year-old Bel for working hard on the craft

So one day she could be transformed from technician to artist

And dance becomes an effortless expression of joy

Religious, spiritual, elemental

Sacred, raw, holy

Dance, my greatest and truest love

I love you.