#10 - Xenia Preveziotis

Xenia Preveziotis believes dance is accessible for everyone and the happiness it brings to life is essential. Listen to Xenia's story as she tells her tale of how she came from Greece in 2001 and was able to travel and continue to grow her knowledge in many ethnic dances and learn and teach all over the world. She speaks of the many ways that dance can help her students to be the happiest and healthiest versions of themselves. Throughout Xenia's work, travels and relocations as a fitness and dance teacher, she has encouraged, motivated and generated new ways to present material to keep students interested and involved while continuing to DANCE.

Xenia teaches group and private classes in Pilates, Yoga Dance, Belly Dance, Ballet for Adults and more. She organizes and performs Greek/Mediterranean parties and events through @GreekMediterraneanConnect on Facebook. Xenia teaches at Transformation Fitness , Hammock Dunes Club, Beach Barre Fitness and 11J Cuban Salsa Dance Studio in Flagler Beach, FL. Contact Xenia for more information about classes and other special events through Facebook or her email preveziotis@gmail.com

Born and raised in Greece, is a dedicated wife of a US Air Force Veteran of 23 years active duty and mother of three. She believes that everyone can achieve well-being, age gracefully and it's never too late to start, no matter what age, physical condition or life circumstance. 

At the age of six, Xenia was introduced to the beautiful world of Art, music and dance, both Classical Ballet and Greek Traditional. She was able to travel to many countries in Europe & visited countries around Africa near and middle east, Brazil and Singapore which ignited her passion for cultural dance art and music. She speaks Greek, English and French. She also graduated from at the Lyceum of Hellinidvn (Dora Stratou The

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Chapters

• 1:23 Xenia's Greek Heritage
• 3:15 Early Years and Dance Influences
• 7:09 Dance from Around the World
• 11:41 A Lesson from Ethiopia
• 15:20 A Lesson from Corfu, Greece
• 17:15 Tap Into the Body's Intelligent Design
• 20:43 Variety is Important for Lifestyle Changes
• 25:53 Adult Ballet for Posture, Grace and Ellegance
• 31:41 Adult/Senior Dance Class
• 35:04 Learning to Belly Dance and Debunking Stereotypes
• 44:21 Importance of Letting Music Feed Your Soul and Creating Movement in Your Feet
• 47:43 Brain Injury and Dance
• 51:00 Dance as a Therapy

Transcript

0:11

This is Angela Grayson from the Living Life Fitness Podcast. To help others in their fitness journey. It's All Possible. It’s time to wake up. Here we go. Hello, everyone. This is Angela Grayson. I'm your host from Loving Life Fitness, the podcast where I talk to professionals and everyday people just like you about their fitness journey. It's all about helping you to live a better life through fitness and health. So today on my show, I have Xenia. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for coming on today. Thank you very much for inviting me. Now, it's an honor and a pleasure. You're welcome. So let's start off with where you're from. Your schooling and your dancing background. I am born and raised in Greece and I live there, of course, most of my life. My life. I'm about movement. And dance started with one of my grandparents, my grandmother, who was a refugee, from what you know now, Turkey in 1922. So they were very, very strong about keeping traditions and culture because they were a lot of Greeks there. And she was the first one initiated me in traditional Greek dancing, but also she was my first teacher in ballet and belly dancing because it was very much the traditional dance in those areas as well. All this love that I have for our culture, heritage, tradition of dancing a music. And my came from this grandmother from as many, and then from my other grandmother, from Corfu because the other side of me is from the island of Corfu. She initiated me as well. And music and and art my love for herbs and all these kind of things. Nature-wise. So it was a kind of a vast input for me to grow. But I appreciated it more when I left my country. Unfortunately. So when I was there, I enjoyed it. I embraced it, but I realized the importance of it only when I left my country in 2001. And it kept me going. And all these things that they taught me and all these things that I have gathered emerged when I was away. And I wanted them to share with people. I wanted to share the love for keeping your culture for movement, for using all these beautiful traditions and all these beautiful things that make us human. That's wonderful that your grandmothers, both of them influenced you so much in your dancing and your heritage. That's such a beautiful thing. Did you study dance after you left Greece? I did. Unfortunately, life got in the way, you know, that I met in a way that some of my plans and original path was not able to be accomplished then. So my dream was to follow the path of dancing and. But when I was 14, I was I had to start working. And I did not have the support that a lot of other kids had. As I see them around me as far as this path, neither financially or emotionally. And of course the work was a priority. I had to support my mother and but I was kind of blessed because some of my previous teachers have seen potential. And so they offered me they found ways of continuing my training and education in dancing. And then I did quite a lot of traveling because I started working when I was 14 and that have had kind of an array of jobs, not all glamorous, right? But they were all of them really incorporated a lot of activities with people and traveling. And that opened my mind even more about dancing and about all these beautiful things. So wherever I traveled, my focus was studying a dance or a movement method, and that helped me all around because I had the variety ahead of versatility. My thing. It also helped me to understand culture by culture, because when you teach movement to people, not everybody is the same. Not everybody comes from the same country sometimes. And I had to experience that through my 14 years when I started working since I was 14. I also later when I followed my husband through all military and we had to relocate. So often I had the opportunity to teach people from a different background. I had people who were French. I had people who were German, I had people who were from Italy. And you would see that some of these people, Japanese, you know, from different cultures and countries, you have to learn body language. You have to understand that there are some gestures, but they do not apply to everybody. And if you allow me, I will give you an example, which I think is very funny, but I think it might you might understand what I'm talking about. When I first left my country in 2001, I've never been to the United States before. So this was a very big experience for me. And in my culture and some Middle Eastern cultures, it's the same. We have a thing where if people show us their palm, it's an insult. You know, your high five, of course, your fingers are closed and they're not spread wide open. But it's something that when I was growing up it in the insult, especially when the palm is open. So when we moved here, I would see people, you know, doing that to me. And I was talking to my husband, I said, But why do they do Moutza? Because we call it Moutza. It's a bad gesture. And so he was laughing and he said, no, they were just high five because it is part of what you do. So I had also to learn these things and not just myself, but also I had to understand that that's what differentiates us from each other, that we do have these little rules, any little things that we need to be considerate about when we teach and when we approach people. So it was a huge lesson for me overall. You were very fortunate to have gotten to travel to so many different places and get to know different people, different cultures, and to live your expression of dance in all these different places, Did you teach your form of dance in these different countries as you traveled yet, or were you still learning from their cultures? I was doing both, but I have to also tell you that a lot of my trainings, especially after the military, were through the scholarships, so I had the opportunity to find another pathway for what I love, which is the dance ethnology. And it's a branch of anthropology where you learn about cultures and about the history of the cultures, just like anthropology, but from a dance perspective. And that was really in addition to everything else, because this plus the travel that I have done and then the training that I was doing really helped me even more open up my my brain and appreciate and understand that in the end of the day, we are not very different with each other because every part of the world is connected through dance. It was the first language, so to speak, before the spoken word. People want to express themselves by moving, by observing, and by celebrating. So that was the whole thing for me. Once I saw that and once I, I gathered all that new information and the information I had before that helped me to appreciate that I was starting to teach dancing. And now I wanted to share this with people that it's not just a step. It's not just learning to step, and it's not just learning one method. A person needs to add a variety of methods once they are alive, and it's just like a dictionary. I think the human being in that way becomes a dictionary. Instead of words, you'll learn movement. And that is so good, not only emotionally, or as an expression known as the way everybody will perceive it but It's also good for functionality because the more movement patterns you have, the more ways that your body can understand and move in different planes everywhere. It's better, it's healthier. It's what the body was designed to do. Movement. We have to keep moving. And why not move in a beautiful way? Yes. Did you have any mentors that helped you along the way or other inspirations besides your family, your grandmothers along the way? Yes. As a matter of fact, if I knew how to express myself better in writing in English, I would have loved to write a book, which is like a diary of all the experiences I have had throughout my teaching career. So I because I have learned so much, my mentors were not just teachers, so I cannot claim I had the most famous teachers in the world because I didn’t. I had amazing people that they didn't claim fame, they didn't care about that, but they wanted to share because we have a saying that if you do not share your knowledge, then you don't have any. You have to share what you know and in that way you feel more accomplished, more fulfilled. My mentors and there were quite a few of them, and each one on their own have taught me a lot of things. But also I have to say that some of my mentors were actually students. I learned a lot from the people I am teaching and I was teaching. I learned a little bit to be more compassionate. I learned to be more considerate. I learned to be able to or I have these students in my class that, for instance, has an X- problem. Let me learn about it. And so when I go and teach again, I will know how to address it. I also learn to be patient, which I wasn't very good at. I've had people who have had cancer, I had people who have losses, who have deaths, who have so many things happening in their life, and they taught me each one of them taught me something that I think it is viable not only to me as a teacher but also as a human being. I learned so many, many things. So yeah, my mentor is I can say that just as another teacher or, you know, another dancer, definitely my mentor is one of the models. We can really learn from other people's stories. Everybody has a story and instead of being quick to judge, just listen. And we learn so much in so many different ways. And to be able to sit back and take it in and listen and go forward from there makes you a better person. Or when you're trying to help others, I agree. That is the thing. I had one experience in one of my travels. I was a guest in Ethiopia, and there are I think it is there is it's kind of a life changing experience, if anybody can have that, because you realize how much you'll have, even if you don't have much. Because when you when you stay with these people that I didn't stay long of course, but you live in a community, you stay in a community of people, well, they don't have anything in advance like how we see people having their homes, their luxuries or whatever. But they were happy and you would see that they had that community that you do not see in a lot of places where people have everything materialistic. Also, you would see again and just like my country, which is dancing, is an integral part of our society in Greece, specifically all of our dances lasted for many, many thousands of years and they are still part of us. So we just it's not just for a specific celebration. Every time we we gather, most times our get togethers will end up with music and dancing. So it's an integral part of the culture that you would see. Of course, the same in other cultures as well. Like what I'm saying, when I was in Ethiopia, they would gather and all of a sudden after an a day they would actually come up and dance. All they need is a drum. And that ability to all be together. And it's the most beautiful thing because they don't have much, but I think they have the most that people can realize. People think that Africa is a very poor third country world and it's so wrong. We we could learn so much from people that we consider lower than most because they are not. I think they have found the meaning of the life. And yes, there are places in Africa that are very, very especially nowadays. But overall, I think just because people have the earth does not make them third world or lower than anybody else. That was a great experience for me. How long were you there? I was there for about almost a week, and I was a guest. I will always treasure that opportunity because I've never had the opportunity to go there again. And I was impressed by the women as well. They as far as, a teacher who also teaches Pilates, and I'm all about good posture, I was impressed by their posture. I was impressed with the way they were carrying themselves. And I believe it was because of their lifestyle. It is hard. Some of these women might need to carry water or, you know, this heavy jar on their heads or their shoulders, but it keeps them upright. And there were some scientific, some science behind it. And they have seen that actually their spine is one of the most not perfect, but the best spine alignment that you would ever see in a human. So I did not know what it is, but I was impressed with everything. I was impressed with the women. I was impressed with the men. I was impressed with their lifestyle. I was impressed with everything when I was there and here we are in America having all the modern conveniences you could possibly need or want. And how many people these days do we see walking around with rounded shoulders and not standing upright, you know, bellies protruding because the posture is not correct. I'm sure it has a lot to do with their lifestyle and the daily struggles that they have, having to do things with their bodies instead of having the convenience of a vehicle. The convenience of things to carry, like you said, they have to carry it or balance it on their head even. Well, and they're the thing with a balancing that on your head is not only found there, it has been around in all their sister countries. And my grandmother from Corfu, actually when I was little, they used to do that. I mean, they didn't have the ability to have fridges in their home, so they had to go and pick up the water from somewhere and usually they had to walk miles to go to the place where they would take their water. But I remember when I was little and I was going to the island knowing one of my childhood memories was actually how my grandmother showed me what they used to do. It was one of our traditional dances in Corfu, actually speaks about the posture of the women carrying, you know, all of the jugs of water and how they would walk and everything. So because all the traditional advances actually are deriving from everyday life situations, most of them. So she would show me how these women would actually do that and how different it was for the children. Of course, it was me either, and it was smaller. So she won one for me one time, and that's one of my childhood memories because she wanted me to experience those things. So they are not going to die after they passed away. And it was really very, very interesting. I mean, I was laughing about it because it was only what I would do if only for a while at 5, 10 minutes, maybe less. But these women walking all these days, though, back and forth you know, So it really makes you understand that back at those times, they didn't have all the choices that the people are having now. They had the wisdom to understand that we are alive, we have a body. We need to use it. Absolutely. Right? So you didn't have the chance to just sit down all day and lounge, and take the car and go from one place to the other or, you know, because not everybody would have that opportunity in the first place. But here, when I first came in the United States, what impressed me the most and very respectful it was that people are trying to get everything easily so they want to lose weight. It was the pills you want to relieve pain, You go to a chiropractor, you want to relieve pain, you will go to an acupuncturist. And yes, all these are good. But if we do not teach our body how to take care, if we cannot teach our bodies how to be well and healthy and functional, all the other things are temporary. And what happens is you go over and over and over again and you are not fixing anything because you don't put the work on it. You have to earn when you earn your health, when you earn your functionality, when you earn the ability to move even at a later age. Because I'm not going to talk about the 20 years old or whatever I'm talking about people that are 30 years and older where the body naturally is going to slow down, right? And things really change. This is important. Understand that you have to earn. You'll have to put some work in. Honestly, after that, your body will actually give you so much more than we think. So then we don't have to pay all that money every every week or every month. Go once a month if you need to. But all this time that I've been here, so many of my clients would go to a chiropractor almost every week. I couldn't comprehend it very well. And I apologize. I don't say it in a disrespectful way. I just believe that we have a body, that it was designed in a way, a very intelligent way to be able to give us all we need to be functional and we lose that. Use the body the way it was meant to be used on a daily basis instead of once in a while. And maybe the body won't be hurting as much. You don't need to go to the chiropractor or the acupuncturist as often. Maybe years ago when people had to work so hard just to live day to day like you were saying, get their water, get their food, no vehicle. So they had to walk four miles. Yes, that was a hard life, but their bodies were stronger because of it. Yes. And, you know, we were designed I mean, the human body is designed in such an intelligent and beautiful way. And I think that we don't really appreciate it the way we should or we take it for granted. Throughout my learning process and my teaching process, I also specialize in things more than others. So instead of I, for instance, accumulating my licenses and very specific formats that you teach only for a brief period of time, I then focused a lot on my dance training, my Pilates training, and through this it's a journey you do not stop in one weekend. You do not stop in one month or a year. You really continue, of course, science nowadays and how the knowledge nowadays is very different because we learn so many new things about the body. We learn new things about the brain. We we are tapping into neuroplasticity. For instance, and how our brain can actually change and all these beautiful things that our body and our and our brains have and all these things that we can do. But it's a constant learning process and it's incredible. It's amazing. That's what I want to share with people, not just do an exercise and expect it to work and because there is not miracle exercise, let's put it this way in a way that if you do that all, you will lose weight or you will be like this, or you will be like that. It doesn't work this way. And of course, I don't believe that you have to work out only for weight loss because there are some people who do not need to lose weight. Right. It's not just for one thing, keeping active, doing some functional movement, protecting your body from injuries, or at least not allowing injuries to become worse in time, is something that we can do. But it takes a little time. You need to dedicate a little bit of your time and find the method that speaks to you. So many different forms of exercise to choose from. And we don't need to stick with just one. We need a variety so that we can work our bodies in a different way. Yes, as I mentioned, I think we need that variety to create a little dictionary not dictionary. Move-inary in our body so we know that the same thing for me applies in that I do teach a variety of formats in dance. And the reason why I did that, I started my foundation in Ballet which I totally feel that a lot of younger dancers skip because they go towards it's kind of boring for a ballet dancer to do the same thing over and over again. To do the exercises at the bar to it requires a lot of dedication. And I found that some dancers nowadays, they go back to it, thankfully, but a lot of them skip it and they go towards jazz and they go towards hip hop and they go towards tap. And nowadays the dance scene, especially here, is basically ballet, jazz, tap, hip hop, ballet jazz, tap, hip hop. And then ballet is not as much as it is the jazz tap and hip hop, because of course, is a little bit more of I believe they find a little bit more interest maybe, but the foundation is the ballet class, the classical ballet class. Why? Because it teaches you exactly what your body needs to be doing in this specific method and hopefully avoid any other problems that a lot of dancers encounter throughout their experience. But the way that I found that I did my foundation but also traditional dance and helped me a lot because it was a different movement. Cultural dances helped me a lot because apart from belly dancing, I also teach some other ethnic dances like Samba, Flamenco, and and I even tapped a little bit on Polynesian dancing because it has found small similarities with belly dancing, but it's very different at the same time. But every every cultural dance has some similarities and some differences, which I find very interesting because then I find that all the world really connects to the dance, whether it is from this this part of the world or from the other part of the world. And the same thing applies with movement. I personally found that Pilates for instance, gave me a very huge range of movement patterns that I really totally appreciate without being too excessive as far as the hip and all these things that people now want to go fast and furious, I found that this mindful and slower pace reaps more benefits rather than anything else. Yes, Pilates has a sneaky way of doing wonders for the body, doesn't it? And I think it's because it's slower, because we do need to learn how to move more mindfully and slower. Then your body will appreciate it because you allow it to breathe by the same. In a way, it's it's a very difficult it's a very demanding movement. But because you combine it with a with a beautiful music, you combine it with a little bit more slower rhythm, I think it's wonderful. Your body appreciates it more. And ballet studies have shown that children, if they do ballet for a minimum of three years, that they have better bone density in their adult lives and also people who are older who do ballet have much less chance of osteoporosis. And even if they started later in life and have osteoporosis, they may be able to build back bone mass. Also, ballet helps with toning all those small muscles in your body, which are essential for balance. And balance is very important, especially well, I shouldn't say in older adults, especially because it's important for everybody. But as we get older and adults have issues with balance, being in some kind of dance and especially ballet helps you keep those balancing muscles toned and you have less of a chance of injury. I do teach ballet for adults. I teach it with a lot of love and passion, mainly because of these beautiful benefits that you'll you just mentioned, but also because the adult that wants to do ballet, makes a conscious choice that they want to do it. Kids often do not have that choice. I used to teach children and it's not my favorite thing, not because of the kids, but the parents because they don't realize that ballet is not something that really eyes on. Oh, this is my daughter. This is my son, and he needs to do a solo. I know it requires dedication. It requires to listen to requires to understand what you are doing with your heart. It's not just doing it because my mom wants me to do it. My dad wants me to do it, my family wants me to do it, and they can pay for it. So very expensive dance method. And that's why going backwards when I was 14 and I had to work, I didn't have the financial support to sustain me in such a profession because amount of money you need just to change your your shows just to, to be able to be part of all this is very, very expensive. So I'll going a little bit towards the adult ballet I teach. One of the reasons why I started teaching it is because of personal experience, something I really wanted to do. So badly and I had to work so hard to do it. And I know that there were a lot of adults that were exactly similar in the mindset that maybe they could not afford it. Maybe they did it when they were young, but then they had to stop. I had clients that saw at student dancers that they were over 80 years old and back in Europe, for instance, the war stopped them from continuing, you know, And then, of course, after a war, life had to go back so that you didn't have the same opportunities because we should never forget also that, yeah, nowadays, thank goodness for the majority of us, we live in the peace sort of world. There were the cases of war and unfortunately are around us and for some people that's a big, big obstacle as well for their passions, for them, for what they want to do. So teaching the adults is very different than the children. One aspect is that then I had to retrain myself to be able to teach adults. You cannot teach Ballet for adults like you teach ballet for children because you have to deal with a body that it is grown, that it has already live more years. Therefore it might have more injuries, they might have a lot more things going on. And also it is better for them because they don't have to worry to be in a conservatory, they don't have to be in the company, they don't have to be professional. So it becomes more as a way to regain that beautiful posture, to find grace in your body, which it's something that is lacking many little bit nowadays. Grace is such a beautiful thing to have to be elegant. The way you roll, the way you stand, the way you approach everything. And I want to bring them back to some adults, especially ladies. But we also have some gentleman that have approached the class and each one of them for their own reason. We had the gentleman who was 80. He turned 85. actually. Mr. Tom, have you you must have met Mr. Tom MacKinney right? Yeah. Yeah. He used to take my adult ballet class at Fitness One, and he was such a wonderful support, but such an inspiration because he was a marathon runner and he still run and he's aware of certain injuries that marathon running can actually give to people. But he appreciated that when he did ballet, he found that it really helped him a lot in his posture and strength in his legs in a different way of supporting his back and his hips and his knees and all these things that go together. And I have another gentleman that takes and he likes tango. He's a tango dancer. And he says that he'd benefit greatly from both ballet adults and the belly dancing teaching. So it's very wonderful to see from different angles. People can appreciate both of the methods, even though they're diverse. As I said, in order for me to teach ballet for adults, which I really love, and I hope I will be able to continue, I had to retrain. You have to learn how to teach ballet for adults. You cannot just claim I teach ballet for adults because I was a former ballet dancer or because I was teaching children. It is not the same. You cannot expect someone to reach their leg very, very high either because it requires a lot of strength on your hips. And for me it's more important for them to get a good alignment, safeguard their pelvis, feel happy that they're not putting all their weight on the hips, find a balance, stabilize their ankles, but also find life in their feet. Because nowadays, you know, we walk with shoes mostly, and a lot of people lose that aspect as well, that their feet have life, they have so many muscles and they need to move. So I am very passionate about that and I'm sorry I can't express myself better because I have the translated is doing an excellent then excellent. And I love hearing the success stories of your clients that come to you to hear that a gentleman is coming to you to learn belly dancing because of the benefits that it's giving his body. That's wonderful. The success stories are amazing, And and that's what my listeners need to hear, that there's other ways of training your body and get enjoyment out of it, too. Dance is fun. And why not? You exercise your body in a fun kind of way. That's that's what I agree with. And I often, you know, even when I teach formats that they are more strict as far as their technique. I also invite people to listen to the music and just allow their body to move. Nothing crazy. Just listen to the music. I had the opportunity to teach, as I said, children and I had the opportunity to teach seniors at a quite a few dance schools, both in Europe and here wherever we were relocated while in the military. And one of the things I always start those classes sometimes is freestyle as a warmup. So if I have a group of senior dancers, I usually want to break the ice and tell them, okay, warm up is going to be put your favorite music, put your favorite song, and just dance to it. I want to observe how they move or how they rely so much in one method that they forget that they can move in many different ways. So it's it was a great way for me to see where they hold on. So of course, the ballet dancers, once they put in music, they would dance mostly ballet. They will do their pirouette, they will do all of these arabesque, they will do this beautiful saute or whatever they will be doing. Other people might have done hip hop, They would start doing something that is more relatable to hip hop. So but these because they were always learning one thing, they didn't have the vast movement pattern. And it is really a shame because you can explore dancing without being rigid, you know, because then more probable is that again, the more movement patterns you give your body to have, the more when you move or when you dance, you will have more freedom. And I in the end of the day, it's freedom. It's finding a way your body to feel free and happy, not to be rigid, not to be like a robot. One step to the side, another step to the side. Take a step anywhere else in that plane. I mean, just enjoy. And even now when I teach other classes that they're not ballet cause they're more like the belly dancing or a Zumba class. Let's put it this way If I ask them to turn around and not face the mirror, they look as if they are, Oh my God, I don't know how to do it, you know, because there used to being only in one plane. There used to only do one thing. So once you move them around, all of a sudden they feel that, oh, but once they get it, though they feel happier as well because they express themselves. They find the freedom. Now we can do it. What? What our body wants to do any time we take ourselves out of our comfort zone, it's a challenge. Even somebody going to a different corner of the room. When we teach classes, seems like people come in and they always go to the same spot in the classroom and you make them move around, change, change their position, go to a different corner or different side of the room. They feel completely loss, making changes and looking things a little differently make our body react differently. And that's a good thing. It's a good challenge for the body. So I'd like to talk a little bit more about belly dancing. That's something that I've always wanted to try. Anytime I've tried to do it on my own, watching YouTube or whatever, that's it's really difficult to get my body moving in that way. Talk to us about belly dancing and the process of going through it and learning it and what it does for our bodies. Belly dancing. As I said, I learned it very, very young. And you don't learn with the step or you have to do this or you have to do that. Basically, you know, you just look and you do. And then I remember my my grandmother always using these beautiful words to express how you should feel like a wave and how you should feel as if you're a wave with your spine, your wave and with your hand that you're using your whole body and your whole essence and always to smile. I was taught to keep in belly dancing elegant. And when I teach, I try to break the stereotypes because when I first started teaching belly dancing, people thought I was a stripper. Or they think that you have to bare your belly or you have to wear a specific outfit. And me as a teacher and instructor, I do not wear outfits. I wear only whatever I feel it makes me feel comfortable moving. I don't wear brands to support different formats and different methods. I don't wear logos. I just wear very simple for some boring. Do not try to to look as if I come out from a magazine. Neither. I did that when I was a dancer. You have to wear certain clothes when you learn how to dance or when you train to be in a specific modality only because a teacher needs to see your muscle tone and they need to see if you are aligned properly. And of course, if you wear baggy clothes, that that's not possible. No belly dancing does not have all these things that people think about. And this is what I was trying to break here, the stereotypes. I want people to understand that dance for everybody. It embraces every body, physical body. You don't have to be of a specific figure to dance it. And it is a dance of lots of wealth because back in those days when when people were dancing, the weren't videos that were on Instagram, the pictures, they weren't anything like that. For us to see exactly how they dance belly dance, for instance, or any other dance. So every sister country that has this type of dance in their culture, because of course, it's not only in Greece, Middle East, all the sister countries around the Mediterranean and the Middle East have a similar the same belly dancing, so to speak. And not all of them would wear clothes that revealing because it's not a show. When we when we dance belly dance socially, we are not doing a show. We are not doing a performance. It became a performance art of the dance, but later on. So that's a very different thing. Also, when it when it was first brought here in the United States, Hollywood actually, I think, took a little bit out of all these movies and thousand nights and whatever they did, and they created this two piece outfit that you normally see, like the genie and all of these kind of things. But in some countries, that's not even allowed for women to do same, that that doesn't mean that women are not allowed to dance. So this is another stereotype they can dance. They can dance in a way that it is not promiscuous and vulgar. So just like any other dance, a dancer makes it or breaks. If I wanted to make a ballet promiscuous, I could. Would that be nice? No. But the same applies with any form of dance hip hop. It doesn't have to be the way you see some children dancing. It, because I think it was mostly a way of thinking of expressing, of giving your story. And so the same thing is the belly dance. But I'm sorry for going all the way around it, but that's the way I teach it. I teach them moves, the basic moves. I don't teach choreography because I don't think that is necessary as it is a cultural dance. We don't have choreography, which is listen to the music, the drum leads us, and the drum is the heartbeat. It's what gives you the opportunity to move your feet. And so this is a little tough for people who are used to learn to do things one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. So in belly dancing. Ms. social context, we don't have one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight because the very polyrhythmic music background behind it there are so many rhythms within that you cannot just only say it's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. It would be one, two, three, four, one, two. So I did it without that and the other thing that I found is that I changed the directions a lot and I tried to let people dance in a circle all around themselves so that they don't feel that they have to be in front of a mirror and just scrutinize and criticize themselves because they don't move the way they think they won't. Belly dancing is difficult. Do requires pure muscular control on the physiology, kind of the physical aspect of it. It has a lot of similarities with the other, so it requires a lot of control. When you move your upper body, you'll have to stabilize the lower. It's a misconception that belly dancing is only for the belly is a matter of fact. It's actually very, very good for your whole body, especially your lower. There is a saying that your belly dancing from your torso up, but you want an outlet from the torso down because it involves a lot of movements that require endurance, stamina and so many other elements of it. I am not a YouTube fan because you might have a fantastic dancer or a fantastic teacher, but you do not have them right there with you. I am all about hands on learning nowadays. Of course, things are a little bit more online for, for obvious reasons, but for me, whether I learn or whether I teach, I want to have the other person in front to me. I want them to see. I want them to see them, to feel them, to to understand them, to get that energy. So belly dancing is a muscular, very controlled dance method. And I often say to the people that I teach ballet that I love, that I did belly dancing, because in ballet you are not supposed to move your hips. You can move your body into these beautiful movements that you see, but your hips need to be stable. You do not do any shimmies These are stuff like that. And then you have belly dancing where your whole body can do something but with control. So there is that more organic, more earthy, and it's more expressive than other dance methods, in my opinion, the benefits, except for the physical aspect of it, because you can really tone, sculpt and help a lot with your overall physique. You can also help a lot your back. It strengthens them out your spine and also it really allows you to have a lot more endurance and stamina because there are some movements that incorporate your upper torso, tour thoracic spine and that of course, as it expands, it gives you more room in your lungs and therefore you can find a little bit more happiness in your lungs. It can really feel good for your internal organs as well, because belly dancing is one of those opposite to the Western mentality of keeping your belly in. We have a lot of movements where we just encourage people to let their belly out. Therefore, you are kindly allowing your internal organs to feel happy and do not feel squeezed all the time. You know, Plus it's very good for your pelvic floor muscles just like Pilates, so it can improve greatly the health of your organs that support your pelvis give you a sense of self confidence, and bring your femininity back. Although belly dancing is not just for women, it does help a lot for women to understand that they are very, very feminine. They have to bring out that beautiful element. I've had clients that had breast cancer and they had mastectomy and they found that when they take belly dancing classes, they feel that they gained back what these monster, all their disease disease took away from them, which is their femininity. So it can help greatly everybody anything that they have what do they feel that they that they need to really get out of their body and their brains and their minds and, you know, just feel human again and gain that extra sensuality and femininity that I think it's very important because we have it. It's there and it's come out without being promiscuous. It's a very sensual dance. We don't want to overdo it to do things because it's already quite sensual, because you move your hips and, not that you don't want to overdo things, you'll want to find that little element of control in a way. Thank you for all that insight to belly dancing. And you said a lot of things that I was not even aware of, and so makes me want to try it for sure. And the fact that choreography is not a part of the way you teach it keeps things simple. You're just learning to move your body in a way that's good for it and not be worried about choreography and not looking in the mirror. Also just feeling the music and feeling your body work and all the different planes of motion. You said something really important there, the no mirror, one to feel your body. It's something that it's very necessary. And even in methods like ballet again, I'm going to go there where you really need that mirror to check your alignment, to check whether you are doing the right thing with with your legs, with your back, with work, with your posture. There are times that when I was training, they would close, that they had curtains and they would close them because you need to start understanding the music you need to hear. If you do not let that in your movement, especially in dancing, whatever dancing you do If you do not let the music feed to you and give you the opportunity to move the body, then you are missing out. Then you are not dancing, just doing a fitness goal. So yes, all these things slowly come into a fitness plateau, but I want to keep it as a form of. Finding freedom indefinitely. Some belly dancing helps because you really do not need all the time as well to have the now. If you are planning to be in a troupe or a group of people where they will perform somewhere, that's totally different because then you will have to learn a choreography to present to people. But for classes, I don't think it's necessary. I mean, I'm using combinations and then I tell people again, you learn two or three or four combinations can you see whether we put music on and you see whether you can put any of those together? Just show me. Just let yourself go without that. Just there is technique as well and belly dancing for your safety. The technique is basically for people to be safe because you don't want to overreact to your spine in any kind of movement and hurt yourself. And you want to know why you need to engage more so that you are making the movement a little bit more cleaner. But overall, it's more of that expression and the ability to move in a way that you didn't think that you could move. Because we hold a lot of tension in our hips. A lot of people do not move them in any other direction. And we do have a lot of opportunities to move our pelvis front, back, side, in a diagonal. The last thing if you allow me to to add on to this is a belly dancing is also one of the very, very few dances that I know of that you have to do everything in the opposite way. So let's say if you do a circle from the right left, you will need to do a left to the right. So you do not like a competitive dance. So again, I'm going to do one and I'm going to be very strong in that one and then continue doing that. It teaches you to appreciate the weaker side work towards the weaker side that reflects to your life all together. So all the methods that I teach that I chose to teach reflect my life. I want to have balance. I want to be able to be out of my comfort zone and work on to my weaker side, not rely on my stronger side. And all these methods that I teach dancing, Pilates, these methods have taught me to do that as well. So that's how I feel. And I believe that we are not moving. We stop moving when we stop breathing. And as long as we breathe, we can move. If I may, I had the opportunity to work with people who had a brain injury when we went in North Carolina. That was our last station in Goldsboro, and I was volunteering at the Brain Injury Center. That was another big lesson in my life, because these people are not only mentally challenged, but they're also some of them physically challenged. So I had the blessing to do a project with them where I did a little dance for them. And what impressed me the most is that none of them, of course, were dancers and all of them were very, very challenged. But all of the residents had their will to live. They had a will to move even if they couldn't. So whether it was just a little part of their face that you would see that it was moving, one or maybe just one arm, that they can move. Maybe one finger. You would see that they wouldn't think about it in the sense of how would it look, I just want to move. For me, that was an important people want to live, they wanted to move. They wanted to do things without judgment, without being criticized. There were some people that criticized what I did because they said, well, that wasn't a dance, but it was. And I can send you the tape I've done after our podcast if you want, just to have a look, because it showed how people sometimes have this stereotype of dancing being a certain thing, and they broke that. There was not that a dry eye when we did that, but of course we didn't have a lot of support from from the from the whole community. But it was an incredible thing because it's exactly what I what I love to do and this is why I love what I do. It's for people who think that way that they have the urge to live, but they have all these challenges. But then again, they push on and they move on and they dance on. Even if it doesn't look like a dance for some people. That is a beautiful thing that you did. We're really else we all need to move and it doesn't matter how we move as long as we're trying brings enjoyment to the heart. So I read a study that there were nine reasons why dancing is good for your health, whether you're just dancing for the joy of dance, or if we're incorporating dance into our exercise routine. And those nine reasons are cardiovascular health or strength, flexibility, weight loss, bone health to prevent memory loss, mental health as a stress buster, and to stay socially connected. So those are not all things that we would think of when we think about incorporating dance and to our life. But are are there a lot of those we already spoke about? But is there one of those that maybe you would like to go ahead and talk about a little bit as a therapy? I think that's the most important thing for me is that it's a way of really making us feel a little bit better. And dance is used as part of therapy as well. So there are people who do dance therapy. I studied a little bit on that. I’m not a dance therapist, but I have had the opportunity to work a little bit on that and it's absolutely true. And it does help because of the hormones that your brain allows to flow and make you feel a little bit better when you're dancing. So absolutely, it can make you feel better nowadays with the with the newer science of neuroplasticity, they have found a lot of evidence that it can really change people that have depression or the way they move or the way they process the people who have PTSD trauma of any kind. So for me, one of the main things that I feel that is very important, apart from anything else, is that it helps keep your brain very healthy and help your whole mindset to be a little bit more positive. And that's very important because I have used it as my therapy as well. Whenever I have a bad day, whenever I had the issues when I was very young, I used to be in my room, turn up the music and dance. And still today when I deal with things that I cannot really deal differently, that's what I do. I feel like it is the best thing to do without going into any kind of alcohol and drugs or any other thing that can cause more problems. I say it's a safe addiction, if I could use this word, because addiction is not good, but it would be the I think it is the healthiest too. Just dance, just dance! Especially for the brain that goes towards the people who learn steps and choreography. Because you teach your brain to use the right and the left and in dance, the right and the left is a little bit peculiar for some people. So memorizing and learning and even if you learn just a new move, it's a lot for the brain, but it does good to the brain to do that. So definitely helps a lot with memory. With Alzheimer, it can help. It can help to delay the brain aging process, which is which is very, very important. Yes, you can have weight loss, but again, I think we shouldn't focus only on that. I think it's a good way of approaching it. But I don't want to deal with that, that I don't want days before a nice dinner was £400 and not 100 because I did dance. It wasn't the dance itself. It's everything else that you do to your body to help heal, maintain and go into a nice, healthy weight. In my opinion, that of course helps. It's a cardio if you use it like that, especially, as I said, for us people who are getting older, we need to make sure that we keep our muscle mass. We need to make sure that our bones are strong. We need to make sure that all these other elements are working very well. Many, many seniors, you see them that they get thinner because they lose fat, right? But with their fat, they lose their bone density as well. And then you see them how their posture changes and how their body switching. So it won't maintain all these things. And dancing for sure can help with bone density and muscle that we need to keep on having similar to the others. Again, I go back to my method because it is really really very helpful and it was designed for that by the creator of the ad this method. So I believe in live love and dance, dance, dance, dance like everybody's watching, not like nobody's watching. Why would you would dance if nobody's watching? Why That's beautiful. Yeah. Okay. My last question, Although that was very good advice. Would you like to leave our audience with a goal so that they can live their best life? I would add to just use and listen and feel everything around you because. I think that's the most beautiful motivation to to to live your life. And also one of the other things that I, I use is that I say to people, smile, even if it hurts the most, because a positive attitude oftentimes can help us deal with a lot of difficulties. And it's it's important. It's important to remember that we can smile not because something really exceptional has happened, but because we're alive and that's not to be taken for granted in my opinion. Well, listeners, you've heard it from Xenia. Get out there, enjoy your life, dance, smile, because you never know who you might smile at that really needs that today. And it could change their day around. Thank you. Thank you so much, Xenia. I know that this conversation here today is going to bring lots of value to our listeners, so I really appreciate you being on the show and I thank you very much, Angela, for asking me to be here today. Just a little note that English is not my mother language. So if I said something that maybe not make a lot of sense, it just came from the heart. I didn't have any preparation for that. You did very well. And thank you very much, everybody. And please, please keep on dancing. Thank you. This is Angela Grayson from the Loving Life Fitness Podcast. To help others in their fitness journey. It’s All Possible! It’s time to wake up. Here we go.