My name is Joe Burgos and I am the founder of Piel Canela Dance School and Director of the Piel Canela Dance Company for the last 19 years. I have been teaching for over 25 years and have first handedly seen how dancing changes peoples lives.
Dance has always been present in my life. My youth is filled with memories of my Mother and Father dancing together at home and at family gatherings. There are no words that can describe the joy I felt growing up in a household that encouraged you to dance your life away. Whether it be doing chores, taking a break from schoolwork, or even getting ready to go on a date, dance was always present. As a young adult I found dancing to be a great stress reliever. Anytime I felt that I was getting to my own boiling point, all I had to do was get back to dancing and it would help me burn off the stress. Big exams – dance, big date – dance, big job – dance, dancing has also kept me healthy and my stamina up into my midlife. During my career on Wall Street when most of my peers turned to drinking or drugs, I found that a night of dancing was just as effective. When 911 occurred I went into a spiral of depression and anxiety I thought I would never recover from. Step by step and day by day it was dance that brought me back. Instead of going back to Wall Street I decided to make my passion in to a business and 19 years later it has become the largest Latin Dance School in the country.
I want to share my journey and its benefits with the world. If you can walk you can dance, everyone can learn to dance and our methodology has proven to make so many people dance. In a world now governed by digital media, streaming content and social media there are few things that still need one on one contact. Hell even my nephew recently married a girl he met while playing a game online – unreal – but he still asked me to put together his first dance at their wedding.
Visit my blog often and discover a new world or one you were always curious about. I’m offering a chance to get away from the everyday routine, whether it be school, work, family, the digital world or anything else occupying your time and to free yourself form the toll that stress takes. Yes, to learn how to dance you will eventually have to come to our school, unfortunately no video can do what we can do in person, but this blog is for more than just learning how to dance. This blog is a chance to share your stories of how dance changed your life.
How did we change your life?
Did you take a few classes with the hope of getting one physical activity in? did you want to increase your weekly cardio count? did you want to loose weight? I compare myself to my peers and friends and sometimes I feel sorry for my high school buddies that now are having health problems. Most of them now having problems due to lack of exercise, yet for those that have started dancing I can see improvements in their health in short periods of time and the best part is they don’t even think of it as exercise.
Did you want to make new friends and find a group of people with a common interest maybe even a new love in your life? I love seeing new groups of people come in our doors and in a few days their joining different groups of people that love to dance but also have other interests. I am an avid runner, I’m looking forward to running the NY Marathon this November and I have a group of dancers that also love to run giving me the support I need to accomplish my goal. Oh and did I mention I met my wife at the school?
Are you shy, do you think of yourself as an introvert are you ready to break out of your shell?
Has something affected you in your life so deeply that its time for a change?
Do you simply want to try something new out?
Are you inspired after watching “Dancing with the Stars” or “So you think you can dance”, and now need a place to start?
Did you always want to dance but you were told it was a waste of time or that there were more important priorities in life than dancing? do you have the time now?
Have you always been told you can’t dance?
Everyone can dance, this blog is for everyone, everyone can benefit, everyone already has a beat just listen to your heart. Through the stories in this blog I hope to guide you through your own reservations when it come to dance. Let other people’s real life experiences shed light through your own journey.