Author: Matt Chung
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Dance, discomfort and making mistakes
Lots of dance activities going on lately and wanted to take a moment to reflect on the journey. Choreography volunteer as a dancer for video shoot promotion Last week, Francesa messaged me over Instagram, re-sharing an Instagram story, where Vi (an elite dancer from Japan currently located in London, teaching House and Locking and Hip-Hop)…
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London House Dance Workshop Summary
I attended a house dance workshop lead by Samantha Mavinga. The workshop took place in London last Sunday on May 25th and ran for 3 hours and though I’ve attended other workshops in the past, this one felt particularly special: Exercises revolving around the “Shuffle” movement We started the workshop with a breathing exercise, and…
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Half term Highlights – Part 1
Elliott is still asleep in the bedroom and I’m afforded the quiet morning to read, reflect, write. In a couple hours (hopefully), she’ll slowly rise and then shortly after I’ll drop her back off at her mom’s house. So, here are some morning musings. On trying Onion Rings I offered Elliott an onion ring to…
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Week 07 – Pistol Squat / Single legged squat progression
I consider my lower body to be particularly weak mainly due to neglect from all these years. During my teenage years (about 16 years old), I started weight lifting and NEVER — and I mean NEVER — worked out my legs, only focusing on building mass in my upper body. Back then, I was focused…
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On Practicing Footwork
Very rarely, even after 2 years of dancing house, do I throw in footwork heavy dance moves like heel toe or farmer. However, I’ve recently been motivated for forward for several reasons: The heel toe practice was inspired by watching the following YouTube tutorial What I like about the above YouTube tutorial is the way…
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37th birthday – a life worth living
Almost exactly a year ago, I moved to London as a 36-year old single dad in the midst of a rather contentious and divorce (they all are) mired with unanticipated betrayal that left me questioning myself and questioning how I failed to see the signs that were actually always there (hindsight is 20/20 they say).…
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Tuesday House Dance Training Recap (May 13, 2025)
Who attended? Elena, Aubrey, Jimmy, Alex What went well? I really liked this exercise I came up with, where each person chooses a rhythm in their own mind, danced their rhythm, then ever other person in the group attempts to guess their rhythm. This was fun, challenging, and engaging. Perhaps next time increase difficulty by…
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Touchdown in London and Easter Sunday Recap
This is me jumping back on the horse and practicing imperfectly doing things. An imperfect blog entry beats no blog entry. Perfection, as I’ve learned recently, is both a trap and an illusion: perfection does not exist. So might as well take action. I’m currently sitting in the kitchen of my London flat, quietly typing…
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An analytical mind in the context of dance – friend or foe? Perhaps both?
These days, I’m learning how to work with this vessel, my body. I’m constantly weighing the balance between acceptance and change and generally speaking, I sometimes tend to over-index on changing myself (in spirit of growth). In spirit of leveraging the way I am wired, I’m practicing leveraging my analytical mind in the context of…
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Journal – Sunday, March 02, 2025
I’m sick right now. Yesterday, my body continued fighting off a cold that started about 6 days ago and throughout yesterday, my body ached, my mind foggy, my chest infected with phlegm. Today my mind feels sharper but yesterday, I felt unmotivated, unable to focus and I had (negative) thoughts like “am I being lazy?”.…
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Juste Debout: 1 month of training for 1 minute of dancing
Tomorrow, I compete as a dancer in the infamous international street style dance competition — Juste Debout — and for the past 1 month, my 2 vs 2 partner (Aubrey) and I been consistently training together. Every week her and carved out 1.5 hours, time spent in a studio practicing. And now, all this comes to…
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Forcing oneself & Procrastination – not a problem, but a signal
My view and judgements on procrastination has shifted over the last year and I’m becoming more increasingly aware of my tendency to delay or postpone certain tasks until pressure builds up. My observation is that sometimes for certain projects or tasks I put it off until (more or less) the very last minute. One example…
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Waking up from a different kind of nightmare
It’s 4:57 am right now. Already, I hear a few birds chirping from outside, despite no sun in sight, outside still pitch black. I am typing this blog post while sitting in my dimly lit kitchen. In the bedroom, my daughter is still fast asleep and hope she continues to sleep for another hour (i.e.…
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Friday night farmer
The house dance farmer move is one that eludes me. I’m about 1.5 years into my house dance journey and this move in particular is one that I both struggle to achieve both the look and the feeling. Because of this, the farmer rarely makes an appearance in my freestyle rounds and when it does,…
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Nose piercing bump – How I’m getting rid of it (in progress)
I started developing a little red bump on my nose after I swapped out the stud for a hoop. On the day of the piercing swap, the piercer said, “If you end up developing a little bump — which is normal and can happen — then use bio oil.” Immediately after he swapped out the…
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A cup of tea, a splash of milk, a flood of love
I’m feeling lots of love right now, all from flicking through my diary and unexpectedly stumbling on some stick figure drawings that my 5 year old daughter drew, along with some sentence fragments she wrote. For a moment, the love was overwhelming and I was on the verge of crying. I just fucking love my…
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House Dance Training Log – January 04, 2025
First training of 2025. In a separate post, I’ll go over one of my 2025 goals but in short: participate in the prelims of summer dance forever 2026! That is, 1.5 years from now, I’d like to stand up on that beautiful stage and be prepared both mentally, physically, and emotionally. Summary Motivational quote on…
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On recovering from plantar fasciitis
Similar to software debugging, sometimes the best thing you can do is create distance between yourself and the problem you’re troubleshooting. Because more often than not, when we’re in the thick of it, sometimes we can become fixated — fine, a bit obsessed — and prevent ourselves from gaining additional insights, our wheels spinning in place,…
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Dance Practice Log – December 09, 2024
When: Monday, December 09, 2024 6:30pm until 8:00pmWhere: Morden home living room Summary Yesterday I trained for about 1.5 hours. Up until last couple training sessions, I felt so much resistance, so much procrastination. And every time I get myself to to practice — not force — I feel emotionally better, lifted with higher spirits, and…
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Wow, you have good memory
To me, I like to think I’m somewhat self-aware (who doesn’t think that about themselves but according to one study, only 10-15% are actually self-aware). But from my own perspective, it does not seem abnormal — to me — to remember little details of conversations. That being said, about at least 3 times in the…
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Dance practice log – reflection
Starting a couple weeks ago, I changed the way I approach dance training, particular when training by myself. December 04, 2024 What did I work on? What are my areas of growth? December 06, 2024 What did I work on? I started uploading my entire dance trainings onto YouTube (as unlisted, since they are primary…
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Weekly Review – November 25th to December 02
Normally, I conduct my weekly reviews on Sunday, on a weekend where I am less pressed for time, a period of time that I can sit down and reflect. However, I had Elliott this past weekend — at the moment, alternating weekends — and by the end of Sunday evening, at 5:00pm, when her mother…
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Reflection on attending a parenting workshop on boundaries
I signed up for a parenting workshop hosted by my daughter’s (Steiner based) school, a workshop on setting and applying boundaries. Though I have an aversion to authority in general — I value and have a high need for independence — I showed up in the space with an open mind and open heart and…
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Hallelujah: Officially divorced
I’m trying to contain my excitement. I feel a profound sense of joy, liberated: I am officially divorced. I’m officially financial broke more details below) but my spirits are very high. Though I have some regrets throughout this process, mainly on my lack of assertiveness, I am very happy with now and what the universe…