 On Think Tech on Spectrum OC 16, I'm your host, RV Kelly, and today I'm here with very special guest, Katie Flaschner. Katie, we're going to have you come up on screen here, but just before we get started, Katie, could you explain a little bit more about what you do? For having me on the show, by the way, RV, I am a ballroom dancer and blogger, and I am known. My alter ego is the girl with the tree tattoo. So basically I dance and I write about my experiences, the good, the bad and the awkward as I go through my ballroom dance journey. Interesting. So ballroom dancing, is that something you just do yourself or do you also teach other people how to ballroom dance as well? I don't teach at the moment as a future goal. I'm actually still a student. I'm a competitive dancer, but I compete in a circuit that's called Pro Am for professional amateur. And so I'm the amateur half of my dance partnership and the other half is actually my teachers. Oh, wow. So it seems like something kind of a little bit out there to be a professional or amateur dancer where you're competing. This is what you do. That seems like a really unique career path. How did you get started? Well, it's actually my first exposure to ballroom dancing was for my wedding back in 2011. My fiancee, this is Hyman, I took just a handful of dance lessons. We were doing a 1920s themed wedding and we didn't want to do a choreographed first dance, but we wanted to be able to, you know, hold our own on the dance floor, learn some 1920 swing dances, things like that. And I was hooked immediately in the ballroom world. If you talk to students, a lot of people describe being bit by the ballroom bug and it's a very real thing. You get just the hard to describe the emotions, the extreme positivity that you feel as you learn to move your body in time with music and with another person connecting with that other person is really incredible. And it's definitely addicting, but just the question about the career path, I'm actually still working at the job full time. I'm a technical editor with an environmental consulting firm. So that I do on during the day and then nice and weekends, I'm ballroom dancing and I'm blogging, but the dancing and writing are really my passion. I've always loved dance and creative writing and the two of them emerged in this beautiful way when I was exposed to the ballroom world. So so tell me about your journey as a ballroom dancer. What did you have to go through? What did you learn about yourself? Oh, goodness, I didn't have to show us that long. But let's see. I started taking private lessons more regularly at the end of 2012. And usually when people start for certain lessons as an adult, they just you just want to learn to dance socially. You can go to parties and be able to actually dance, you know, songs that are played. And then the next level up is a lot of dance videos. We'll hold hold showcases, which are basically like dance recitals. You learn a specific choreographed dance to a specific song. You get to, you know, get messed up in a fun costume and you get on on a stage in a theater and perform for all your family and friends. And that was the route I went because I've always. Since I was a little girl, love dance and whenever I would watch a live performance, I would literally end up on the edge of my feet because I would just be drawn in. Like I was physically being pulled toward the dancers and that movement and the emotion that was expressed through the movement. It was just beautiful, but I was very shy and reserved as a child. And so I never got into I took some ballet, jazz, pop classes when I was maybe six or seven years old. But then I just got the fear got to be too great. I couldn't I couldn't push past the fear. I was too shy. I didn't I ended up stopping the classes and it's always been have a regret of mine that I let the fear of performing in front of people and being vulnerable in that way. I was kind of regretted, you know, letting that hold me back. And so when I found out that you could perform and as a ballroom dancer on stage, I was like, OK, this is my chance. This is my chance to have redeem myself and fix this one major life regret that I've been carrying around. And it was magical. It was terrifying, absolutely terrifying, but but it was magical. And after that, it's sort of snowballed. I learned that ballroom competitions were a thing. And after my first going to witness my first competition, that was finally my niche. That was like, OK, this is it. This is where this is the part of the ballroom world that I really want to be a part of. And it pushes me every single day. You know, you first go to the studio thinking you're just going to learn some dance steps. But you end up being confronted with fears and self doubt that you've been carrying around that you didn't even realize were there. And so you push yourself to connect with another person, connect with the audience, connect with them, the music and connect with your own body. It was really surprising to me how much of a mental and emotional journey this was as much of as much as it was learning physical movement. That's a really impressive journey that you've been on, Katie. And I'm wondering if you if you ever look at people around you who who haven't been bitten by the dance bug or who are still, you know, new to, they've never even tried ballroom dance. And you think, oh my gosh, your life would be so much better if you just learned to dance. Oh, plenty of people I have met where they learn that I'm a ballroom dancer. And that's one of the first things that come out of my mouth. Oh, I've always wanted to try that. I've always wanted to try dance. But there's always some excuse. I don't have any rhythm or, you know, I'm just too shy or I wouldn't be any good or I'm too old or too whatever. There's always some kind of an excuse. And every time like it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if it's too old or too short or too tall or too whatever. It doesn't matter. Everybody has a rhythm inside them that you can connect with and you can dance. And it really, I think that's the biggest part of it that can be transformative is connecting with that dancer inside yourself that you don't necessarily even realize is there. And from a human perspective, every culture you look at has some type of dance. Even going back hundreds, thousands of years, there are always dances. And ballroom dancing in particular that kind of held a really cool and a really long run. And it's not something you publicly teach anymore. And it's not something you can just be like, oh, here's a nightclub. I'm going to go in and foxtrot. It's you don't get a real chance to do that anymore. And so I remember in my senior year, I finally, finally mustard my courage and took a social dance class. And I had so much fun. I mean, I learned to waltz, I learned to foxtrot, I learned to tango. And like you said, there's so many different things that you feel and you experience. And for me, it was just that one semester. And so I've never danced since, but being able to be twirled around the floor by an attractive partner, being able to be coordinated and graceful for the first time in my life, it was so powerful for me. And so even now, I'm always like nudging my husband like, hey, honey, why don't we go dance? Or hey, honey, why don't you come try this with me? But he never got the chance to try it in school. So for him, it's still like you said, this big scary thing where he doesn't want to try it. So I'm, I'm always hopeful that someday we'll, we'll make it out and we'll go dancing. I hope you guys do. It's not uncommon. It's not uncommon at all for, especially men for some reason to really hesitate at starting ballroom lessons. I think it's just, because you go to the studio and you know nothing and you have to be willing to make mistakes and maybe look a little silly in front of at least one other person, your partner, and then a second person, the teacher. And I don't know. I think that's a little more difficult for guys to push themselves to view. But actually once, once guys, you get started dancing, they, really, they stick with it longer as they'll, they'll advance faster. Once they get into the groove and you know, learn, you know, learn themselves that, okay, yeah, like I can, I can do this and this is pretty cool. Then it's, it's motivating for them. So I hope you can convince your, your husband to at least try. Just try one. Yeah, me too. See how it goes. Yeah. Well, and I think it's so funny because when I talk to women, they are always like, oh my gosh, I wish I could learn. I've always wanted to learn and men who can dance are so attractive. But when I talk to men, they're like, ballroom dancing is stupid. So I'm not really sure what's going on there. They pick up the message and I've, I've said that to, I don't know how many men that I've met who scoff at the idea or like, oh no, that's first, you know, that's first 50 years or, or what have you, like, no, you don't understand. Women love men who can dance. Like if you're looking for, for a date, learn how to dance and then go show off those groups. You will have women lining up. No problem. And that's absolutely true. I think when I, when I, we say this to men, I think they think we're exaggerating. We're really not. The most attractive man in the room is the one who can spin you around the floor and make you look like a goddess. And, and really in dance, I don't know how it is at higher levels, Katie, but for beginning levels where I was at in dance, like the men had the easiest part. Their job was just to kind of like take a couple of steps and like troll the woman around and make her look pretty. So it was really easy for them to do, but they had so much fun and we had so much fun. Even when you are just doing the basic steps, you know, just, just starting out, that's the other great thing about ballroom dance versus some of the other dance genres in ballet or tap is you can go and take one lesson and you can learn how to dance. You can learn the basic box and then you're, you're dancing with a live lesson. I think that's, that's something that's so cool and makes it so much fun, even when you're first starting out. I love that. Katie, you have been such a delight to have on so far and viewers, we're not going away. We're just taking a very quick one minute break and then when we get back, we'll start talking about dancing with dragons and how you can start. I'm going to the game and it's going to be great. Early arriving for a little tailgate. I usually drink but won't be drinking today because I'm the designated driver and that's okay. It's nice to be the guy that keeps his friends in line, keeps them from drinking too much so we can have a great time. A little responsibility can go a long way because it's all about having fun on game day. Let's go. I'm Ethan Allen, your host on Pacific Partnerships in Education here on Think Tech Hawaii. Every other week, Tuesdays at 3 p.m., we have guests on and talk about the fascinating, interesting and unique partnerships in education that occur across the Pacific Islands with Hawaii, Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, Palau, Guam, all these places have really rich local education programs going on and the exchange among and between these programs is a wealth of great information helping the islands all learn how to survive and thrive in our ever-changing world. I hope you'll join us on Pacific Partnerships in Education. Hello viewers, welcome back to Out of the Comfort Zone on Think Tech on Spectrum OC16. I'm your host, Arby Kelly, and here with me today is ballroom dancing expert, Katie Flashner. Now Katie, when we were talking behind the scenes viewers, we mentioned about some of your inner journey that you've gone through and how you had to face your own demons and even your own dragons as you went through this dancing process. For sure, yeah. Like I said earlier, it was surprising how much of a mental and emotional roller coaster and journey that ballroom dancing has taken me on. It really, for me personally, I deal with anxiety, like I mentioned before the break, I was very shy as a child and it's kind of developed into some anxiety as an adult. So it's, you know, this weird struggle inside where I have this passion, you know, I wanted to get out and dance and perform but then, oh my god, nobody look at me, you know. So, and it's, there's been, there's definitely been moments where I've literally pushed myself to my limit for this passion because at that limit is when the anxiety gets triggered and I've had to run to the bathroom during a dance lesson because I was going to start hyperventilating because just even practicing, for me, the bigger triggers were practicing the emotional expression. You watch dancing with the stars, you know, you see the pros of, you know, such expression and I feel a little more comfortable doing it now but when I, especially when I was first getting into the serious training for competition, it was very difficult for me to even practice that because I'm introverted, I'm shy, my emotions don't show on my face but naturally. So even to smile big, I have to think about it and tell myself, smile big. So it's incredible but I've come up with this mantra of do it scared and that's guided me through and helped me continue to advance up in the levels in competition and become a better performer. I can do that emotional expression a little easier now because I acknowledge my fear, you know, those I call in my demons in the head, the self-doubt, the anxiety, the fear, all those little buggers inside my brain that are screaming, no, don't do it, you're not going to be safe. It's how them, okay, you can just sit there, you're going to be okay, we're going to do this anyways. I know we're scared but we're just going to go for it and the great thing about ballroom, you know, there's so many aspects of life where you can work hard and get nothing for it, you know, you can bust your butt at your job and maybe you get a promotion, maybe you won't. So ballroom, you work hard and you see the results almost instantly. Competition, you know, the placements, there's a lot of other variables besides this year hard work but just for yourself as a dancer, every time I set out to, okay, I'm going to work on this specific aspect of my dancing and I see the results. I feel the results. My teacher, when he dances with me, tells me he can feel the results and our partnering and in our connection and it's so motivating and it inspires me to just keep pushing myself even as I have those demons in the back of my head, those screaming, those biting their nails like, no, I don't think we should do this, like, no, remember? Remember the last time we just did it even though we were scared? Look how great it turned out. Let's do that again. We can do that again. So and the cool thing is it's translated to other parts of my life. Just growing the blog and the girl with the tree tattoo brand, I would never have gotten to where I am today with those proceeds in my life if I didn't just do it scared. There's just no way because you're never going to feel completely ready. At least for me, I always feel that fear. Those demons are always in the back of my head but it doesn't matter. I just push forward anyways and hopefully, reap the reward. That is so true, Katie. And as you were talking, I was even thinking of times in my life where I've been like, no, I'm not ready for this and so there's something I need to do for my business or for my relationship or something. But I'm so scared of it that I just like, no, I'll get to it later. I'll get to it later and I put it off and I put it off and I put it off until finally I'm forced to do it and then I get, I do it scared and then I get on the other side and I'm like, huh, that was easy. And you build it up in your mind and it's so much bigger and scarier than it is. Is that how it is with us? Yeah, we really, absolutely, we really can, we can really mess with ourselves. Like, our brains are so powerful. We can take the tiniest little worry and just blow it up to, you know, this huge problem that we can't take any action, you know, because of this huge thing. But in reality, if we just took a step past whatever was causing us with fear, it's like, oh, that's a big of a deal. And it's definitely been that way in dance with the, you know, as I practice my expression, like I was saying, or there were certain, certain dances that would give me more trouble because it just, the movement made me more uncomfortable. Tango was, was a problem dance for me because it has this real, like, low movement and then fast. And just that switch, like I couldn't, it was so scary to me, like I could do this slow, no problem, but harnessing the intensity was, was difficult for me. You know, I felt like I was drawing too much attention to myself, even though that's what I'm supposed to do. And then that transition from the flow to the quick movement in Tango, that sharpness that Tango has, that was, that was difficult. I had to really push myself. But now, it's, you know, I love it. Tango is one of my favorite dances now. So it's just, yeah, it's just pushing a little bit, you know, to keep pushing at it. And it doesn't, you know, it's not like one push and you're there, you know, you just kind of keep nudging yourself. Like, okay, like you're not, you don't have to get it perfect right now, but just take one more step toward it. Just give it one more try. And then, you know, eventually you turn around and you realize, oh, I need it. I think that's so cool. But I know a lot of our viewers are still going to be like, I'm not sure about this whole ballroom dancing thing. So what advice would you have for people who are just starting out and maybe need a little help? If there's a dance studio or I don't know, you know, where to go, me personally, I went on Groupon and found a studio that had a deal and that's where I started. But if you want a better idea of what to expect, viewers can actually go to my blog, TheGirlsOfTreeCats2.com, and there's a page there called Dance Diaries. And I wrote just a short little e-book on learning ballroom dance. And it basically covered everything that I wish I had known having the first year of my dancing. I wish I had known before I started just as a little better prepared. That would definitely give people have a leg up, a little advantage if they wanted to start searching around for dance lessons or other opportunities to dance. So it sounds like you've got a free e-book with all the things you wish you'd known when you first started out. And our viewers can find it at TheGirlWithTheTreeCats2.com. Yes. Well, it's not free. It's like $5. But you can find it at my website. All right, so we can find it at your website. And so gentlemen, if there are any men watching this, this may be something you want to read for yourself or send to your wife because my birthday is coming up. And this is what I want from my husband. And women, if you're watching and you're wishing your husband would take you out dancing, well, tell him and send him this guide. So all of you, if you want to strengthen your relationship, break through some of your barriers or even just have more fun with your partner, then you should definitely go to TheGirlWithTheTreeCats2.com and find that book. But Katie, is there, where are you going in the next few years? What should we be expecting to see from you? Back to seeing me on the dance floor a lot more. I'm actually going to a competition in New Orleans in a couple weeks. And then there'll definitely be a few more on the calendar. And then just in the digital landscape, I plan on growing the blog and TheGirlWithTheTreeCats2 brand a whole lot more. My mission in general is to really inspire and enable other people who are pursuing bar and dance either as a hobby or a passion or an obsession. I really want to be able to inspire and enable those people to become fit and joyful ballroom dancers. Because that's what's inside of us all, that confident and joyful being. And it just takes a little step to do it scared and then do it scared again. And you can find it. You can connect with that dancer inside you. So definitely be on the lookout for inspiration from TheGirlWithTheTreeCats2. And I'm curious, Katie, are we ever going to see you on the big screen TV, like dancing with the stars or American Idol or something like that? Happy to talk. Since the future will bring, I really, I just whatever opportunities come up for me in bar and dance, I'm going to stay open to them because this journey has been incredible so far. I've learned so much about myself. I've grown as a person. I've done things I never thought I'd be able to do. And I've just learned that I'm actually capable of doing all those things I never thought I could do. So for me, I feel like the possibilities in the future are have very little, very few limits. I'm happy to hear that, Katie. Thank you so much for coming onto the show. I really appreciate your time. And I wish you the best of luck in the future. Thank you so much, Arv you. Thank you for having me. My pleasure. And viewers, if you stay tuned, you will see us next week at 1pm on Out of the Comfort Zone. We'll all be here interviewing Kameesha Muhammad, who is a mindset lifestyle and confidence coach. See you then.