Let Me Catch My Breath

In the fourth grade, I met a friend who really loved to dance. Not formal, ‘official’ dancing like ballroom, and not the frenetic dancing people do to club music, but just moving around to music for the sheer joy of it. We’ll call her JDF (joyful dancing friend).

I remember going to some kind of dancing event with her family in grade school. I wore my favorite blue circle skirt with red paisleys on it, and I whirled and twirled the night away. Someone tried to teach me waltzing at this event, and I failed miserably, but it didn’t matter, because I was dancing, and I was having the time of my life.

This is what I want in a dancing DVD – moving to music with joy, and without worrying about whether I’m doing it ‘right’ or not. It turns out this is pretty difficult to find in the regimented world of exercise dance DVDs. I keep trying though.

I chose today’s selection, Breathe I & II, because I loved the idea of combining tai chi, yoga, and dance. I’m a big fan of fusion exercise DVDs in general … it must be something existential about the sum of the workout being greater than its parts.

B.R.E.A.T.H.E. is an acronym, but the jury’s still out on what it stands for. the opening credits indicate it is Breathe, Relax, Energize, Align, Turn In, Harmonize and Evolve. In the introduction, instructor Petra Kolber says it stands for Breath, Relaxation, Energy, Alignment, and Tuning In for Harmony. That, of course, spells B.R.E.A.T.H., but at least it’s still an actual word … unlike the DVD cover, which entertainingly spells it B.R.A.T.H.E.

Now that the proofreading section of the review is over, let’s turn to the actual workout. There are two workouts on the DVD: Breathe I is 45 minutes long, and Breathe II is 48 minutes long. The two workouts are really very similar, but the background for Breathe II looks like a movie set where the protagonist would go to meet up with God and find out if it was his time yet, so I’ve focused more on the bamboo-paneled set of Breathe I, and that’s what I’ll cover in-depth in this review.

The workout starts off reassuringly slowly, showing one move with arms only, then a second move, again with arms only, then adding leg movements to go with the arm movements. This is always a tricky point for me, when the arms and legs start doing separate things, but I’m still managing to keep up at this point.

There is a move a few minutes later in the workout where you are supposed to sweep your legs out to the side one at a time while your arms are sweeping forward, and I just can’t do it. Either my legs sweep forward to match my arms, or more frequently, my arms sweep to the sides to match my legs. I’m also really terrible at simultaneously rubbing my tummy and patting my head.

This workout is a classic example of TIFTing; for those of you who aren’t in the know, TIFT stands for Take It From the Top. This means you learn two moves, then string them together, then learn a third move, then string all three moves together, then learn a fourth move, then string all four moves together … until eventually you have done the first move roughly one million times and you have learned an entire dance routine. Each time you go back through the whole routine with the new move you just learned tacked on at the end, the instructor says “Let’s take it from the top!” – hence the name.

TIFT-heavy workouts can be problematic for the uncoordinated; it adds an extra level of difficulty to the workout. Not only do you have to do the moves, but you have to remember what they all are and in what order they happen. This workout is no exception, and it was a bit of a struggle for me.

One of Kolber’s favorite phrases is “one more time”, but it is often not clear whether she means do that single move one more time, do the current sequence of two moves one more time, do the whole routine one more time, or something else entirely. Also, she lies: it is hardly ever just one more time. This workout goes on forever.

I think a lot of the issues with these two workouts stem from the fact that they started life as VHS tapes. Back in the olden days, there were no menus on workout videos; you just stuck the tape in the VCR, pressed play, and did the whole thing from beginning to end.

If the workouts had been created for DVD, they could have been made much more user-friendly. For example, each 45-minute workout, which currently has 14-15 moves, could have been broken up into two 20-minute segments, each with 7 moves, plus a cool down. Even better, it could have been broken up into three 12-15 minute segments, each with 5 moves, plus a cool down. This way, the irritatingly coordinated people could just do all the segments and get the complete workout, but those of us who are overwhelmed could choose just one segment to focus on at first.

This would have the added benefit that you wouldn’t have to remember any one move for the entire 45 minutes. Even I can keep track of 5 moves for 15 minutes, and then promptly forget those moves and continue on with the next segment.

My normal workaround in this kind of situation would be to go until I was getting frustrated, and then skip ahead to the cool down. Unfortunately, this DVD does not have chapters built in, so if you press the skip button, you end up back at the main menu. This would have been a simple thing to put in the DVD; shame on SOULjourn for not taking the time to add this feature. Being able to skip to the cool down would have easily earned this DVD another half star. For your reference, the cool down starts at about 39:30 in Breathe I, and at about 44:00 in Breathe II.

Having said all that, this workout has a lot going for it. The whole concept of turning tai chi and yoga into a dance routine is pretty darn cool, the music is great (especially on Breathe I; my JDF would love it), and Kolber is good about offering alternative moves for people at different fitness levels and just generally being encouraging.

This DVD will stay in my collection, because I think the concept is really neat, and I’m determined to get the hang of the moves, but it could have been so much better. I hope Petra Kolber is taking notes for her next workout DVD; I can’t wait to try it.

In the meantime, the search continues for a dance DVD that will get me moving with joyful abandon …