Forums > Social Chat > I realized today I have never seen anyone poi...

Posted: 19th Jan 2009
How big are the gaps you need to fill? If you'd like I could help you fill a few of those gaps, I've always meant to do more tutorials, but I usually tend to wait for a topic I really enjoy, rather than one that needs to be done.

Posted: 19th Jan 2009
Hmm, I'm not sure. I did want to have all the videos under the one user, so that people only needed one place to go, rather than having the information disjointed and spread across various users. That was my vision anyway, a complete course in everything poi, all put into a decent order and all in the one place.

If you didn't mind having the videos under my user, although of course will full credit given to you and a link to your account, it'd help if you could make an advanced stalls tutorial, a plane-bending tutorial and hell man, a tutorial on style would all be better coming from you than from me.

If you'd rather make them under your user, that's fine, but I may make tutorials for the above myself at some stage to complete the course.

Posted: 19th Jan 2009
I'm not fussed about the username. I was intending on putting together another stalls vid anyway, one that encompasses the last two as well as all the other tips I've gathered along the way that I just hadnt been thinking about. Plane bending comes into the same tutorial, really. We'll see if I have to break it in half due to length...

Style? I guess you'll have to point out why you think I'd put together a good style tutorial and then I spose I'll work out why I move in that specific way, otherwise I'm not really sure what you're referring to.

Posted: 19th Jan 2009
there is a finder for people around your location on this page. you should check that out.

Gata Gata Para Sum Gata Bodhisvaha.
Go far, go further, go further than ever imagined.

Posted: 19th Jan 2009
I have checked it out, there is no one close to me, but thanks.

Human

Posted: 19th Jan 2009
Hi duvan

If I were starting with poi today, and I didn't have anyone around me to teach me, I'd look specifically for lessons that were directed towards ultra newbies. When i search poi lessons, HoP is at the top of the page, and who can't click on a site with a name like that?

What I'd probably do is start here, and look for other lessons featuring the same move just to get some extra perspective. I don't think I'd feel overwhelmed by sheer volume as I'd sort out the wheat from the chaff, so to speak and concentrate on moves that I figure I could "understand" easily and spend my time and effort "mastering" those moves.

Posted: 19th Jan 2009
Originally Posted By: NathanielEverist

As for egos, unfortunately, I too have an ego, as I said earlier, I feel jealous when I see people who can do things I can't, especially with poi, and sadly it lead to a lot of brilliant performances or spinners going unappreciated by me, because I couldn't see the beauty of their skill for what it was, I merely saw a set of new benchmarks for me to meet. I guess that comes from a low sense of self-worth, to the point that one needs to compensate by developing a set of skills to fill the gaps in one's confidence.

Despite this, I've never withheld from teaching, I taught everybody who wanted to learn, and made tutorial videos, I think this was a conscious effort to combat the feelings of possessiveness that I knew I felt, but didn't want to, I forced what I thought were good values upon myself. But hey, now I realise my ego has extended into my tutorial videos, which I am quite proud of, and that I enjoy teaching primarily because it makes me feel good about myself.

Man, this ego stuff is tricky, sorry to ramble on about myself.

Well, we're pretty much all ego driven with these arts and jealousy over people who are "better" than you is only natural. the best spinner ( tech speaking ) that I know IRL and spin with regularly....is 15 years old !! If I want to learn a move, I'll just ask him, and if he doesn't know it, he'll go learn it and teach it to me the next time I see him. it's kind of annoying, in a way, I've been spinning 6 years now, he's been spinning just over a year but I don't let it bother me to the point of being competitive and thinking I have to learn more to keep up, as I pretty much stopped "worrying" about new moves years ago ( heck, I just learned hyperloops a few months ago )

BTW..15 year old guy learned from your tutorials among others and has never set foot in these forums saying he prefers the narrated video format over text.

With the egos and our local situation, it was more "political" than anything. There was one main group that had a very strict ideology on who they thought "should" be spinning poi ( 40+ year old guys weren't in that preferred demographic ), another performance group that used to monopolise the weekly spin jams with tactics like setting up a video camera and telling everyone else to "get out of the shot". There was a third group that claimed to have invented fire spinning, or at least brought it "home" and they figured they should be the dominant group, and then there were the "strays", like me, who just wanted to spin and didn't have time for all this cow's poo.

This led to a community that could only be described as tiny, being fragmented into several sub groups and it's still going on, sort of. this winter, there were changes afoot, and this weekend might just be the start of a "healing" of old animosities...fingers crossed.

If I were you, I'd be proud of those tutorials too...they're great

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
Holy crap! I'm glad I'm not around all that drama. I just like to have fun and spin with my friends. We're all learning together and we like to help eachother if one of us gets a move first.

I'm sort of forced to learn on my own so I'm greatful for all the resources available to me.

"When we dance with the faeries, we dance with the reflections of our true selves and the true inner self of the world."

"If you keep thinking like that, you'll never get to meet a Unicorn."

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
Meetup.com

I'm tellin ya peoples...I found a group within an hour. In a year with them I've learned a lot. It made my introduction to poi a smooth one that involved hands on experience. The big thing about finding a group, to me, is just having people to spin with. Anyone can watch at any party, and that's fine, but ANYTHING you do around them is AWESOME so it's a one sided relationship, and they'd probably hardly notice progress.

Hell one of my friends said one of the most annoying things I've ever heard I said "I've gotten much better(at fire dancing obviously) his response, "How?"

And I don't think he meant that I was tops to begin with, but it showed a genuine lack of comprehension for what I do, and same goes for most people, they don't get it. So spinning with peers, while sometimes lame (so I hear) is in my mind incredibly beneficial.

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
Stout, man, that sounds crazy! I mean, I've got an ego, but I've never let it stand in the way of my morals, and if anybody asks me to learn something, even if there is a twinge of possessiveness, I always teach it to them to the best of my abilities, I like to think that our conscious control and free will can over-ride the more undesirable aspects of human nature.

The behaviour of those guys you're talking about sounds rediculous, I've only met a couple of people that bad, just people with an over-inflated sense of superiority based on the fact that they can spin fire. When somebody asks me if spinning is hard, I say "It's not as hard as it looks, and like anything, if you put in the time and practice it'll be easy to you in no time". But at this festival, I was watching this guy spin fire, and he was technically average, nothing amazing in my opinion, and this young group of boys, like 12 years old were watching him in awe, and one of them asked him if it was hard to learn and he said something along the lines of "it's very hard and very dangerous. I've been spinning for years to get this good, and I wouldn't try it if I were you, it takes a special kind of person to do it." I can't remember his exact words, but it was along those lines, and that was probably the most appalling thing I've seen in the way of egos in spinning. I later taught one of those boys a couple of poi basics when I saw him and told him to keep it up, and I hope he did.

You've got the right attitude with just wanting to enjoy your spinning and not getting too caught up in learning new moves. I've become quite like that myself recently, I just wanna enjoy what I've learnt and relax, rather than be driven to keep learning new things. I think the HoP community in general has got the right attitude too.

And thanks for the compliments on my tutorials, I'm looking forward to making more.

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
I believe that is called reaction formation in psychology. Where you feel one way about something, be it possessiveness or whatever and you react in the opposite way.

I have to admit that when I first started spinning...(like 2 weeks ago ) and my friends wanted to do it too, I did feel slightly possessive. I wanted to be unique with it and so I found my reactions over enthusiastic about them learning, like I was too excited or something. That all changed when I had a fire dancing friend come over and help me and my friends, the energy we all had together was so beautiful. What made it all the better was when I helped my friend get the 3-beat weave just today. I felt genuine thrill for her and I was so excited we were all doing it together.

And yes Nathaniel, I have very much enjoyed your tutorials, they have helped me a great deal.
EDITED_BY: Derwyn (1232420092)

"When we dance with the faeries, we dance with the reflections of our true selves and the true inner self of the world."

"If you keep thinking like that, you'll never get to meet a Unicorn."

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
Reaction formation, that's cool, I'll have to read up on that.

Yeah, the feeling when you successfully teach somebody something is great, I almost enjoy it more than learning something new myself.
And I'm so glad to hear my tutorials have helped.

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
Sometimes I just have a movement and I want someone to tell me HONESTLY whether or not its any good, whether its worth cleaning up or does it just visually look like crap in which case I only do it for the feel and a slightly sloppy version is A-ok in that situation, I just don't whip it out with fire.

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
I tell you Stuart, I said I don't like plane bending, most of your stuff is pretty tight though, but visually, I just think plane bending lacks flair, and I'm still a skeptic when it comes to anything regarding 3D spinning too.

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
I've got one very nice looking plane bender that I think even you'll like.

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
Originally Posted By: NathanielEverist he said something along the lines of "it's very hard and very dangerous. I've been spinning for years to get this good, and I wouldn't try it if I were you, it takes a special kind of person to do it." I can't remember his exact words, but it was along those lines, and that was probably the most appalling thing I've seen in the way of egos in spinning. I later taught one of those boys a couple of poi basics when I saw him and told him to keep it up, and I hope he did.


jesus christ, it's people like this that truly annoy me. reminds me of several experiences I had some years ago. it really crushed my fragile ego back then to hear stuff like that and almost made me give up. good to hear you gave the kid a lesson though!

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
Yea, the drama's a real time waster, not to mention the bonus stress it brings on. It gets worse too, but I'll spare you the details.

I actually did a thread on poi and community over on tribe about three years ago and found that ( at least in the US ) that fragmented spinning cultures are not uncommon. San Fransisco, for instance seems to have a few different spinning "camps" with the attendant animosity that accompanies such separations.

I tried Meetupdotcom a few years ago, and when it finally came down to the actual meetup, only myself and two other people actually showed up..I already knew the other two, so no meeting was actually done. Then the thing just sort of died out and Meetup is still after me to be a moderator, or facilitator, but there's been no new interest in "the group".

It's true, most people don't understand what we do which is why when I perform these arts, I'm not so fussed about moves but tend instead to focus on not looking "stiff" which is my greatest problem, especially if it's cold out and I haven't had time to warm up at all.

One idea that did pop out of that poi and community thread was the idea that some people want to keep these arts to themselves and a suggestion was made that maybe this is the only "cool" thing they know how to do. I can sort of relate to the idea as I'm a professional artist doing something you've never even heard of, let alone seen before ( I won't describe it because you'll form a mental picture,and chances are it'll be wrong ) but that's strictly based on my own financial self interests, not my ego. Mind you it is fun having a hundred people a day tell me I'm awesome, it's the non taxable perque.

Derwyn...IMO, that would be the best situation, to have a group of people all starting out at the same time and learning off each other as you go. So far no one I know is interested in picking up these arts, so it's more of a matter of existing spinner meeting existing spinner.

Then there's the unfortunate idea that a large, a very large, percentage of people who take up these arts don't actually stick with them. It's sort of like, they learn how to spin, get to a stage where they can "do it" and then abandon their toys ( Scuba diving's like this, big time ). There's no shortage of people wanting to learn stuff, well, lately there is, however there's a reluctance to practice leading to me ( and others ) teaching the same things to the same people because the "forgot what I/you said last time"

Quote:Sometimes I just have a movement and I want someone to tell me HONESTLY whether or not its any good

That's the sort of feedback I've been looking for for years and for some strange reason I find it extremely difficult to get. Alien Jon's around these parts this week and I'm hoping for a get together for some critique and there's this guy in Vancouver who I'm hoping to get together with, he's a dancer, and a poi teacher and he has a studio and....everything. I'll pay, I'm not fussed about forking over money for critique, it's just that it seems hard to find people who're familiar with dance, familiar with the limitations of movement these arts ( poi especially ) have. and are willing to talk.

Aside...i went to register for Alien Jon's workshop last night, and got told I can only do it online. I'm saying "Look here's cash" but do to some strange organizational setup, I couldn't actually do it that way, and seeing as how the website that I'm supposed to use to register has been down for four days so far, unless they get it fixed, I won't be able to take that workshop.....sheesh, what ever happened to good ole' cash ?

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
Hmm, I missed a few posts there, dunno why, I think I was in a rush to throw out the last post.

I second duvan, never had that happen to me, though....

But I did have someone try to teach my girlfriend at the time and he went straight from the butterfly to angel wings. She got the butterfly pretty quickly and it was kinda "Oh yeah? Try this."

We were indoors, too!



I'm glad I won't be able to turn out as an egotist who hides all my poi skills, I'll happily share with anyone! I just LOVE teaching, anyone who is willing.

I don't have the attention span to learn from others most of the time, though... which is a shame.

I once had a meeting tee'd up in Geelong and I turned up on the wrong date! I could have swore he told me both a date and a day and they didnt match up which was the date and day... I turned up on the day I thought it was and it was the night previous... oh well... I still havent seen them, I think they were more jugglers than poi'ists anyway.

Man, ramble ramble, just because I can't sleep.

Posted: 20th Jan 2009
Originally Posted By: NathanielEverist.. at this festival, I was watching this guy spin fire, and he was technically average, nothing amazing in my opinion, and this young group of boys, like 12 years old were watching him in awe, and one of them asked him if it was hard to learn and he said something along the lines of "it's very hard and very dangerous. I've been spinning for years to get this good, and I wouldn't try it if I were you, it takes a special kind of person to do it." I can't remember his exact words, but it was along those lines..

I'll exaggerate the danger of fire to kids (the last thing you want is for them to go- 'oh, ok, so it's easy'- get home, make up some home-made lethal poi, having never spun before, stick petrol on em and...) but that guy does sound like a jerk. I had a bit of people acting like that when I was first learning, as well as 'useful' tips, like the one which still makes me giggle from a girl who was supposedly teaching me, who told me off for spinning forwards with one hand and backwards with the other because 'you don't do that with poi'
Sometimes real people teaching you don't help

I spent my first few months learning poi backpacking round New Zealand, picking up random bits from absolutely anyone- (Maori hitchhikers, other folks in hostels, randoms who wandered up to me in the park, one official meet up in Dunedin..) then spent the next year in a tiny English village with a silly name being the only spinner (and almost the only person between the ages of 5 and 50).. and only very rarely managing the 2-hour-each-way drive into Manchester for the nearest (semi)regular meet.. where I always had to leave just as most people were arriving because I had to work early the next morning..

Definitely more fun being somewhere with regular meet ups now, but I can't say I'm actually learning much I couldn't have got off the internet- I'm mainly just drinking more tea and talking more

THE MEEK WILL INHERIT THE EARTH!


If that's okay with you?

Posted: 23rd Jan 2009
Well, I started in 2006, but never really looked at vids and such. The first guy who I saw taught me some stuff (still does) and there is a group of other people around.

Somehow between then and now I have gotten to the point where people tell me I am good. I like teaching as well, but hardly anyone comes back for more. Not sure if that is my fault or not though.

Oh yes, Nathaniel: I can possibly make some tuts as well. You would be free to use them. Just drop me a line on what you need and I will see if I can organise something.... I might not be able to do what you need done though.

'We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad." [said the Cat.]
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "Or you wouldn't have come here."
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures In Wonderland

Posted: 23rd Jan 2009
You guys are going to steal Nathaniel's thunder

Human

Posted: 23rd Jan 2009
Not the plan, I assure you.

I just do not really see much point in duplicating what is done already.

I doubt that my way of teaching is that new that it would be different to anyone else's.

'We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad." [said the Cat.]
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "Or you wouldn't have come here."
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures In Wonderland

Posted: 23rd Jan 2009
I disagree, doppelGanger.

I think that the main aim is to make a set of tutorials all in the same place. And working with a team of highly skilled individuals *cough* makes it seem as though you are part of some elite group.



But as I said, I don't think its about thunder, anyway.

Posted: 23rd Jan 2009
*shrug*

Human