Your improvement doesn’t buy you freedom

You can find the first post here.

Previously on Goodnight Tango

In my last post, I left you with a rhetorical question.

Suppose you improved yourself to the maximum. Suppose you had perfect technique, an expanded vocabulary, and exceptional musicality.

What would all that mean if you still couldn’t find a partner to share them with?

The answer seems obvious. And yet, the question itself quietly challenges a deeply rooted belief:
Better dances come simply from becoming better yourself.

Before looking at this in the context of Tango, let’s examine a bit more where this idea comes from.

Self-worth in the job market

The logic of self-improvement is deeply embedded in the job market. As we already discussed in the previous post, the promise is straightforward:
the better your skills, the better the offers you receive.

But there is a second promise hidden underneath it. Independence.

Browse YouTube for a few minutes, and you will find endless content about side hustles, freelancing, passive income, and building a business “with just a laptop”.
The message is clear: become skilled enough, and you won’t need anyone. You can be your own boss.

This promise is often exaggerated. My own store, for example, exists for over a year and yet it has produced only one order so far. But still, there is some truth in it.

The more skills I develop, the more things I can do on my own.

On my YouTube channel, I write the scripts, shoot the videos, edit them, and handle everything else myself.
I don’t need an editor.
I don’t need a studio.

I am, in a very concrete sense, independent.

So in this domain, the equation holds: the more you learn, the more independent you can become.

💥In case you missed it💥
The Rejections in Tango survey results are out.
Watch them here before the next topic takes over.

Tango and independence

In Tango, this argument collapses the moment you realise that your dance depends on another person.

Yes, we also develop skills here… balance, technique, musicality, sensitivity.
But these skills do not function the same way. You can better see them as capacities.

They are not simply used to produce a result.
They are allocated.

If my partner struggles with balance, part of my own balance is allocated to her.
If she struggles with rhythm, part of my musical capacity is used to manage and adapt the dance so that it remains coherent. The same also works the other way around.

But… when my partner does not need that compensation, something interesting happens. I can allocate my full capacity to my own expression. And she can do the same.

In other words, Tango skills do not make us independent.

They make us capable of handling tension.

They give us agency when something is missing, uneven, or unstable. And the more capacity we have, the more options we have for responding to those situations.

Progress in Tango does not buy us freedom from others.
It buys freedom within constraint.
It buys our partner’s freedom from us!

The more skills I have, the more I can compensate for my partner if needed, and also have available capacity to use for my own expression. The less capacity I have, the more this will be used by my partner and leave me with nothing for my own expression.

What skills actually give us

Seen this way, it becomes easy to understand why advanced dancers often say things like:

“I want to dance with good dancers to enjoy myself.”
“I want to dance with good dancers to protect myself.”

A capable partner allows me to keep my capacity for my own expression instead of spending it on compensation. The dance becomes lighter… richer… more pleasurable.

This is not a moral failure. It is a structural reality of the dance.

But once we see this clearly, an uncomfortable question appears.

The ethical problem

If our partner’s skills increase our pleasure by allowing us to spend less of ourselves on them, then what is our partner, exactly, in that moment?

A person we share the dance with?… or a condition that must be met for our enjoyment to appear?

At what point does protecting or enjoying ourselves turn the other person into a means to an end rather than the end itself?

Before tonight’s Goodnight Tango… just a small thank-you.
The project is growing beyond the blog, with new videos, surveys, and a lively community.
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Tonight’s Goodnight Tango

Tonight’s Goodnight Tango is about memory, loss and the impossibility of replacing what was shared. The narrator is not lacking skill, words, or reflection… he is lacking the other. Like a dancer who searches to find a partner to match them.

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