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Welcome to Episode 91 of the Salsa Kings LIVE podcast
We have been featured as #1 in “Top 10 Salsa Podcasts” on FeedSpot.
The Fountain of Youth was said to be in Florida, where Ponce De Leon searched for it. Today, Andres is joined by Jose Luis Gutierrez to discuss their own search for the fountain of youth, metaphorically. Jose Luis has spent twenty years owning a dance studio and teaching dance and seventeen years as the founder of the Orlando Salsa Congress. As of recording, Jose Luis is on his way to teach for the Big Salsa Festival, which can be looked up at bigsalsafestival.com. Jose Luis grew up in Puerto Rico until he was sixteen, where he learned his love of Salsa. Afterwards, he lived in Miami until he was 21, when he joined up with the Marine Corps and was stationed in Los Angeles. Jose Luis looked for a place to learn salsa dancing there, but could not find a studio. In a hip-hop club, he met some women who were able to take them to a club where he could learn. From there, his passion only grew and he became the dancing master he is now.
Plenty of other subjects are brought up, such as the social nature of dance, the difference between Salsa among different cultures, and Jose Luis’ perspective on the nature of competition, all things he has learned from his time as a dancer.
Jose Luis wants to talk about how dance can be its own fountain of youth, from its health benefits to how it can revive you and realize that age is only a number. At a young age, this isn’t something you think about at a younger age, but as you get older there is a realization that your passion for dance can keep you physically, mentally, and emotionally healthy. At 52, Jose Luis understands how dance changes as you get older. Despite his age, dance has kept him healthy and feeling young to the point that even doctors have noticed. Jose Luis also points out the difference between the older women who have come to his dance studio and women of a similar age who stay in a far more inactive lifestyle. Dance can keep you young, not just physically, but through its emotional passion and zeal.
We all want to stay young, and many recoil from scary words like exercise or eating right, but the solution really is to have love for what you’re doing, which will lead you to those things. Dance is a perfect way to find that youth, an activity of energy and passion that absolutely anyone can do if they put their heart into it.
“In my dance studio, I have a few late senoras. They’re out there, they’re 71-72 and they look amazing. I compare this to my mother who’s at that age and she doesn’t go out, at home she doesn’t do anything. And it’s like at that age you need something to keep you going. The dance keeps you going.”
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