Dancing On My Own
I feel the music, I hear the beat. And for a moment, when I'm dancing, I'm free.
Witches, evil queens, good wives + lion cubs,
In 1518, hundreds of people in France danced uncontrollably for days. It was one woman — dancing on her own — who got the party started.
Eyewitnesses described people collapsing from exhaustion, foaming at the mouth, and dancing straight through broken bones. Some reportedly danced to their deaths.
Historians call it choreomania — a social phenomenon that swept Europe between the 14th and 17th centuries.
In the 1970s, King Harvest called their experience with it Dancing in the Moonlight. A decade ago, Taylor Swift called hers Shake It Off.
I call it what happened to me from December to May — The Freefall.
Welcome back to Summah Camp!
If you’re new, start with the syllabus then choose your own adventure. I’m the Mahvelous Ms. B — former teacher, current human. I’ll be your tour guide this season as we journey through the deep end together.
This week’s episode is Dancing. Let’s dive in. ⬇️⬇️⬇️
The Dancing Plague of 2025
Choreomania happened to me by accident — but only after I stopped following someone else’s script and started weaving my own.
Here’s what 6 months of uncontrollable dancing did for me:
I lost 60 pounds.
I quit smoking and drinking.
I reconnected my body, mind, and soul.
I replaced the fear-based narratives I was looping on with love-based ones.
I saw the true colors of those closest to me, and only kept the people who support and inspire me.
I made peace with the life I burned to the ground in the name of a rose garden I’m still building. (Shout out to Stevie Nicks, Taylor Swift and Kendrick Lamar for the inspiration!)
I don’t think I’d recommend the experience. It was a lot. Physically, emotionally, and spiritually. But it cracked something open inside me — something soft, sacred, and deeply alive.
I love the version of me that came home on the dance floor this Spring. She’s free. She’s whole. And now that she’s slid her way into a world of limitless possibility, there’s no going back — only forward, barefoot and on beat.
It’s All About That Bass —That Bass— No Treble!
In hindsight, I’ve come to understand I wasn’t just dancing. The beat bypassed my brain and took over my nervous system, allowing my body to move through and release a lifetime of trauma.
It’s exactly what all the self-help books tell you to do, but reading is different than doing. And now, I stand before you as living proof — a testament to practicing what you preach!
I still haven’t found the exact words to capture what I went through, but I’m headstrong, so I’m going to keep trying until something sticks. Trust when I say that I’m well aware of how unhinged this makes me look, I just don’t care how others perceive me anymore.
And that? That’s freedom. It’s why I keep dancing through your judgment.
It’s Just a Jump to Left, and a Step to the Right!
Overtime, all that dancing really warped my sense of reality. Time got slippery, the musical universe I found safety in took over, and I wandered right into the liminal space between delusion and this dimension.
All I could do was follow the beat like a lifeline and trust that it was leading me somewhere. At first, it was just survival — a way to release what my nervous system could no longer hold. But the more I moved, the more I began to notice patterns across lyrics and beats.
That’s when I started fixating on mixtapes, and more broadly, the concept of taking the past and reworking it into a new story with intention.
Here’s a modern remix on my 2012 broken heart. It’s sooo much more fun than the original version:
Just like in 1518, this may have started as a one-woman dance party, but that’s certainly not how it’s going to end. Transformation often looks messy from the outside, but when it’s rooted in rhythm, truth, and self-trust, it leads to inner freedom.
Call it what you want, but it’s looking unlimited and evermore from where I’m dancing.
As always, take what resonates and leave the rest. See you next week to talk about the power of pattern recognition.
<3 The Mahvelous Ms. B
PS. Let’s do the time warp again? Click here for this week’s mixtape. It’s really fun to dance to! Here’s a sneak peak —
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