Thinking About Getting Into: TikTok Dance Challenges

I rewatched Frances Ha recently and found myself the unwitting target of an insult. "You look at yourself in the mirror too much," Sophie says—or something along those lines—to her best friend, the titular Frances. She's not wrong. Frances does frequently make eye contact with herself when she passes reflective surfaces, but this habit, I think, is one that's rightfully made. Frances is a dancer, after all.

If I asked you to picture a dance studio, I'm sure the vision would be clear: ballet barres might line the perimeter of the room and the floor would be gray or black and sprung to limit injuries to joints during any kind of allegro. But most present of all would be the mirror that dominates the front wall. It's a secondary teacher and it does not restrict its criticisms.

I can't count the number of hours of my life I've spent looking into mirrors. I know it's got to be something in the thousands, as I was planted in front of one at the age of three and spent the following 15 years watching myself unravel in front of them in ballet class. There's a softness that your gaze develops when you're staring at yourself in adagio or spotting yourself during a pirouette. You recognize the form of your body without recognizing the personhood in your reflection; your main goal is to see, and correct. The mirror is the rough draft—a place to make mistakes and revise without shame, to draw your mind and physicality closer together, and to achieve intimacy in a place that isn't aways necessarily private. Which is why, now deep into my TikTok obsession and years away from my ballet practice, I've turned to the mirror once again.

If you're not familiar with TikTok, here's a crash course: basically, it's an app beloved by Gen Z that's kind of like Vine, if Vine had built-in editing software and filters and the sense of community granted to meme culture. Think: if the admittedly iconic "a potato flew around my room" vine was recreated in 250 different ways by 250 different users, each time landing on a surprising new punchline. On TikTok, everything is copy—as Nora Ephron meant it, and in the sense that the app is filled with highly encouraged copies of trends.

The trends are usually musically or sound-based: one user might make a video that ends up going viral (usually by way of the algorithmically curated 'For You' page) to a song like, say, Little Mix's "Wasabi." They'll probably use a particular filter or make a specific edit to the video that helps it align with the song in an almost magically comedic or satisfying way. Then, others will create their own versions, always throwing in little tweaks to make their takes different—the joke doesn't get old because it usually changes at least a little bit. This striking balance of surprise and consistency is what has made TikTok, for me, so addictive.

Our of all the TikTok trends, though, the ones that I love the best are the dance challenges, which users can "duet"—basically, placing their video side-by-side of another user's. When I first got on TikTok, I watched countless videos in awe of people perfecting BTS's choreography from the "Boy With Luv" music video. Fortnite dance moves are also a consistent challenge on the app. Yesterday, I discovered another dance challenge, in which users use a filter that clones them, making it look like they have two twinned backup dancers. The song they then dance to is a cover of Kelis's "Milkshake" from the CW's Riverdale. It is absolutely perfect.

I can't help but feel a little sad sometimes when I watch TikToks, though it is the thing that I turn to when I need a lightning bolt of dopamine to the brain. I know in my heart of hearts, however shameful it maybe to admit, that if I were a teen now, I would absolutely spent hours of my days making these videos. After all, I was an early YouTube fan girl. I relished any school project that had a video-making option. And, of course, I was a dancer.

Dance is a weird sport-slash-art to grow up with because it doesn't necessarily age with you well. I graduated from college with a minor in dance, yet my approach for my requirements were largely academic: when I took a ballet technique class my first semester freshman year, I had felt too uncomfortable in my own body to pursue that route any further. After my first summer in six or seven years that I hadn't gone to a ballet intensive, I had finally developed hips, lost the moderate turnout I even had, and found a fair amount of my flexibility lost. I was beholden to my body, and my body was uncooperative. I looked in the mirror and I grew dejected, unfamiliar with the form that I had studied for years.

I've started dancing again, somewhat, relatively recently. After picking up a regular workout routine as a means to better mental health a few months ago, I tested out an adult beginner ballet class, where my solid technique made up for my lost flexibility. I went to DanceBody—where in a real Frank Ocean did-you-call-me-from-a-seance moment, I checked in at the front desk with a girl who had worked at a dance studio I attended 10 years ago. Through the intense class, I lost myself in the music and got by with the self-assurance that even if I semi-faked my way through the plank routine, I would never pop my hips off-beat. I found my way back into dance, and it was through a mental space that allowed me to focus solely on my reflection; not the pressures, people, or expectations that surrounded me.

Which is why TikTok dances are so inspiring to me: they make the private public and the public private. The teens who master the (admittedly sometimes challenging) choreography that makes its way around the app tend to record themselves dancing in messy bedrooms or suburban basements. They simply look at their reflections in their phones and capture themselves as they are—moving to the music.

As a social platform, this is also what makes TikTok so stirring. My own approach to social media was always calculated: I'm doubtful I would have shaped up to the person I am today if I hadn't had my Twitter, Tumblr, various blogs, YouTube, Facebook, and hey, even Myspace, as platforms onto which I could show myself as I wanted to be seen. There lies in these platforms a heavy amount of curation and editing (even if I had expressed more vulnerability on platforms like Tumblr, where I knew I was afforded a little more privacy). I treated my profiles as reflections, not necessarily for my full self, but for the self that I desperately wanted to see. If I'm being realistic, they've always been something in between the mirror of Erised and that Snow White mirror on the wall: showcasing my desires and my jealousies.

I like to think about who I would be if I had no inhibitions at all or fear of embarrassment. I think about indulging in the things that bring me pure joy and absolutely no productivity—which is what has brought me to learn the TikTok dances myself.

Not all of them, but a few simple dance moves that I can keep in my back pocket like an especially good lipstick or a quippy comment to make in a moment of silence. I stand in front of the biggest mirror in my bedroom (one of five) and I raise my hands over my head, slowly but surely figuring out the rhythm of the helicopter-like choreography I've seen plenty of people perfect. This should be easy, I think. I was a flag-twirler for two years in high school.

Like Francis, I can't help but look in the mirror more than I should. It's a common habit of a former dancer to keep watch on myself, as if I might suddenly notice that I'm actually raising my right shoulder a little too much and that's what's been throwing me off balance this whole time. I pour my hopes into my reflection when I put together an exceptionally good outfit or when I spent an extra 10 minutes attempting to pull off a complicated eyeliner look that somehow ends up making me 20 minutes late for wherever I have to be. I don't think there's anything wrong with this kind of behavior: it's important to fantasize and create your own identity. But I know, too, that I can always use a good spoonful of realism.

So I continue to practice. In my room I learn the Fortnite dances. I don't fully commit to BTS's complicated choreography, but I pick up a few moves. I try the shuffle that goony-faced teenage boys, of all people, have mastered with total glee. And as I start to speed up the steps, I watch myself watch myself, bridging the gap between my private joy and my public confidence. I have no plans to record myself, or to even take my moves out on the dance floor. For now, I see myself reflected clearly, and I feel good about where this is going.