Today we’d like to introduce you to Mimi Midnight.
Hi Mimi, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
When I was younger I was massively horrible at all ball sports and deemed myself not athletic. Growing up I was always shy, I never danced in public and felt awkward in my body. When I moved from Hawaii to San Francisco in 2014, I wanted to pick up a new hobby so I googled “adult dance classes” and pole dancing was the first thing that came up. I took my first class alone and it was the scariest and most uncomfortable thing.
For someone who doesn’t even dance when they’re alone in their room, I had a really hard time dancing in my underwear in front of strangers. But a special bond forms between people who go through something uncomfortable and scary together and I made some of my closest friends from pole dancing. My journey became a story of empowerment and confidence and my mission is to give that to others today.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
Learning to pole dance was NOT a smooth road. I had no upper body strength or sense of musicality when I started.
Being comfortable with being uncomfortable was the biggest lesson I learned. Being bad at something as an adult is a relatively unfamiliar feeling for most and not something that a lot of people get excited about. Forcing myself to show up to classes and put in the work when the end goal seemed so impossible was a big struggle.
These days, the biggest struggle I have is with social media flagging my content as inappropriate. Just because pole dancing has a negative connotation and is still taboo in mainstream society, I’ve been “shadowbanned” from most social platforms (shadowbanning is when no one can search for you, and your content is not shown to people who do not follow you).
Algorithms hate the female body and any embracement of our feminity, sexuality, or body positivity. Society constantly tries to shove us in the shadows which makes it hard to market our businesses or reach new audiences.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I’m a pole dancer that specializes in heels. My brand is based on two pillars: movement and magic. Movement is everything to do with the quality of movement, technique, and fluidity while magic is all about how you perform, get into the flow, and add the magic to your dance that connects you to your audience.
What I love most about pole dancing is that it ranges from an athletic, Olympic-style sport to an artistic expression.
You’ll see categories of pole dancing that are very much like gymnastics, where skill, technique, the difficulty of tricks, strength, and flexibility are important, but you’ll also see categories like theatre where it’s all about how you develop a character and tell a story.
Even within exotic/heels, you’ll see subcategories like “old school” which is more the classic American stripper style, or “flow” which focuses on how you transition from one move to the next, and “hard” which is full of acrobatic tricks and a hip hop like style. Each category has a million nuances that artists can explore and make their own.
Recently, exotic pole dancers have been exploring edgework which is basically using our heels in unusual ways to emphasize movements. It’s almost like our heels are another appendage that we can use to express ourselves and not just decorations on our feet to make us look long.
Pole dancing is still relatively new and after being in the industry for 8 years, I’m proud of the contributions I’ve made to the art and all the people that I’ve helped inspire along the way.
We’d love to hear what you think about risk-taking.
Pole dancing has a lot of physical risks, but the biggest risk I’ve taken is simply telling people I pole dance.
I had to develop a thick skin to withstand the comments and judgment that I got from everyone, including some close friends. Even today, I have to be careful what I share with my male doctors and some female doctors. Everyone will look at you differently and most of the time it won’t be what you want.
Pricing:
- $95/hr one-off virtual private lesson
- $400 for 5 virtual private lessons
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mimimidnightx/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@MimiMidnight
Image Credits
Maliceous Studios, Knocking Bird Creative
