ROCKLAND — This past weekend’s Juice Conference 4.0 centered around the theme of trust. In our last profile on improv comedian Rachel Flehinger, we explored the obstacles around trusting our own potential. In this second profile, we feature Kea Tesseyman, COO/co-founder of Power Performance, Dance and Empowerment company, Kinetic Energy Alive Productions, who delivered a high-energy, motivating presentation Nov. 14, titled Power Performance Dance Your Story, Unleash and Reclaim Your Power Through Dance. The video and talk included the stories several local adults and teens, some of whom were not able to break through their own painful experiences until they learned how to dance. They trusted Tesseyman so much they allowed her to showcase them on film as they worked through certain issues through dance.

How do you get people to trust you in not only telling you their stories, but also to get them to leap out on stage for the first time in front of an audience?

Sometimes people who see me or my dancers on stage become inspired and want to learn how to dance. Once they’ve taken that step, it’s golden, because they don’t have to do the work alone. I’m there. So, I don’t ask them to trust me. I show them my reason for dancing, my vulnerabilities. I will give all of me that I can to that person and over the course of time, I earn their trust. They come to know that they are not alone in learning these moves, these awkward positions of dance they’re not used to, at first. Along the way, they build that muscle memory and become confident. When I can get them to perform on stage, it becomes this cycle. Someone else in the audience sees them, and is inspired by their story.

To see highlights from the Juice Conference 4.0 visit: facebook.com/JuiceConference

To learn more about Tesseyman visit: www.powerperformancedance.com

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com