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This Dancing Mom Became a Social Media Sensation

Marie Moring’s hip-hop how-to on TikTok helped save her dance life


spinner image Marie Moring (in peach skirt) with family members near her Georgia home
Moring (in peach skirt) with family members near her Georgia home.
Photograph by Matt odom

When my business — a dance studio — shut down in 2020 due to the pandemic, it was crushing for me. I’d left a corporate accounting job in 2009 to launch the studio so I could be home more with my seven children. Now it looked like my life’s work was going down the drain. I wondered, What am I going to do? There was lots of prayer.

Around this time, I saw my kids looking at TikTok. I would ask to make videos with them, but they would say, “No, it’s not for you.” Still, I would see people on the app doing dances to old-school songs and think, That’s not how you dance hip-hop. So I took matters into my own hands. I pulled out the old-school moves and told the camera, “This is how you dance to this song.”

That video went viral, and I got 300,000 followers within 14 days. I was, like, What just happened? Then I started creating my own choreography. Now I have over a million followers across all platforms.

Hip-hop is a whole movement. I don’t want us to forget how it started. You’ve got to have the Running Man. You’ve got to have the Cabbage Patch. Those dances take us back to a time where things were a lot simpler.

I was able to save my business. I’ve learned that when there’s a problem, if you just keep moving forward, you’re going to run into the solution.

Marie “BustinMoves” Moring, 47, is a Georgia dance influencer and creator of the BustinMoves TV entertainment and education app.

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