Dancing With the Stars pro Derek Hough wrote in his blog this week that he is "torturing" himself to come up with good routines for him and Bethany Mota in the semifinals.

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Hough and his celebrity partner Mota have made it to the semifinals, and they are now tasked with performing two dances for a chance to get to the finals. As such, Hough is ramping things up in order to get the best scores from the judges and votes from America.

"I'll be honest, it's been kind of rocky so far," Hough wrote in his TVGuide.com blog, discussing his preparation for semifinals. "I had a creative block. It's not just a creative block because I am thinking of things, but it's a point where I'm just not satisfied. I want to do something different. I'm not happy with certain things."

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He continued that on Wednesday he had to stay late and ultimately, "I literally tortured myself until we had this breakthrough and ideas started flowing. This tends to happen at least once a season where I hit a creative wall. Any idea I thought of, I didn't like it. It could've been a fantastic idea, but I hated it. I was in this weird place and I kind had to work it out in my mind myself. It was rough start, but it's been worth it because of what we've been through."

Hough and Mota are slated to dance to I Want You Back by the Jackson 5. The semifinals are featuring a "plugged" round, where the couples dance to a classic song, and an "unplugged" round, which featured the acoustic version of the same song. Hough and Mota are dancing the Salsa for their plugged round and Contemporary for the unplugged round.

Dancing With the Stars airs Mondays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC.

Watch Hough and Mota's latest dances below:

Tags
Dancing with the Stars, Reality TV, ABC