The other day was international dance day. I couldn’t help but write a love message to all the glorious expressions and forms of this movement. It has always been my source of comfort and play. When I was younger it was my outlet to move and play in this way, and as a shy kid, I had no issues with performing through the medium of dance. I received many accolades for my performances, not because of some athletic measure but because I allowed myself to improvise and play and not get caught up in the rules. It would be what I would come back to over and over again.
I learned many formats from ballet, tap, ballroom, jazz, salsa, tango even from twirling a baton, contemporary, ecstatic, yes lots of Bollywood, and too many to list on here. And what I can say is that it has been a form of medicine for me and my mood can shift when I start to dance. I start to lose myself to the movement and I’m not worried about anything else.
I remember later when I was in college a very driven pre-med student, I was heavily focused on making sure I was fulfilling all the quota boxes of classes one should take. I was achieving and doing well. And for some reason, many of my pre-med friends could not understand why I would take more classes that were not electives for the pleasure of it. They may have had a point but I could see no other reason to not take developmental psychology, neuroscience, and yes dance. The psychology and neuroscience classes were easy for me and so I thought the dance would be too. And I never understood how all of those classes were connected until now.
Oh, what a lovely surprise when I walked into my humble beginnings with dance mostly free form from my childhood years as I entered into a college course on contemporary dance. Every student there had been dancing at a professional level since childhood. And here in my nerd posture, I had to overcome quite a bit. And I also lost the connection to freely move the way they so gracefully did. I had my head in the books and many bad habits during that time. And when I was told we had to perform with this group and do a solo performance and that would be our grade, let's just say I had a mini freakout. The question came to me: should I just drop the class not a good idea when your grades matter for medical school. And so I let go of what I thought I should do or be and gave it my all. And yes when we were daily performing I felt inadequate and awkward to these graceful swans.
What I learned during this time was invaluable to me. I learned to let go and to re-learn. And what a beautiful feeling it was when I did perform after all of my hard work. That class, the students and professor and the memory of that experience has stayed with me and it holds a special place in my heart. We are never too old to learn something new.
And so thank you to all of you dancers and movers. In whatever medium that you may move, dance is an integral part of life. There is no culture that does not honor this form. It is a sacred rite and yet it is accessible.
Many people I know feel uncomfortable with the free form and may choose to intoxicate themselves with substances such as alcohol and drugs because that is the only way they know dancing. And maybe it is because as a society we carry the discomfort of how we will be perceived from ‘group think’, numbing out and some form of perfection that we do not feel is within us. And yet you can feel intoxicated just by dancing. It's hard in the beginning you may feel stiff and odd but as you start to push through the feelings something new will emerge. It is not yours but the expression through movement, let it move through you and that is where the magic is.
I learned many formats from ballet, tap, ballroom, jazz, salsa, tango even from twirling a baton, contemporary, ecstatic, yes lots of Bollywood, and too many to list on here. And what I can say is that it has been a form of medicine for me and my mood can shift when I start to dance. I start to lose myself to the movement and I’m not worried about anything else.
I remember later when I was in college a very driven pre-med student, I was heavily focused on making sure I was fulfilling all the quota boxes of classes one should take. I was achieving and doing well. And for some reason, many of my pre-med friends could not understand why I would take more classes that were not electives for the pleasure of it. They may have had a point but I could see no other reason to not take developmental psychology, neuroscience, and yes dance. The psychology and neuroscience classes were easy for me and so I thought the dance would be too. And I never understood how all of those classes were connected until now.
Oh, what a lovely surprise when I walked into my humble beginnings with dance mostly free form from my childhood years as I entered into a college course on contemporary dance. Every student there had been dancing at a professional level since childhood. And here in my nerd posture, I had to overcome quite a bit. And I also lost the connection to freely move the way they so gracefully did. I had my head in the books and many bad habits during that time. And when I was told we had to perform with this group and do a solo performance and that would be our grade, let's just say I had a mini freakout. The question came to me: should I just drop the class not a good idea when your grades matter for medical school. And so I let go of what I thought I should do or be and gave it my all. And yes when we were daily performing I felt inadequate and awkward to these graceful swans.
What I learned during this time was invaluable to me. I learned to let go and to re-learn. And what a beautiful feeling it was when I did perform after all of my hard work. That class, the students and professor and the memory of that experience has stayed with me and it holds a special place in my heart. We are never too old to learn something new.
And so thank you to all of you dancers and movers. In whatever medium that you may move, dance is an integral part of life. There is no culture that does not honor this form. It is a sacred rite and yet it is accessible.
Many people I know feel uncomfortable with the free form and may choose to intoxicate themselves with substances such as alcohol and drugs because that is the only way they know dancing. And maybe it is because as a society we carry the discomfort of how we will be perceived from ‘group think’, numbing out and some form of perfection that we do not feel is within us. And yet you can feel intoxicated just by dancing. It's hard in the beginning you may feel stiff and odd but as you start to push through the feelings something new will emerge. It is not yours but the expression through movement, let it move through you and that is where the magic is.
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