Rise

The great mistake is to anticipate the outcome of the engagement; you ought not to be thinking of whether it ends in victory or in defeat. Let nature take its course, and your tools will strike at the right moment.

                                            Bruce Lee


It's 3 am and I'm actually sitting on furniture, on a couch and I have a bed! I had been sleeping on a mattress on the floor that my friend Paul and I stuffed into the back of his mom's minivan for over a year now. I believed that my apartment should be empty because I had a duty to spend all my earnings on my path to dance and all things related. But I am now learning to have balance, so that I may have the energy to supply to all my endeavors, and also learning to have patience on my journey, to allow things to run their course.


Needless to say, I have been uncharacteristically MIA from the dance world and down the depths of depression for nine months. I was frightened by the idea of what my efforts had materialized into-and I believed that was not a damn thing. I was eaten alive by the thought of how others perceived me and my dance abilities. I let the voices of my fabricated sinister "fates" whisper, control my destiny and imply future doom that left me exhausted and petrified. I was dead in my tracks.


Success was supposed to be measured by my trophies, victories, the validation, recognition of my talent. But all I could see were my struggles, my empty apartment and no one to blame but myself. I saw myself as nothing but a z-list dancer. So I decided to want nothing and stay pressure free, safe, cowering on the sidelines.


But after some time there was a healthy shift of perspective for me, to challenge a perfectionist way of thinking I had been struggling with my whole life. I realized, it is not in my control to anticipate the outcome of my choices, whether it leads to victory or defeat- that learning to accept and build my sense of self worth was not upon my wins, others expectations, or others praise but on the unwavering belief in myself.


I realized you must value and be kind to yourself no matter how others view you - and that failure must and usually does not change the strength and power of what you are and what you believe you are. It does not change your path- the worst of facing your fears is that you are right back to where you started and haven't lost any ground.


I have a few great voices around me encouraging me that I'm not alone, I am worthy, I am strong and that I can push through. And now, I am starting to believe it myself.  I am feeling the beautiful energy surge back into my life. I have realized that I must use the tools and resources I possess to the best of my ability. I must do my part to take action and prepare for the day I will use what I have been working for.


I'm saving my energy only on positive things that will encourage my success and enjoying the victories of my day to day activities. I have started to go back to my gymnastics classes with a great coach named Sam Stone who encourages my mind to believe that which my imagination could never fathom. I walk into that padded studio among his beautiful students all under 11 years old and each day watch them use their bodies to sculpt remarkable shapes words could never express. It is a space that defies gravity, a place for creating without limits, a dimension all of its own.


So I choose not to give a noodle on whether others accept where I am or not. That is another fact that is usually out of your control. The point is to do your part. Show up. Dream. Believe; not in the victory, but in yourself. In the best of your talents. In what you are able to create with your abilities, in the moment of this space and time. Rise above the failures, learn, love, see the bigger picture, enjoy the ride and take risks - but most of all never give up on yourself. You never know when it will be your time to shine under the bright spotlight.

Let go

 "Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not seek the answers that cannot be given to you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer."
                          Rainer Maria Rilke




In each of us there is a battle between good and evil. And I don't mean in the religious demons vs. angels or god vs. the devil sensationalist sense. I mean, in the decisions we make in our everyday lives that collectively make us the people we want to become. Most of us never think that deeply about who we are or how our thoughts create the people we will evolve into. A lot of us are just surviving the day to day until those trying situations in our lives commands us to confront ourselves.


I have taken a job teaching kids how to dance, ironically at the school where I grew up. And, despite the chitter chatter of judgmental voices like wicked stepmothers spinning threads of criticism into my head, I am awestruck when in the midst of my disciplining and coaching, I have a breakthrough with one of my kids. When I get through to one of the troubled ones, we'll call her Big Al, and all of a sudden she is the first one getting the choreography, telling the other kids to put a sock in it as she shamelessly shakes her head at their misbehavior and is excited to show me choreography of her own.


Or when my little ones, the five year olds, run and hug me, look up with their big eyes and say, "Ms. Natalie, I love you." Or, "we had an amazing time," or "you're awesome". When they ramble on and on about their lives- in that moment I feel my whole life has purpose. I feel a joy I haven't felt with anything else.


Let me balance the good by saying there is so much going on in my personal life that some days, I want to walk down the 210 going the opposite way of traffic. Perhaps, that is a bit dramatic but my little life is constantly brimming with crazy aunts coming over my apartment threatening to kick me out, racked up bills, crises of every sort from family, to police, perverts, peeping toms, incarceration, horrible bosses, co-workers I can't stand, and I now I am beginning to think I was some kind of merciless serial killer in my past life.


I am brave enough to say I don't know what the hell I'm doing, I don't know where I'm going. I have a plethora of great potential according to those around me and not one clear road in sight.  I seem to be finding my way in a world I never really did fit into. 


But then again, I think about my kids, what I want to do with my life despite the fact that the picture isn't there yet. I think about the moments I want to leave behind and the amazing impact those few special teachers had on me growing up and how I feel it is a call of duty to do the same for these kids. I'm coming to realize that life isn't about figuring things out, but about letting go and letting the answers reveal themselves. I cannot control the path’s direction and what happens if I take one road versus the other, but that I should just live anyway, trust in myself to make the right decisions and learn to let life run its course.


This is the lotus flower we must find in the murky water of our lives; the human spirit that thrives in each of us. There is no shame in having to start over or to reevaluate a new path because the map you had for yourself did not lead you to the destination you were seeking. The point is to accept who you are no matter how the world sees you and even though the world hasn’t validated you yet.


Sometimes, your decisions despite hard work temporarily leaves you on a road bump that challenges you to continue, to muster the strength to keep going. But that is the challenge. To be the good in the world when no one is a witness. To learn to love even when you have been hurt before and every pore in your body wants to hold you back from another hazardous experience. To take risks and to keep going no matter what. To be afraid, terrified of humiliation but to try again anyway. For me, that means dusting the dirt off past failures, putting on my four inch bad ass stilettos and fervently breaking through the surface to rise and dance again.