Trying to make it in the performing arts is not easy. There will be days when you get frustrated and days when you cry. There will be days when you feel inferior and like you don’t have any talent at all. There should be days like these, but they should be balanced with days when you fee like the luckiest person in the world for having such a passion. Ultimately, doing what you love should make you happy. A few years ago, I didn’t realize this until it was too late.
In the beginning of high school, dance and acting were my biggest passions. Though I loved them equally, I was a far better actress than I was a dancer. I didn’t have proper ballet technique or a good studio to guide me. At the end of my freshman year, I met a dance teacher who promised she could fix everything that was wrong with me as a dancer. Excited to finally have the opportunity for proper ballet instruction, I joined her studio. But the excitement didn’t last long. There was always negative energy permeating the atmosphere that made it very hard to deepen the appreciation for my craft. The teacher had a cynical sense of humor that was amusing, but she was often grouchy as well. She seemed to see more things wrong with me than any other dancer in my class. I told other people that I loved my new studio, but the truth was I only loved that my technique was improving. I secretly dreaded going to class. My new teacher’s methods only allowed me to focus on the cons of myself without giving credit to the pros. But I had been roped into believing that I only felt this way because I was weak. I thought that if I wanted to succeed, I had to be willing to put myself through hell and back all while keeping a smile on my face.
The feelings that I had during an intensive at The Joffrey Ballet School during the summer before my junior year should have been the real red flag to me. After doing a beautiful contemporary combination, I found myself fighting back tears. It was the first time in forever that I felt beautiful, happy, and in my element while dancing, and it hurt me so much that I hadn’t felt that way since I joined my studio. The staff at Joffrey appreciated artists from all walks of life, and I didn’t feel forced into a mold there. For a few days, I got to know that though I was far from a perfect dancer, my style was unique and beautiful in its own way. However, I once again failed to recognize that internal joy was more important that outward perfection.
When I returned to my regular studio that September, things hit rock bottom. Nutcracker rehearsals began and I was struggling immensely with learning the choreography. My teacher suddenly crossed the line from cynical to nasty. She snapped at me and humiliated me in front of all the other dancers. She once even went so far as to yank me by my arm when I was dancing slightly upstage of where I was supposed to. I began to experience crippling anxiety as a result of her treatment. There was no was I could retain the choreography when her mean words and feelings of self-loathing occupied every last inch of space inside my head. I would freeze up every time someone talked to me, and I cried before and after almost every rehearsal. It was a vicious cycle. The more anxious I grew, the worse I performed. The worse I performed, the worse my teacher treated me. The last few rehearsals were the absolute worst. My teacher began to talk about me to the other dancers like I wasn’t in the room. She announced to the entire group that they needed to “push me into my place” because I never knew what I was doing and was “in outer space” all of the time. I couldn’t help tearing up when she said this, because the fact that I suffer from ADHD and anxiety makes this issue extremely sensitive and personal. With a disgusted look on her face, she then told me to suck it up because there was “no crying on Broadway.” In the week leading up to the show, she also said that she wouldn’t be able to look at herself in the mirror if she was making the mistakes that a few other girls and I were. Again, this hit too close to home because I had recently recovered from some body image issues, and had endured many times when I actually could not stand to look at myself in the mirror.
Despite all of this, I was somehow able to pull everything together on the night of the performance. Afterwards, a different teacher from the studio approached me, saying I danced beautifully and almost brought her to tears. As soon as I left the auditorium, I broke down in tears myself. It had been so long since I heard kind words about my dancing.
Needless to say, I never returned to this studio after that night. I tried to keep dancing elsewhere, but I could never get myself to enjoy it in the same way I used to. I continued to dance half-heartedly for the rest of my junior year, then quit completely at the beginning of my senior year to focus on auditioning for college acting programs. But sometimes I do believe that all of this happened for the best. Focusing on acting has allowed me to be accepted to a top-tier drama school in NYC, where I will be pursuing my BFA this fall. I’m not weak for having needed time away from dance. Backing off of it has allowed me to view things from a different angle, and to rebuild my self-esteem from the bottom up.
Just last week, I returned to ballet class with a new attitude towards myself and dance. And I finally was able to experience those feelings of joy again. It took over a year and a half, but I’ve finally learned to ignore my old teacher’s voice in the back of my head. I was able to do this because I had the right environment. I had learned to me less critical of myself, and I had found a studio where every dancer was treated with the respect they deserved.
I did not write this article with the intention of trashing my old dance studio or my former teacher. I do not believe that she is a bad person. We were two people who clashed because of different personalities and opinions. Underneath everything, I think that she is a good person with the ability to learn from mistakes. My main point here is that doing what you love should ultimately make you happy. Taking things seriously isn’t always fun, but at the end of the day it should bring you joy. If you find yourself in an environment that is tainting your joy, you need to remove yourself from it. Passion and love are the things that fuel success, and if your passion is crumbling there's no way you'll be able to achieve your goals. Not wanting to do things that bring out more negative feelings than positive does not make you weak. No matter what other people say, the best way to success is to feed your passion and protect your soul. Yes, there are times when you’ll need to “suck it up”, but its more than possible to push yourself without breaking yourself.
