It's like there was someone I used to know who loved to dance, but I’ve not seen them in a while. I know everything about them, I know the songs they would dance to now if they were here and how their style would have evolved had they kept dancing - but they’re busy. Busy exploring. Exploring other areas of interest, areas that could have used dance to their advantage, but for now remain strangers.
I adored and still adore everything that I have learnt from dance - but I needed to take a step back to get an outside view. Throughout my whole time dancing, I have always been able to see the power it holds - to let people express, to heal, to grow, to educate. That being said, I have always acknowledged its vulnerability and its ability to be harnessed - pulled and pushed, tied into corners, wrapped around beams, broken down and rebuilt in seconds. Dance is not a stable field - its growth is volatile. Something so beautiful can tear you apart as quickly or slowly as it likes. To be involved in dance, of any kind, is a full soul commitment. Everything you do starts to come from the core, from a beat. This intensity for me became unsustainable and knowing that a world exists where no one cares how hard you can pop on 2 and 4 or whether you can hit every hi-hat in a 3 minute track - it seemed like a dream.
Don’t get me wrong I still love to dance and I still consider myself a dancer. I just don’t want to force myself to enjoy it, I’ve got different kinds of growth to work on and taking a step away from dance has made me appreciate it all the more. If you consider yourself to live, eat, sleep and breathe dance, do you! I can’t fault it. I just know that I don’t want to do the same, it feels unnatural. I used to dance and I still do - only now, I enjoy it