“The best things in life don’t come easy, but those things are the ones worth the sacrifice.”
-Adriana Locke
When you watch a ballerina bourée (a fancy word for tiptoe) across the stage, all you see is poise and grace. She makes it look effortlessly easy. What you don’t see are the years of struggle, injuries, countless hours of rehearsal, and blood, sweat, and tears that got her there.
Like most girls who grow up doing ballet, I dreamed about the day that I would go en pointe. A dancer’s first pair of pointe shoes are a rite of passage.
I will never forget my strict German ballet mistress who insisted that we do everything the old-fashioned way. No toe pads or gel cushions for our pointe shoes. Lamb’s wool and lamb’s wool only was all we were allowed to wrap our toes and cushion the boxes of our pointe shoes with.
I can still vividly remember my first summer en pointe, pulling sweaty, bloody clumps of lamb’s wool off my feet, which were covered with raw blisters. I danced five hours a day at my summer intensive classes, and then I would go home and work in my pointe shoes some more. I wanted to be a professional ballerina when I grew up.
I am grateful that my career took me down a different path. The lessons I learned from my first year en pointe have carried me through many years of dancing and teaching.
1. Everything New is Hard at First
No one is born knowing how to play the piano, or ride a bike, or dance in pointe shoes. New skills take practice and practice makes progress.
2. There is No Such Thing as Perfect
Progress is better than perfection. Try as you might, you can never be one hundred percent perfect one hundred percent of the time. As in life, there are good days and not so good days in the dance studio. It is up to you how you decide to handle them. Don’t let the good days go to your head and don’t let the bad days go to your heart.
3. There is Only One You, So Be the Best You!
Ballet in particular glorifies precise technique. Everyone has their own strengths and areas of struggle when it comes to dance.
They say that comparison is the thief of all joy and nothing could be more true when it comes to dance class. It’s healthy to have goals and aspirations, but if you find yourself constantly competing and comparing yourself to other dancers, that is counterproductive. Know your strengths and commit to working to improve yourself without sacrificing who you are!
At Liberty Dance Center, we are all so very different, yet together we make a beautiful family of dancers and teachers. As we settle into the beginning of season 14, let’s refuse to settle. Work hard, dance strong, and make this your best season yet!
~Miss Lori
