What Burns in My Soul

"A dancer, more than any other human being, dies two deaths: the first, the physical when the powerfully trained body will no longer respond as you would wish. After all, I choreographed for myself. I never choreographed what I could not do. I changed steps in Medea and other ballets to accommodate the change. But I knew. And it haunted me. I only wanted to dance."
-- Martha Graham


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2RszuyACbM


Every time I watch this video, it moves me to tears, and I'm left asking questions that can't be answered.

What do you do when the thing that you passionately love is ripped away? It leaves you torn and bleeding, and -- I don't know, it's been between three and four years since I stopped training, depending on how you count, very nearly a quarter of my life, but my guess is that it never heals. Dance is as present on my mind now as it was while I was training. I still miss it just as much as I did the summer after I stopped. The only difference is that now I'm used to it.

But it still kills me a little inside every time I see something that reminds me of all the classes I've missed, all the choreography I haven't done, all the rehearsals I haven't attended, and all the technique and skill I've lost.

And it doesn't mean I don't still spend hours sometimes trying to figure out how to go back.

What do you do when the thing that burns brilliantly in your soul and only flows out through your body is trapped there, and continuously burns you alive?

What do you do when time drags on until it's gone, and it feels like every moment is a struggle and every day is a flash?

What do you do when you're so worn out from doing everything you "should" and none of what drives you on that changing into pajamas before going to bed is a strain?

What do you do when the only thing you want to do is dance, but you can't, and the agony is so consuming that it's literally difficult to breathe?

What do you do when everyone else is impressed with how good you are at the things you do, desperately trying to fill the hole that your passion leaves, and all you can think is that, I could be so much more, and, I used to be so much more, and the compliments are only painful because they're a reminder of everything you lost?

What do you do when you identify most closely with Job and the writer of Ecclesiastes from the Bible, with River from Firefly, with Ender and Valentine from Ender's game, with Takaki Kun from 5 Centimeters per Second, with Angelica from Hamilton, with Johny from Johny Tremain, with Katniss from the Hunger Games, because they're the characters who get it?

What do you do?

What are you supposed to do?

What can you do, except try to be as brilliant with and as fulfilled by other things as you are by your passion, and utterly fail?

When I'm in a frustrating situation and feel like giving up or killing the person, I remember my dance teachers, and try to carry myself as they would have expected me to. Years later, they are still the people I think of when I need something to keep me going, and I work to make them proud. Even though they might not care anymore, even though they might not even remember me. It probably doesn't even matter.

When I feel completely horrible and just don't want to do the work, I remember dance, and remember forcing myself through really difficult combinations when I was exhausted. But the difference is, I love dance. This work is dead; it's always a difficult, unpleasant combination at the end of an intensive, but there's none of the joy, and none of the driving fire present even there. I go on, because it's the only thing left to do, and often I hate it. 

And I wonder: Is this a little crumb of what hell is like?

The flip sides of life.

Dance has made me who I am, and somehow, losing dance has been just as important. 

So this is what it means to be human. 

Why I'm Deleting My Facebook Account

I'm planning to delete my Facebook account in approximately a week and a half, on October 1st. (I'd do it now, but there's some unfinished business I need to attend to first). For those of you who wonder why, I've written this for you.

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I've found that much of the content on Facebook is not the kind of thing that I want to spend my time on. There are a lot of ads and clickbait, which actively lower the level at which I think. While I find a good article every so often, Facebook is not a reliable news source, and the benefits are not worth the time and energy it takes from me.

I'm not comfortable with Facebook's copyright policy. I believe that if I take a photo, write something, or create some other kind of art, the rights to that art should continue to belong to me. I find the pull to post my favorite pictures directly to Facebook quite strong, but in doing so, I lose the rights to that work. For instance, I very nearly posted this text as a comment to one of my posts just now. Had I done so, I would have lost all rights to it. That's not something I'm willing to continue to do.

I've found that people say things on the internet that they wouldn't dream of saying out loud, that Facebook systematically exhorts this, and that being in such company is detrimental to my mental well being. I'd much rather spend my time with people in real life, where real, valuable, educational conversation happens.

I've found that spending time on Facebook makes me feel more depressed, more isolated, and more disillusioned with society, in addition to making me less productive and more tired.

I've found that I don't need Facebook to have a social life, to maintain my friendships, or to be an interesting person. In fact, spending time on Facebook has a negative effect on all of these things, each of which is important to me.

I've found that Facebook brings out my worst tendencies, making it much harder for me to carry myself with character, dignity, and professionalism, both online and off.