FOr the Love of Dance!
These past several days have been exhausting. Time spent working on the business, working my way through home improvement projects, keeping the pups engaged, and picking up extra work shifts whenever I can has contributed to my physical and mental exhaustion. Not to mention the weather went from 75 degrees a few days ago, to cold and snowing over the weekend (springtime in Colorado is never predictable)! Saturday rolled around, my only day off and it was freezing, snowing and I was so tired I napped most of the afternoon. When it was time to head out to the “Glow Party” at the gym where I teach yoga, I struggled to get motivated to leave the house and participate. Thankfully, I am externally motivated and because I had made the commitment to be there to support my boss and her efforts to make our group fitness program succeed, I begrudgingly got into the car.
When I got to the event, the energy was palpable. It was 99% women and they were ready to party! The Glow Party was a combination of Zumba and Rebel Groove aerobic dance and the Zumba ladies were decked out in florescent neon leggings, glow in the dark shirts, glow in the dark paint, tattoos, it was like the 1980’s all over again. An absolutely amazing environment! Once the music started there was a tribal energy, women in sync with the beats and the dance moves. Women getting lost in the moment, moving to the beat of the tunes and just allowing themselves to let loose, workout, and move their bodies. The pumping music, the heat in the room and the contagious energy reminded me how much I love aerobics and dance.
Dance has saved me from myself several times in my life. The rhythmic movement of the body to the pulsating beat of music, either free flowing or to a specific routine, gave me the space I needed to step away from my anxiety. When you’re focused on the next step, or the next beat you are not thinking about anything else, you are just in the moment. I also think it’s so natural for our bodies to move to music, which is why the phrase “dance like no one’s watching” is such important and relevant advice. I was on the dance team in high school, it was my outlet for all things. I utilized dance to blow off steam, to release pent up emotions, it kept me extremely busy so I didn’t perseverate on whatever teenage angst was happening in life. After high school, I lost dance as an outlet. With the rigid structure of a dance team and choreographed routines lost, and the rigors of college life, working, and just adulting, my love for dancing faced into the background.
In my early 40’s I had a devastating breakup, that in combination with my ever-increasing anxiety caused me to have a panic attack. I was in the car on the way home from a massage. I remember the moment vividly and couldn’t be more grateful to my mom when she answered the phone and talked to me until I got home. I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t stop crying, I was a mess.
There was a gym right behind my apartments at that time, they had a Dance Jam class. I enrolled and was in attendance every Tuesday and Saturday for almost a year (until the instructor resigned). Dance saved me once again, it was my outlet, my safe space, a room of positive light, positive energy, upbeat music and choreographed moves. Once a routine was in my head and my muscles remembered each step, I was free. When COVID hit, Jazzercise on Demand in my living room was my routine each morning for that first year, just me and the music and the lively instructor coming through the TV, keeping me moving and grooving through that first challenging year of the pandemic.
With everything going on in my life right now, my sincere dedication and commitment to practicing and teaching yoga, getting this business going, working, looking for work, and trying to date, I forgot about dance, until the Glow Party. Once we got started, with that very first song, I was reminded once again, of my love for dancing and just moving to music. My worries and cares melted away for an hour as we clapped and whooped to the Latin Zumba beats, a tribe of women I didn’t even know, converging their energy into the gym space and letting lose.
Is there an activity from your childhood that you loved so much, but either forgot about or put on the back burner as you navigate your adult life? What was it about that activity that brought you joy? What caused you to put it on the back burner? Or, if you are still committed to that activity, how did you sustain that commitment into adulthood? What, if anything did this activity “save” you from? I would love to hear your story, share on our Facebook page!
