“You’re so weak”, “Ballet is not a sport”, “ Don’t you play any real sports?” Those are all things I’ve heard people say in the past couple weeks. I know ballet doesn’t seem like the most vigorous, physically demanding sport but the only other sport that is a little more physically demanding than ballet is professional American football. Think about it, out of the 61 most common sports ballet is number 2 on the physical demand scale. Even thought it might not seem like ballerinas have any strength we mask our strength with beauty. Trust me the strength is there. Now at this point you might be thinking,” she is totally making this up”. We’ll let me see if I can change your mind.
In order to be a ballerina you need to be flexible, you need to have good posture, strength, balance, alignment, and most importantly you need to have emotion. Dancing is like telling a story without speaking a word. Ballet helps me express my emotions in ways I can’t possibly describe. “Dance is an art, paint your dream and follow it.”-Steven Thompson.
There is so much passion that goes through me when I dance. “Dance is your pulse, your heartbeat, your breathing. It’s the rhythm of your life. It’s the expression in time and movement, in happiness, joys, sadness, and envy.”-Jacques D’Amboise. I would love to see one of those people who think dance is not a sport to take one ballet class (not a beginner class, thats just cheating). They would then realize that dance is much more than just moving your feet. Dancing doesn’t stop at the tips of your toes or the end of your fingertips, it goes much farther than that. I have learned my most important life lessons in my ballet class. I know I will take these lessons with me for the rest of my life and continue to spread the passion I do now to each person who watches my “story”.