Yeah, Maybe I Look Silly...Who Cares?

One of the biggest obstacles to walking into a ballet studio as an adult, for anyone is the fear of making a fool out of yourself. 

I think in this particular scenario, I actually get the better deal as a true novice.  I feel no shame in looking like a moron when I can honestly say I've never danced a step in my life.  I have no muscle memory of how to do a attitude, and seriously I don't even know what a Pas Du Chat is.  

For adult dancers coming back to class after 2, 4, 5, 10, 20 years off, there's this sense of frustration, of "I could do this before, why can't I do it anymore???"  There's an expectation that they should still be able to throw a leg out to a 145 degree angle and expect it to stay there effortlessly and gracefully.  There's an impatience that the skill and strength don't come back easier, faster, or (lets face it) at all.  

Before beginning ballet, I dabbled at the gym.  Running the occasional 5K (ugh...), wandering in and out of bootcamps, Zumbas, Yogas, and other group fitness classes.  While I wasn't a complete couch potato, I was certainly shaking like a newborn baby giraffe halfway through my first ever demi plie.  Don't even talk to me about how my body felt the next day.  Never in my life had I ever needed to "turn out" for anything, much less for an entire hour and a half.  I found muscles I didn't know existed.  And the foot cramps.  Dear God, the foot cramps. 

But I welcomed it all.  Let my body freak out a bit - all of this was very new, and I would get stronger, more balanced, more graceful soon.  Barre was, and still is, an exciting challenge in strengthening my body.  Getting that plie a little deeper, the leg a little higher, my feet stronger, my balance more steady. 

Once you take away the linear, skill-focused nature of barre and put me in the center.  Well.  Let's just say I've accepted that I look like an idiot, but won't get better unless I just throw myself into it.  I'm a firm believer that there are dancers and there are people who dance.  I am not a dancer.  I don't feel the urge to express myself by throwing my body across the dance floor to music.  Ballet, to me, is a physical challenge, just like my favorite weekly bootcamp is. Time in the center isn't really my favorite, nor my forte, but is certainly an opportunity to explore something outside of my comfort zone.

The beauty of being an adult dancer is that you are allowed to make your ballet experience what you want it to be.  My teachers encourage me to be brave and graceful and expressive, but understand and respect that my goals and enjoyment lie in different aspects of the art.  I can (and usually do) choose to work my body hard each class, but am more than free to pull back on days where my aging body demands that getting my leg to 90 degrees is absolutely not going to happen, or nursing injuries requires me to modify or sit out of exercises.  My teachers make a point to know of students' injuries and level of physical ability to help keep us both honest, and safe.  

The other beauty of being an adult dancer is the community of adult dancers.  I of course can't speak universally, but in my 3 years of experience in the adult beginner classes at New Orleans Dance Academy, I have never once felt anything but respected and supported by my fellow dancers.  I honestly harbored a pretty deep fear that walking into a ballet class would be like walking back in to high school and making myself the butt of every snide comment and joke.  But adult beginner ballet is not 15 year old ballet.  It's not competitive, it's collaborative.  It's a group endeavor to reach our own respective goals and to share our knowledge, experience, or encouragement with other members of the community.

As adults, we don't often find ourselves outside of our comfort zone.  Partially, we've just experienced a good deal of what life has to throw at us by now, but also, we no longer have anyone (parents, teachers, peers) forcing us to do things we don't want to.  We avoid things that make us uncomfortable.  

DON'T.  Try it.  Not just once, give it at least 2 tries.  If you hate it, that's fine.  But you never know what you'll end up loving if you just allow yourself to feel a little bit silly and try something new.