I don't believe in fate

Dinosaur Comics (c) 2014 Ryan North

If you have this idea of me as a sophisticated woman of high-brow tastes, you should probably stop reading now because today's blog post was inspired by Dinosaur Comics and Cracked.com. But I promise, I'm going to talk about some deep, serious stuff!

I woke up today and as usual, I read through my web comics, and I thought today's Dinosaur Comics (shown above) was really funny and to the point. Then later I was reading The 5 Most Useless Pieces of Advice Everyone Gives and I was nodding right along with it when I read this really poignant quote near the end: "But as far as I can tell, success is heavily based on luck -- it's just that long hours earn you more chances to get lucky. The more stuff you do, the more people you meet and impress, the more chances for opportunity to come your way."

It's strange when great life advice comes from an internet humor site, but there you have it. So often in artistic fields like dance, writing and music you'll hear people grumbling about how it's all about who you know, or being in the right place at the right time... but here's the thing. Everyone has the chance to meet the right people, or be in the right place. And the harder you work, the more chances you have.

I don't believe in fate. I don't believe that when I am ready to start dancing professionally, the perfect gigs will just land in my lap. I believe that sometimes, things will fall together perfectly, and other times I'll work really hard to chase something only to have it end in disaster, and most of the time, things will fall somewhere in between. Everything that has happened to me so far has lead me to feel that way. A few examples:

-Living in Tucson doesn't afford me as many great dance opportunities as some larger cities with a more vibrant community would have, but I did luck out by having two good years of study with Jolie Roberson right when I was ready to really dig deeper into my dance, and she helped me with a lot of my dance problems and has given me the tools to keep growing as a dancer.

-I've also had the opportunity to dance with a great troupe, which has helped me to learn how to work well with others, how to learn choreography, how to work within costuming guidelines, and so much more. Plus I've made some lovely friends.

-But I've also been in some troupes that didn't work out for me at all, and while some might chalk it up as a "learning experience", sometimes I think it would be nice to have put that time and money into something else. The same can be said of some classes and workshops I've taken.

-I've had people offer me performance opportunities that I had to refer to other dancers because I wasn't ready for them yet.

-I've had performance opportunities that seemed like they were going to be awesome, only to have them completely dry up or turn out to not be very good at all.

So all of this, along with things in my personal life and my general outlook on life, has lead me to feel that things don't happen for a reason, they just happen and we can decide how to react to them and what to do about them.

And so what about the correlation between luck and work? Well, I've already seen that "luck" sometimes brings dance opportunities that your way, whether you're ready for them or not. The harder you work at dance, the more likely you are to be able to say "Yes, I am ready to dance at this high-profile event and serve as an awesome example of my local bellydance community." 

But it's not just about training hard. It's about attending classes, workshops, and shows and making a good impression on the other people there. It's about attending non-bellydance art events around town and forging connections in your local art and entertainment scene. It's about being pleasant and outgoing in your community as a whole, so that when that local business owner finds out you're a bellydancer, they hire you for their big customer appreciation party. It's about networking on-line with your fellow dancers, so that when you decide to go on a cross-country bellydance jaunt, your internet friends invite you to teach and perform in their town. It's about building a good website, blog, Facebook page, what have you so that potential clients can find you with a Google search and see what a professional presence you have on-line.

The more you put yourself out there, the more chances you have to know the right people, or to be in the right place at the right time (keeping in mind that sometimes a "place" isn't a physical location, but a Dance Opportunities FB group or a high ranking on Google). If you just sit back and wait for fate to drop something in your lap, you're probably going to start second-guessing whether the universe wants you to dance. But the universe doesn't care, so don't let it control your life. If you want to be a dancer, or a writer, or a stand-up comedian, or whatever, go out there and do the work!

Practicing vs. Performing

A photo from my Vegas performance, by Lee Corkett

As I was on the way to the show I was performing at on Friday, I was hoping that I wouldn't screw anything up, thinking about the things I did wrong during troupe practice, and wondering how it is that I always manage to pull it together for a performance. I mean, that's not to say that I never mess up on stage (in fact, I messed up on Friday), it's that I usually recover well and put on a great face and give an overall pleasing performance with a flub or two in between.

But at practice, one flub can suddenly snowball into half a dozen flubs! Taking the wrong step at the start of a choreo can mean feeling slightly "off" for the entire dance and thinking that I am screwing everything up.

So what is the difference?

I think when I'm in class, at troupe practice, or practicing choreography at home, I'm in thinking mode. There's a little track running in the back of my mind, reminding me of the things that I specifically need to work on, the things the entire group has been told to watch out for, etc etc. Then if I make a mistake, I'm now thinking "Wait, what did I just do? What was I supposed to do instead? Oh crap, while I was thinking about that, I just missed that other step and now I'm off by two counts and I am making a weird face and and and and..." Add to that an element of tiredness if I'm at the end of an hour of troupe practice after an hour of class and a busy day leading up to that, and I'm going to look and feel like a hot mess.

When I'm at a show, on the other hand, I am in performing mode. I know that at this point, there's nothing to be gained by worrying about what I'm about to do, because I've practiced as much as I can, and I'm as good as I'm going to be for the moment. I'm all dressed up, I've got my makeup on, and now it's time to give it my all. If I mess up, there's no time to think about what I did wrong, I need to be on top of what I'm supposed to do next so the audience doesn't catch on. Even if they realize at that moment that I screwed up, if I recover well I can probably make them forget about it by doing an awesome job for the rest of the song, giving them an over-all good impression of the piece in question.

I guess the point is, I'm allowed to fail in class or practice, so sometimes I do. I learn from those failures, and learn how to train my body, brain and face to respond to failures. But when I'm on stage, failure is not an option! So that might mean that when I'm at home, practicing a new solo, I might try some crazy method of getting down to the floor which results in me tripping, or some new fan veil trick that results in silk strangling my neck. Those failures show me that those ideas need some more work, so when I get on stage I stick with the safe stuff. I know not to try that crazy drop because I don't want to face-plant in front of the audience!

So if you mess up in class or practice, don't let it get you down. You have to screw up behind the scenes in order to know what works on stage! You'll be fine. 

Momentum

I seem to have lost my momentum somewhere around November and I desperately need to find it again. I have such big plans for 2013 but I have been struggling to carve out time for practice. It doesn't help that this week has been weird... I've been out and about a lot, catching up on errands and getting massages and meeting with people.

Today's meeting was with Jolie. I will be assisting Skirt Full of Fire at Infinity: A Kinky Adventure in Phoenix next weekend. This is my first time doing a ride-along with the pro troupe and I am really excited to get a behind the scenes look at gigging (more than I get at the community shows that we do). Anyway, today's meeting was to discuss the details of that and what will be expected of me, but we also talked a lot about my professional development.

I really enjoy working with Jolie because she gives me the right mixture of praise and constructive criticism. I get a lot of "I've noticed you're getting a lot better at X, so keep practicing that but now let's focus on Y." Today was a lot of what I can do for my image, both from a physical standpoint and in my interactions with people. It's funny that a lot of what she suggested to me (play more with makeup, put more of a positive spin on things) was stuff that I had already put on my list of goals for 2013.

Anyway, all that talk made me want to take more action. I want to be practicing more and working on costumes and playing with my makeup and hair and journaling and having deep thoughts about what I'm doing, instead of goofing off on Facebook. I think I need to try having an actual schedule to adhere to, dividing up the various work that I need to do. Maybe that will help.

Off to brainstorm about how I can squeeze some practice in tomorrow...

An Audience of One

Today I went over to the home of my first belly dance teacher. I only had a few lessons with her, but she was the one who really lit the fire under me. I thought I was too clumsy and gangly to dance beautifully. She showed me that I was wrong, and even though she doesn't belly dance anymore herself, she is constantly encouraging me in my journey as a dancer.

Because she hasn't been able to come to any of my shows lately, I told her I'd bring my music along for a private performance, so she could see what I was working on and how far I've come.

There is really nothing more nerve-wracking than dancing for One. Person. It's very intimate and intimidating. It feels weird to look at them the entire time, and weird to look away. And you know that if you mess up, they're going to notice because they're certainly not looking at something else! You can't even really do the "look at the top of their head" trick, because they're close enough to catch on.

On the other hand, when that audience of one is one of your dearest friends and a mentor, it's possible to get past the initial weirdness, relax into it, and enjoy showing off for a friend. I had a good time, and I got some glowing compliments that had me floating through the rest of the day.

Experiences like this help remind me as to why I'm doing what I'm doing. They reassure me that I'm on the right path. And they remind me that dancing doesn't have to always be getting all gussied up in a fancy costume with a ton of makeup for an official gig. Sometimes dancing can just be casual, fun, and friendly, still from the heart, still with all of the technical skill at my disposal, but without the trappings of the stage.