Recently it happened that I was asked in my office to share how I manage my dancing and the hectic work together and how it impacted my life and why it is important to have passion in one’s life. I was really nervous because I was not sure if I can talk about it specially in front of 50-60 people, because I feel I don’t deserve to be at place where I can talk about such thing because I am really struggling to be able to manage things. In fact I feel I am not at all managing it. Some days, I have to miss my morning classes because the work previous night didn’t finish in night actually and some days I postpone my work and meetings because I have to attend the class. However its actually difficult to say no in corporate world, if you know what I mean. So I thought I will give it a try.
I realize I became pretty serious about dance in last couple of years. I realized that I don’t it for time pass or just for the sake of fun , I also don’t it because I want to be a performer or want to be on stage someday. I just love being in class , I just love being the student of my teachers .I just love the way they teach , they say things, they inspire me , they have impacted my life. But when I ask myself was I really this attached with dance always , the clear answer is no. In fact I also started doing it because I had extra time with me and I wanted to something so that I could kill time.
There was a time when I was little less loaded with work and around that time only most of my friends got married. All of sudden I became alone , I didn’t know who to talk and since I stay alone things became even worse. I guess the only thing I used to do in that time was thinking thinking and thinking randomly, worrying about life , worrying about future. I also thought that probably getting married is good idea so that I wont feel alone. So I along with my parents did every possible thing for groom hunting. But things were not working out so that added to my frustration even more. I was clueless what exactly to do. So in order to get my life back and kill that extra time I joined dance class where I met my teacher Rukmini Vijaykumar. When I think about what happened after that its really a journey , a journey of me being a better person if not a better dancer, journey of realizing importance of every single thing we possess in life instead of cribbing for those which we cant attain. In this life, if I have to thank one person other than my parents to make what I am today, it would be her. I really don’t know what kind of dancer I am becoming or even in this life I would ever be able to call myself a dancer , but I want to believe I am living much better version of myself.
Well obviously, I didn’t understand everything immediately after I met her, because as I said that time I was dancing more to “kill the time” rather than really investing time and effort in it. But slowly during process of life whatever happened with me or how I overcame those big/small problem or how I started looking at my life differently, how I started handling myself, I thing its all because of dance and her. And these lessons are not dance lessons but life lessons which I hope to live by even if I cant dance anymore, and apparently nobody ever taught me these life lessons , not my school teachers , not my friends , not even my parents or even if they would have told me I was not matured enough to understand those. So these are few things I learned in last couple of years which did change my life :
1.To be patient : This is my first life lesson which I learnt in class, because dancing, specially classical dance takes around 8-10 years to master and when you start as an adult I think this life time is not sufficient. For around 3-4 months the only thing I used to do in her class was squats , because I didn’t have any strength to hold my postures. Somedays , I would get frustrated that this is not what I registered for, but there was something which didn’t allow me to give up and the day when she said yes you are at least able to hold “aramandi”, I think that was the first time I understood things would get better and this was my second life lesson.
2.Howsoever complicated it seems at first things will get better : The same applies in life also, at first we struggle so much that we want to give up, we feel like we will not be able to handle the life. I have felt the same thing, there was time when I felt like my life is over, I cant handle it and wanted this life to be over. But the moment , instead of focusing on our weakness if we start focusing on how to make ourselves strong enough to tackle the situation , we become better with that , we get habituated to handle ourselves in a much better way. There is dancer quote which says “ What seems difficult today, tomorrow will be your warmup” . I think life can be lived in a similar way too.
3. Its always a personal journey: Personally for me this one is the most important lesson. I have always been a competitive person, in my school, college or even work. Not negatively though but I will always be like I have to do more in order to be better than that person. I would work harder to top in exams , to be best in class. And obviously , I could not be the best all the time , and that would really put me down, lower my confidence and then I would try to find some practical excuse why I was not the best. Its such a poisonous way of living.
Only in my dance class I learnt that whatever we do in life its always a personal journey , its never a competition with others, because the moment you became better than one person there will be 10 persons better than you , and the cycle continues and if you fall in that trap you would stop enjoying things which you started only because you enjoyed doing that. That doesn’t mean you have be complacent with life, but make yourself your benchmark. Do things better than you used to do, and some days when you really cant do better than yourself ,learn to forgive yourself , don't blame . I know I am not good dancer , and I am not that regular in my class too, and then I would really hate myself for not being able to go to class but then I forgive myself too, because I know the previous night I was working till 12-1 and was tired enough that my body needed rest instead of class . I may not progress faster but next class I go I would give my 100% without thinking how slow or fast my progress is. I will do whatever is in my hand to make better version of myself, I will never miss class which are in the night or on weekends , even if I cant go to class I will do some sort of physical practice or revise what the teacher said in last class. I just want to be better than myself in next class and no-one else.
4.Attach yourself with bigger goals : Again this lesson is so life changing for me. I have always been very emotional person. I would get attached to people so quickly and so intensely that the moment when I realized the person is not in my life anymore I would start feeling like I don’t how to live my life. I would spend months to come out of that situation. Most of life I had focused on people, I would try to make everyone around me happy , I would do anything to keep people happy even if I would not feel happy. I used to feel that I am doing great job or I am being a great person sacrificing my happiness to make others happy. In this process people took me granted, and I could never understand that if I am not happy I cant keep others happy. Slowly slowly most of the people I used to consider mine ,left. Well, for some reason, either because living alone was my destiny or my choice I learnt that, people will not always be with you, they may travel some pathways along but not necessarily they will reach till end with you, regardless of who they are , friends , spouse or even parents. Its your own responsibility to make yourself happy and not anyone else’s . I don't know what my life goal is , or how long I can last in my dancing journey but I know I will keep myself attached with something I love and not with someone I love. Because that “something” will never leave me alone.
5.Its not about destination : She says “as a dancer the only goal should be to dance as much as possible and enjoy the process. Performances, tours, appraisals, accolades may /may not come and that should not be concern, as log as we believe in what we are doing and do it with honestly things will work out” . Isn’t it true in every field of life. The most enjoyable part is the journey and not reaching the destination. Achieving something is great but its short-lived, what we remember entire our life is how we achieved those things. So focus on destination but enjoy the process more, don’t get overwhelmed with what you could get vs could not get. Just focus on what you are doing in order to get that.
I think there are so many more lessons I discover everyday listening to her. This entire thing sounds preachy but that was not my idea. If I hadn’t personally experienced these lessons , wouldn’t ever come and talk about it. I have been lucky enough to have her in my life so that I keep getting strength to do what I do and the reasons why I do.
No comments:
Post a Comment