You know what I like? Actually. No. Let me rephrase that. You know what I LOVE?

I love dancing. I love creating. I love teaching. I love seeing smiles on my students faces when they understand or appreciate a movement, a concept, or idea that I’ve offered them. I love that people appreciate what I appreciate. I love that I can teach a workshop on the history of tribal belly dance and more than 90 people show up because they want to learn. I love that moment when I’m creating a new piece when a segment of choreography falls perfectly into place. I love that flash of inspiration for a costume for a new choreography, and it makes me want to sew all day and night to get it finished.

I get frustrated with the belly dance community because I love this dance. I get frustrated because I see people who profess to love it, too, but they don’t seem to take it seriously. Some think that they can use belly dance as a means to act out fantasies on stage without understanding the dance’s history. I love the history of this dance, and I hope that others feel the same. I get annoyed with people who ooh and aah over dancers who lack technical skill but have beautiful costuming or wonderful music, or over dancers who rely on gimmicks and schtick to increase their popularity… I get annoyed because I and many other dancers insist on dance for dance’s and art’s sake, not for the applause of the crowd or increasing the number of views on our YouTube channels. I get annoyed because I love this dance, and I take it very seriously… and it is only natural to be protective of something you love.

For the record, I wouldn’t be dancing, teaching, or blogging with the dedication and passion that I do if I didn’t love belly dance.

I do not blog about things that bother me out of spite. I do it to educate, to help dancers see things another way, to enlighten, and to work out my own issues. I do it because it scares me; it scares me to click “Publish” every time I post something because I fear that the dissenters will emerge with equal passion. And if they disagree with me, will they tell their friends and, ultimately, will I still get work? Will I still be able to do what I love for a living? But the world doesn’t end when I click the publish button.

This is one of the few things in my life that brings me great joy. It is one of the few things about which I am truly passionate. I wouldn’t have quit my dayjob, knowing I’d make tens of thousands of dollars less a year, sacrificing financial security, a retirement fund, health insurance, life insurance, and paid sick and vacation days if I didn’t love teaching and performing.

And, you know, I love the belly dance community. There are so many of YOU who bring me joy. I love seeing so many of your faces at festivals and workshops. I couldn’t do what I do without you, and you are creative, inspiring, and beautiful.

So, the next time someone posits that I, or anyone else, is just analyzing the love out of their passion, remember that we’re probably analyzing our passion out of our love for it.

One thought I keep having is why belly dance will never be as respected in the eye of the general public as ballet.  I’ve heard many belly dancers throughout the years say that they want to make belly dance as respected as ballet. While I do believe this is a noble cause, we can’t change how these dances have developed throughout the centuries.  The histories of both ballet and bellydance directly affect how each is viewed by the general public.

I’ll give you a little glimpse into my brain, and I’m sure I’ll expand on these ideas later, especially as I read more and more of the book.  As I read about the origins of ballet in the 16th century, this comparison flitters around my head:

Ballet (as we know it now) began as a European court dance, codified and performed mostly by men, specifically French kings.

Bellydance began who knows when, began in its more modern forms as a Middle Eastern folkdance, wasn’t codified until the 20th century (and there is still no universal standard codification of steps), and is mostly performed by women.

I assume you start to see the problems inherent in comparing the two?

What bores me?  I don’t like watching a dancer who has no story to tell.  I don’t like watching a dancer who is just showing off technical skill with no meaning behind it all.  I often find performances that are just energetic and fun dull.  Performances that have put more thought into their presentation than the overall idea of their performance leave me cold.  What’s the point?  What are you trying to tell me?  What is your story?

I want a connection.

Art is about being raw.  Art is not always about being pretty.  Art is not just about having fun.  Art is about expressing your inner Shadow, your demons, your scary secrets in a way that not only provides you with catharsis but also helps others cope and deal with their own demons.  Art is about making a connection beyond, “wow, that performance was really fun!”, or “wow, did you see that girl’s isolations?”, or “did you see that girl with three swords on her head?”.

At the end of the day, I am a dancer because I want to make art, and I want to express my ideas, my demons, my dark elements in a way that feels natural to me.  I practice my technique because my technique is my medium, my paint and my brushes that I use in my performances.  I might not physically practice for 6 hours a day, but I think about dance and art from the moment I wake up to the moment I sleep.  I am not a dancer because I just want to have fun.  I am not a dancer because I just want to show off an aesthetic or my new dance tricks.  I am a dancer because I have things I want to say and ideas to express that I don’t know how to express by any other means.

I think I have figured something out, and of course I reserve the right to alter my conclusion at any time.  At the end of the day, I am an amateur philosopher.  I spend more time in my head than I do in my body.  I am a dancer, but without my musings on expression, art, and integrity, my dance is nothing.  Dance is a vehicle for my ideas, a means to express my ideals and my internal self. My body is a vessel for my contemplations.

My roommates, however, are much more connected, I think, to their bodies as BODIES, as physical beings.  When the three of us were talking about what we’d like done with our bodies after we have passed away (a morbid and yet fascinating conversation), they said that they’d like to be buried, particularly my dance partner Natalie Brown.  I’d rather be cremated. I’d rather return to the spiritual world, whereas they would rather continue to inhabit their bodies even after death.

Megan and Natalie often wake up and want to dance.  I wake up and want to think… and I’ve been thinking about my place as a dancer, as a physical being with a brain that won’t stop.  When I see my roommates just dance and enjoy the act of dancing without analytical thought… and I wonder, “how can I get there?”  And should I get there as a dancer? Or are my reasons for dancing just different, and should I just embrace my motives as they are and build on them?

I love the feeling of being lost in dance, but it is a rare moment when my frontal lobe takes the back seat and just lets my body do a majority of the work.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing, or is it just a thing?  Does this make me any less of a dancer? And what does that mean that I would rather embody my thoughts than my physical self? Does this harm my position as a performer, does it enhance it, or does it just make me different?

I’ve known for a while that my personality type is rare, especially for women.  In the Myers-Briggs lexicon, I am an INTP: The Architect.  The very first line describing my type on this website says:

As an INTP, your primary mode of living is focused internally, where you deal with things rationally and logically. Your secondary mode is external, where you take things in primarily via your intuition.

The second line?

INTPs live in the world of theoretical possibilities.

If you read the rest of the article, you’ll see where this conflict between my body and mind arises.

But is it a conflict at all… Maybe as a dancer, I am meant to inhabit my head and my ideas, whereas my roommates are meant to inhabit their bodies more.  What does that mean? Maybe that’s a post for another day.

Herein lies the issue.

What does it mean that I, at 5’2″ and 130 pounds, am getting comments on my performance videos that I “look like [I've] had a baby”, or that someone on a popular bellydance forum suggested that I am a “larger” dancer?  I am secure enough in my own self-image that I’m only mildly offended by these comments, but the implications of the comments really bother me.

Why is it that if someone is 5’2″ and 130 pounds that she is considered “larger”?  Seriously.  What is wrong with our own self-image as women when a we see little belly jiggle in a fellow dancer and consider her, for lack of a better term, “fat”?  As I sit here in my Size Small shirt and my Size 6 Short jeans, I wonder, how damaged are we as a gender?  And when will we stop projecting our warped view of the women’s bodies on our peers, teachers, and mentors?  No WONDER there is an epidemic of skewed and negative self-image among women in this country (I’m in the United States, so international readers might have a different perspective).

On one hand, I am appalled.  I am appalled that I am considered “large”.  I am not large. I know I am not conventionally skinny, but I am not large.  And if you think that I am large, then I seriously suggest that you re-evaluate your perception of the female form.

On the other hand… if I am considered to be a “larger” and still internationally-known performer and instructor, maybe that can inspire my fellow dancers, give them hope that you don’t have to be 100 pounds or less to be a success.  For some reason, some dancers see me as some anomaly, the “normal”-sized dancer who made it big.  Frankly, I never even considered this concept to be unusual at all.  I dance, and I want to dance well.  I teach, and I want to teach well.  Isn’t that what matters?

I am hardly a scholar of women’s studies, so I understand that this topic runs deep… but if you ever looked at me, or any other dancer and thought, “she’s larger…”, please catch yourself, reflect on your reaction, and ask yourself, “why do I think this, and [more importantly], why do I care, and how is this perception affecting my like or dislike of this dancer?”

And with that I leave you a video of Miasia, a dancer who will rock your socks off…. and who does happen to be larger.  And I don’t care, because my jaw is on the floor every time I see her dance.  Watch and let your body-image issues melt away….

I don’t mean commitment in a relationship sense.  This blog is certainly not to discuss those issues. But rather to committing to an idea or artistic endeavor, movement, choreography, or event.

I’m a procrastinator, and I know that the main reason I procrastinate is because I’m a perfectionist.  I wait until the “right moment” to do something – to write a new blog post, create a new workshop topic, make a new flier.  And I used to be a lot more of a procrastinator, but what I’ve needed to do is just commit.

This applies directly to dance and to art in general.  Anyone who’s read The War of Art by Steven Pressfield (read it!) knows that procrastination is a form of resistance.  Resistance prevents us from moving forward, from growing, from making progress and making art.  My hesitation to write a new blog post is not only because I am afraid that this post won’t be as good as my last posts, but also because I’m worried about making this blog post the most amazing blog post ever. Or, what if this just isn’t good enough?  If I’d just sit my butt down and write a blog post, then maybe I wouldn’t be worrying about all these things, and I’d actually write something worth reading.

When it comes to dance, these same concepts apply.  I see students in my classes hesitate in executing a technical movement, because they so want to get the movement right. (I’m terribly guilty of this myself, not only with dance but also when I was a figure skater.)  I’ll try so hard to get whatever technique correct that I won’t commit myself fully to the movement itself.  If I’m learning a choreography in a workshop and I forget a section, instead of dancing that part of the choreography at half effort–or worse, just standing there and not doing it at all–I should dance something simple with dedication and poise until I can catch up to the song again with the steps that I do know.

What we need to do is commit to the movement with the mindfulness to know when we’re doing it incorrect, but at least we’ve given it our best effort.  Rather than tip-toeing around the movement in an attempt to get it right the first time, we need to just jump right in and give it a go.

We also need a balance between gusto and perfection. While I admire a dancer who tackles a movement or a performance at full-force, such enthusiasm can also lead to a messy and unpolished performance.  But what’s worse is when an artist or dancer agonizes over one set or song so much that they never feel it’s ever right to perform, and then we’re all robbed of sharing that art.

Perfectionism is the enemy of art.  I need to remember that, and I’m writing this blog post to let you all that I am committed to writing more, even if my posts aren’t perfect.  I’m also writing this to remind you all to make art, even if it doesn’t always live up to your own personal standards.  The only way to improve is to keep creating and to learn from our own mistakes.