The past few weeks at the Sacramento Ballet have been a whirlwind of emotions : From the highs of tackling a big production, the tedium and at times humdrum drilling of steps to the lows of physical pain, emotional exhaustion and everything in between. It's certainly been quite the rollercoaster ride.
The chocolate flavored moments as evidenced by last night's Inside Director's Studio are numerous. One can glance into the studio on occasion and marvel at the masterful physicality of Amanda; the nuanced artistry of Chloe; the ineffable vulnerability of Alexandra and the powerful partnering of Stephan and Rick; and have your heart touched in places you never knew existed before.
It isn't however someone's magnificent physicality and technique or emotionally charged portrayal that I am going to talk about.
It's an emotional upset by a teary-eyed dancer during one of the rehearsals that struck a chord of true empathy. It's never easy to talk about UPSETS publicly, be it dictated by social convention, the fear of disapproval or something that we have learned to suppress and avoid.. I decided , H*ll why not?! It's by not looking that limiting beliefs stay hidden.
Whatever the upset was experienced by the dancer I cannot speak for. I can only say that when witnessed, I was at first dumbstruck at how beautiful this expression of human emotion was, then mildly confused that I would think it is beautiful. And then in an instant, the heart opened...And I remembered a once dark place of profound aloneness and unworthiness, masked in terms of a quest for perfection : the perfect body, the perfect technique, the perfect job, the perfect relationship....
The quest for perfection is not a good or bad thing in itself. If it is a search for clarity, then in my experience, it is helpful. But if it is a device to constantly crucify oneself and blame others, then it is destructive and insane. We need not be reminded what the cost of this insanity is in our world. Shakespeare makes it particularly poignant with the suicide of a 14 year old girl and a teenage boy.
......
What is this clarity? It is mindfulness. A mindfulness of everything that is brought into one's experience, and even of the subtle judgments of self and others... If I am not mindful, then I cannot really honestly look, question and change my mind. The programming of limitation runs me and the heart is closed.
I heard Carinne say that it is more difficult to be still. I resonated. It's true in my experience that a mind addicted to busyness and easily distracted by limiting thoughts that it believes it cannot let go of are obstacles to being present. With stillness we can allow for a clarity of purpose to be borne and an unimaginable intuition to flow "where the dancer and the dance become one". Being mindful of how your fingers move or how each metatarsal points a foot and how the body moves across time and space can be an exhilarating and exquisite moment-to-moment discovery. Who knows?
It is my sincere wish that Ron's production of Romeo and Juliet will be a beautiful and magical journey for all, to a place beyond conceptualization; to a place where your heart beats wildly and you don't know why , where "true love is grown to such excess, I cannot sum up some of half my wealth" .
I am once again kindly reminded why I am so in love with this artform. With vulnerability comes a world of feelings, emotions and experiences too subtle to describe. It is perhaps a love that grows and grows and grows....
Roy
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