We are dancers. Our body means to us more than anything we'll ever acquire in our lifetime. To us, it is not simply a hollow shell in which the soul reside. It is the sole instrument through which that soul is fed and fulfilled. Our body, of course, is ours. We've lived in our body our whole life. You would think that we had total control over it, wouldn't you?
Unfortunately, as we dance more, we learn that our body has its limits— and we learn that the hard way. That our body doesn't work in the way that we think we can have it work. And as dancers, we try to go against these limits. We hurt ourselves, rather ruthlessly. We put ourselves in uncomfortable positions. We abuse our body. All that just so that we can hit that split second where we look "perfect". Sad to say, "perfect" at times doesn't really come by and say hello. It may never come by even after the hours— long hours— the sweat, the pain. We realise that no matter how hard we tell our body to do something, it seems to act with a mind of its own. There are things which we simply cannot do. The irony icing all these things on top is that: the more we know that we can't do it, the more we want to do it. We feel the hurt, on and off, and we resolve that hurt, on and off.
We start to comfort ourselves that: no worries, time is on our side. We tell ourselves that someday, whatever that means, we will be "perfect". Under that delusion, pretext, or hope— depending on how you want to look at it— we press on. We put in more hours. We sweat more. We endure more pain. All that because deep deep down, we know as dancers, that a split second, as fleeting and illusive it may be, at which we are "perfect", will give us a feeling that is just extraordinary. It's not about others and what they think. It's about the relationship between us and our body. A love-hate relationship: torrid, private, almost sacrilegious. We covet to give ourselves that extraordinary feeling.
That's why, we don't mind the hours. That's why we don't mind the pain. That's why, we are dancers.
