Dancing is my solace. My rhythm has always found me. In the cacophony of Mumbai traffic, the cold winds of Delhi weather, or in an unknown song, a simple body wave, movement of my fingers and the tap of my feet has been unavoidable. It is what I have always indulged myself in as a child. It’s been my escape. From the chaos of school and exams to the drama with friends, dance has been the one way I have taught myself to unwind.
That’s what this blog post is about. Telling you to unwind by doing something you love. Psychologists in the field of positive psychology talk about passion as an individual’s defining activity. So, what defines you? Is it music or theatre, sport or poetry?
Whatever it may be, I’m here to tell you that you should focus on doing the things that you love. Being animals of ambitions, it is easy for us to focus on our academic/ career goals to the point where we become dismissive of feeding into our creative side. We get stuck in the cycle of monotony until one day we realize the time we gave up training ourselves to be robots. I’m here to tell you that that needs to change. As bizarre as it sounds, it’s so easy to not want to do something you love sometimes. Despite my love for dancing, there are days when I don’t want to go for practice because I have too much work to finish. But still, I push myself to dance. Because the word passion is rooted in the Latin word patoir, which means to endure. And at the end of it, every single time, I’m glad that I endure. I fight my urge to work and I just take a minute to breathe.
At the end of the day, that is what defines you. How you learn from your passions, how you give yourself time to create something you love. It’s not ideal to expect that all of us can live our lives by earning from our passion. But we can force ourselves to indulge in it, even if we forget to sometimes. It’s going to make you happier, calmer, and it’s going to give you a sense of purpose (even if that’s just momentary.) I know that every time I danced, it taught me something new. From the times I choreographed routines for shows, I learned leadership. From the times I couldn’t memorize a step, I learned patience. From all the times I had stage fright, I learned confidence; and for all the times that dance was my escape, I learned that a peaceful mindset can make anything right.
When I dance, I lose myself in the movement, music, and adrenaline. I stop for a moment. I hope you do too. I hope you give yourself at least an hour every day, to unwind and do something you love. Don’t do it with your friends or family. Do it alone. Be with yourself and a passion for a few minutes. Let yourself do what you truly love.
November 25, 2018 at 7:18 pm
It never ceases to amaze me how you can transform a somewhat personal experience into an inspiring moral that you project onto your audience. I cannot help but acknowledge that that is the stuff of great speech givers and storytellers. And I also can relate with your struggle of balancing extracurricular activities and work when I was so involved in my high school swimming team. Finding the right balance to keep you happy is the key and I think you made that crystal-clear in this most recent post. Looking forward to the next one.
November 26, 2018 at 8:27 pm
Another very relatable post! I can completely understand where you are coming from in this post, as I have always resorted to playing the piano when I am stressed in order to clear my mind. I really liked how you drew upon the Latin roots and etymology of the word passion and used it to support your advice, as I thought that was extremely effective. It also really stuck out to me in this post the rhythm of your language. The way you structure your sentences makes reading your writing very flowy, almost poetic-like, which really adds a stylistic depth to your posts.
November 29, 2018 at 10:41 pm
This was a wonderfully relaatbale and interestingly calming post. As a musical theratre major here at Penn State, my work and my passion are one in the same. While I am very lucky to have this be the case, there are still those days when I, like you, don’t want to ‘dance,’ or indulge in my passion for one reason or another. I think the way you articuated this feeling and advised of how to overcomeit and the benefits of doing so was skillfull and inspriing. I espeiclly loved your use of the etymolgy of “passion” to support your point–what a creative nad wise peiece of evidence. Thank you for another beautiful post!
November 29, 2018 at 10:43 pm
This was a wonderfully relatbale and interestingly-calming post. As a Musical Theatre major here at Penn State, my work and my passion are one in the same. While I am very lucky to have this be the case, there are still those days when I, like you, don’t want to ‘dance,’ or indulge in my passion for one reason or another. I think the way you articuated this feeling and advised of how to overcome it and the resulting benefits of was skillfull and inspriing. I espeiclly loved your use of the etymolgy of “passion” to support your point–what a creative and wise piece of evidence to include! Thank you for another beautiful post!