Living in a Dance Bubble.

What we perceive as normal behavior is hugely affected by the environment we live in and the people which we are surrounded by. Living in a dance environment and having all these dancers around me has definitely given an impact on me. For me it’s normal to spend almost all of my free time on dancing. For me it’s like an automation to go to my dance classes – even if I had something else that evening that something else is just not going to happen. For me it’s normal to plan my holidays around dancing – everybody does dance festivals regularly, right? Who would be interested on going to some holiday destination that doesn’t have a dance scene, let alone to move into a place like that? It is normal to build my life around dancing, to (almost exclusively) have friends that dance and on top of that to write about it to an online diary.

I was walking home from a dance party late on Monday evening, something yet again a normal thing for me to do, and started to think about the situation. It was slightly raining and the streets were empty. I didn’t have that great night dancing, maybe because my feet were hurting badly after a two hour tango class before the party. Suddenly I felt somehow empty. Was this the thing I want out from my life? To run to a dance class after work, followed by more dancing until late night until I crash to bed (meaning an unpleasant wake up the next morning after short sleep), and repeating the same pattern the next day? Work, eat, dance, sleep, repeat. To be honest, there’s not that much more in my life. Isn’t that a bit… limited?

Lately I have been giving this a thought quite regularly. Do I really want dancing to take up so much time from my life that I don’t have much left for anything else? I mean, the world is full of exciting things to do, interesting people to meet, new skills to learn and beautiful feelings to feel! From all those I have chosen, for the last couple of years, to dance. That very moment this choice had led me to walk alone in the empty streets of Helsinki on Monday night and I got a cold feeling that I want something more.

I have to admit some things to myself. I have to admit that sometimes dancing has been my way of escaping from reality. Sometimes dancing has been my way of fulfilling a need for physical closeness. Sometimes dancing has been my way of ignoring the feeling of loneliness. Sometimes dancing has been my way of staying in my comfort zone. Sometimes dancing has been my way of feeling less insecure.

Have I been living in a dance bubble?