Hello, hello to the world!
I hope u r all fine and still healthy and going strong.
The Corona-Virus has changed our lives so much and I can't wait untill we have a kind of, sort of normal life again.
But most probably this will take another while.
Just hang on in there everybody! 🙂

This time I wanted to share with you my experiences and my thoughts about trying to find a new job and new hobbies etc. after having said good bye to dance.

As I said before, the last 3 years on stage I noticed that I wasn't that happy anymore about standing on stage and performing.
I was tired of all the projects that somehow kept repeating itself and I was especially tired of rehearsing: working really hard and rolling in your own sweat and in the sweat of others, having a body that was somehow always hurting, choreographers with big egos and with no human skills at all, etc.
So I started to think about quitting dancing already 3 years before I actualy did it.
This process was necessary to be able to stop, though.

When I was a kid, I traveled a lot and I saw a lot of different countries and experienced a lot of different cultures. So I was also flying a lot and I remember I always said that I wanted to be a flight attendant. They were so pretty and so kind to me and somehow they were also glamorous. I found that very appealing.

As I started orientating myself for a new job and career, I knew that I did NOT want to go back to studying for a longer period.
That was no option for me.
Why not, actually?
I think it has to do with the fact that I gave my whole and everything for my dancing career and I studied dance for so long, that I wasn't able to give that much AGAIN for a second study/career.

I also knew that I did NOT want to have an own dance school or an own dance company, like so many dancers do after their dancing career. I just saw how hard that is and how much work and responsability come with it.
So those options were already not relevant for me and I seriously started to think about a job in the airline business.
Being a flight attendant was actually a great option. It is irregular, it is international, the job itself is physical, it is working with people, it is working in a group.
And dance is irregular, international, physical, working with people, working in a group.
So, there you go!
And I knew from a few dancer friends that they also choose to be a flight attendant after their dance career.
For me the choice became quite obvious and I was happy that I found something that I was in some way happy about.
I even really looked forward to it!

The first two years a s a flight attendant were a ball! I felt so great and so happy about this new career and I loved discovering all these new places and working with all these nice colleagues, etc. I was on cloud 9, as I said before in another post.
And I dind't take any dance class or didn't visit any dance performance in those first two years. It was a clear cut.
But after those two years I just noticed that I was missing something.
I started to take ballet classes again and I just felt how much I loved it and how much I have missed it!
I knew it wasn't very wise, but I just couldn't resist. I was just prosponing the problem of really letting go. Someday I would HAVE to quit because of the body not being able anymore to do what I would want it to do.

So I quit taking classes again and I took classes again and I quit taking classes again, etc., etc. It was a huge struggle, because I did NOT find anything else that fullfilled me the way that dancing did.
I thought about singing (thank God I dind't try that.....poor singing teacher, hahaha), acting, coaching actors movement-wise, teaching dance, writing about dance, private trainer, translator, tissue-acrobatics, etc.
And this went on for a while. It drove my partner crazy, because I would start something and then after a while I would just leave and start something else. I just didn't have the patience anymore to start from scratch and to build up something.
I had enough of starting from zero again, like with every audition I had done.

This went on for a few years and I felt like I was trapped, in a way.
Trapped between quitting dance, leaving a big void and not having any energy to put in a new hobby that starts from point zero.
Is that only me or do you recognize anything of this?
And after a while it hit me: "everything that comes after stopping dancing, is a second choice". No matter whether it is a great Hollywood-career, it still will be second choice, simply because dancing was the first.
And I think in my case it will always be first choice...I still miss it very badly.

But I have to say that I had a kind of definite closure last fall:
I saw that the company of Pina Bausch was hiring dancers and I decided to go for that one more last time!
So, I prepared a solo in two days, I taped it and I sent it to the link for the audition. The solo was nothing special, but it was very me and in a way and I was kind of happy about it.
I didn't get invited and that was exactly right, because THAT solo that I chorographed, was my good bye-solo for dance.
And since fall 2019 I didn't take any dance classes or visited any dance performance.
And thinking of dance I just feel grateful for all the productions I have done and for all the times that I could be on stage!

Corona and the lockdown made me discover another artistic side of myself, which is painting and drawing. My therapist advised me to start painting.
I actually like it a lot and I notice that I can express what I feel by pictures that I have in my head and that I can put on paper.
It is nothing great or unique, but still: it helps me get rid of certain (negative) emotions or feelings.
Another idea that I have for a while is doing something with dogs. Maybe to become a dog trainer or something like that.
I just LOVE these animals and now I am actually seriously thinking about doing a two year course for dog trainer.
AND of course I started this blog a few weeks ago, so that is also a new side of me that I discovered. And I enjoy it very much!