Dance Life

[Amer]

Hello everybody,

Since I was a child whenever elders asked me what is it that I want to do in life. I never had an answer. Other kids always wanted to be firemen, doctors, pilots, etc, for me, I never had an answer.

Until I discovered dancing and music by the age of 6 i think... 

I got hooked up ever since, with music especially, then by the age of 14, I officially started dancing, fast forward after almost two and a half years, I started to teach, and contributed in creating the dance scene of that genre in my country, along with so many other accomplishments that I feel proud of.

University started, and I was studying and dancing in parallel, I had a lot of setbacks when it came to my dancing and things that I am passionate about, but I came across people I looked up to who told me I should continue. 

And I am grateful I crossed paths with them, they helped me believe in my inner voice and tenaciously follow my intuition.

I graduated from university around 7 years ago,,,, I have entered the corporate life ever since (And kept on dancing and traveled to different continents participating in dancing and cultural events and so forth)

today, and specifically right now, I am working in a big company (a regular 9 to 5), I pursue my passions everyday, dance practice, music, and calligraphy.

I really want to LIVE this, not do it after my 9 to 5. I want it to be my full time.

while typing this I think what is stopping me is fear.. fear that it won't work, taking the risk of giving up a fixed salary and pursue something that requires my personal hard work in order to make a living. 

another reason is.. I don't want to be broke, and most dancers/ performers who do this for a living are actually living their passions, but in most cases, they are broke which I don't want to be!
 

so that is my conflict in a nutshell... I think I am answering myself in the context.. but would love to hear the actualizers thoughts!

Have a great day everyone, and try dancing, it could be spiritual, meditative and therapeutic (and I don't mean clubbing loll. I am talking about body movement to soulful sounds in general, contemporary, ballet, etc..)

[Arman]

31 minutes ago, Amer said:

while typing this I think what is stopping me is fear.. fear that it won't work, taking the risk of giving up a fixed salary and pursue something that requires my personal hard work in order to make a living. 

another reason is.. I don't want to be broke, and most dancers/ performers who do this for a living are actually living their passions, but in most cases, they are broke which I don't want to be!

These are fears based off reflexive dualistic thinking and lack-based-assumptions that have been programmed into you

Once you really face your fears and start to move through them, these thoughts will automatically start to be replaced with more empowered ones.

There is NO REAL REASON to assume that you will be broke, or that it is necessary to struggle to become a dancer, or that you won't make money. Who says you need to quit your 9-5 straight away and start grinding day in and day out to make it work? If that is a path that excites you and you think it makes sense, then do it, but is that what you want to do? If you really start busting your beliefs and inner barriers you will start to have realizations and epiphanies that will create empowerment and ease in place of apathy and fear. You may realize that you don't necessarily need to quit your job before you get the ball rolling and you don't have to put yourself in a vulnerable position. You don't have to live paycheque to paycheque trying to find work. If you want to buy into that reality, then you are free to reap those results, but you don't have to. 

If you can replace scarcity consciousness with abundance consciousness, you will realize there are an unlimited number of doors and there are intelligent and satisfying ways you can achieve your vocational goals. You don't have to be a beggar and dance every day until someone decides that you are worthy of money. 

If you are really good at what you do and are being your fullest authentic expression then things can start to align in very incredible ways. Don't pay attention to people who have struggled - your selective focus is tricking you because of your emotions. People with poverty-consciousness will struggle in everything they do. Keep your eyes peeled for people who do things that you would never typically imagine someone getting paid for, and notice people who are creating massive abundance and doing things on their own terms. Find just one person like that, and then you'll find another... and another... and it will start to blow your mind. 

Trust in your ability to make it happen. You don't have to be adverse to hard work, but you don't have to believe that it is necessary to struggle to have what you want either.  

 

[Sevi]

Hi @Amer , I'm in the industry for long enough; additional to what @Arman says, I'd like to outline some pointers for you.

The more you get into the field and have some results due to your effort, the more confident you become to overcome the scarcity; since the vagueness of it turns into clarity and certainty for you.

Roughly speaking, first you need to figure out how you wanna take place into it, it's a vast field. What do you like the most and what are you good at in it: do you like, teaching, performing, entertaining crowds, forming choreographies, shifting people's moods, arranging events; in teaching do you like teaching casual people to move around, do you like improving performers, are you more of a fun person to pass time with or do you like to focus on details and improves the techniquality of a person or a routine.

And what you like the most and what you are good at might not match, that's okay, then, according to your choice either you gotta educate yourself or you gotta pick your battles and be fine with it, and of course time to time you will shift your strategy and approach to it.

Basically to create security in this business, you need to cover 3 areas for your clientele. 1) benefit 2) forming the future 3) finances

1) benefit: (the client can be a person/student or a company/ organization/ event organizers) major 3 benefit areas are I)personal (health, feeling good, sense of accomplishment, recognition, overcoming shyness, pass through a difficult stage of life, sense of belonging, etc) Il) social (making -new- friends, socializing, getting better with the opposite gender, pua, connecting with the alike minds, etc) lll) organizational (getting the media's attention to promote their product, creating a certain social image for the company, event, or the concept; cover up their mess by sending the media's attention to somewhere else -I'm giving the facts without getting into integration factor)

2) forming future: when your clientele comes to you, they will have a specific image and a specific need in their mind. It's your job to educate and show them what else is also possible, beneficial and helpful for them, and excite them about it.

Individuals and companies are naturally always concerned about future, and they cannot see how this type of things can have future and continuity (it's another discussion to write but) when you create the clear vision and the big picture for them and present the doable tools to get there, it creates psychological relief for them so that they start to understand and know what exactly they are doing while they are putting their investments of their time, effort and money in it, so it creates certainty for them, so rather than questioning what the hack they are in it and so on, they do start to have the comfort to relax in your structure, counting on you.

3) finances: you have to create the value and the equal result and benefit for the money they put in. That's how you turn your business. So you improve yourself as a teacher, choreographer by any means possible. And putting the right numbers for your service is important. Your attitude about money also will define your duration in the business. If you freak out and just because to have money start to give away your principles, you will loose your accountability in the long run. How you do your business will claim your reputation, and you need a very solid trustworthiness for that.

So if you get good at covering those 3 areas well, and if you produce constantly good trustworthy business for those who interacts with you, and also if you keep yourself accountable to be someone who is easy and clear to do business with; then you won't have fears to stand out in the field.

There are enormous numbers of sub-categories that you can produce business in this field. It's matter of discovering what particularly you want, and start to build necessary components around it.

Wishing you all the best?

This is such a fulfilling, full of life type of thing to have in your life? no matter what I'm loving every moment of it.

Edited April 25, 2018 by Sevi

[Amer]

Thank you so much guys for the insight... @Arman I completely agree,, sometimes I go too extreme with my thoughts and visualize that I will start dancing full time overnight.. which is not the best scenario... I mean there is no right or wrong it could be very challenging but if there's a better way to do it then why not? really appreciate your response.

21 hours ago, Arman said:

You don't have to be adverse to hard work, but you don't have to believe that it is necessary to struggle to have what you want either.  

 

[Amer]

@Sevi its amazing how you broke it down! I think your message will be a reference for me. thank you.

19 hours ago, Sevi said:

The more you get into the field and have some results due to your effort, the more confident you become to overcome the scarcity; since the vagueness of it turns into clarity and certainty for you.