1. I’m always going to care,

No matter what.

I cannot leave you behind

 If you need me,

 No matter what you’ve ever done to me.
 

2. I let people be my happiness.

I am happiest when I can help others

And when they are happy

And when I am surrounded by good people.
 

3. I am okay with being someone’s

Second, third, fourth, etc. choice. 
 

4. I dance to feel loved.
 

5. I am constantly in a state of

Wanderlust; I can’t stand to stay in one place

 For too long at a time.

 Even if it’s taking a walk

To get away from my house,

 I rarely enjoy days where

 I stay at home the whole time.
 

6. I want my world to be about

The little things,

The morning sunrises

 And the 2am phone calls

And cold coffee

And the colour of summer

 And the feeling of waking up

 And the way light falls

Through the trees in the spring

And heartbeats

 And the feeling of grass between my toes

And herbal tea at four in the afternoon

 And waking up at four

In the morning

Just because I can’t sleep. 
 

7. I love people too easily

And don’t stop easily.

 If you’ve found your way

 Into my heart

Then you are going to stay there

 For a really long time,

No matter how much you hurt me.
 

8. I live by the saying that

 Nobody looks back on their lives

And remembers the nights

They got plenty of sleep.

I don’t like to sleep,

 I like to get things done,

 Making art and helping people

Or running off to somewhere wonderful.
 

9. It has been drilled into me since

 I was little that in order to

Become a well-rounded, good person,

 I have to be exceptional at everything.

I was taught to not attempt

 To become the best at one thing,

When I was a little girl, I was a dancer. Dancers are graceful and poised and proud. But that all changed when I stopped dance. I always felt very, very small. I would shrink whenever people were around. I always wanted to hide away. I wasn’t that proud dancer anymore. I was just me. At school I got abandoned by friends because I loved to read and I was advanced for my age. When I was a little girl, I lost my hope.

My sisters and brothers and I are so different. I look in the mirror at myself and see nothing of the rest of my family, except for maybe my dad. I’ve always been such a different person than the rest of them. But my dad always taught me to embrace myself. I didn’t like feeling small, but that’s how it was a lot. I was no one. I don’t think my mom really ever noticed when something was wrong. I think that’s why I learned to tell people I was fine, even with tears running down my face. My mom taught me, unknowingly, to doubt myself.

My best friend has always been perfect. She is a dancer, and you can tell by the way she moves. But for me, being a dancer has always been more than just “being a dancer.” In my life, it’s always been a metaphor for boldness, beauty, and incredible strength. I think that when I was little, I was a dancer then. I sing, too, but according to my mother and sister I was never any good. But my perfect best friend heard me sing one day, and she gave me back the courage to stand in front of an audience and sing my heart out again. She truly is perfect, and sometimes, standing next to her, I feel small. But even still, my perfect best friend taught me that I could be anything, and that I was loved.

Then there was April. One horrible, terrible April. My life was a mess; there was constantly a blade at my wrist. The knife taught me about pain, and about how weak I really was.  I was suffering from anorexia nervosa, but I didn’t know it then. I took one look in the mirror and tried to kill myself. Twice in one month. And the only person I even thought to write a letter to was my perfect best friend. I got a little better, and I haven’t cut since.

I really never belonged anywhere. Not until band. Not until I started playing brass in band class did I ever belong anywhere. My first band teacher taught me to love music, and to use it to express anger and love and beauty. And the music reminded me of dancing, of how there was so much more you could say than when you just spoke. And music captured my soul, and I started to sing again.

When I was in third grade, I found out that I wanted to be an actress. My mother always told me that I would never be an actress. That I wouldn’t go to Julliard. But being an actress is the only thing I’ve ever wanted to be that I’ve always wanted to be. I started to do competitive acting. I learned that I loved dramatic monologues, and my drama teacher taught me about how acting is becoming someone else, and how sometimes it’s easier to be someone else for a while. That’s how I survived the moments I was hurting.

I used to get so angry. I don’t know how I had any friends, I treated them all horribly. It was pent up, looking after four siblings when my parents weren’t home, hearing the things they said about me and still trying to smile, crying myself to sleep and usually not sleeping at all. Then I’d go to school and someone would say something and I’d snap, and then a fire would build up and I’d be screaming and nearly crying and so, so angry. No one understood what happened when I went home and picked up the knife, or when I closed my eyes and all I could see were the memories I just wanted to block out of my head. But the more I tried to hide the memories, the more they came to me in my sleep. And the memories taught me that I was small and afraid.

It was summer. I was inside all summer, because I never had friends in my neighborhood. I went to school far away from where I lived because they wanted me in programs for advanced students. So I stayed inside with my siblings, and I faced all the bitter anger that came from my home. It was always loud at my house; I never had time to myself. I raised my four siblings, and even taught two of them to read.  And raising those four kids taught me that I can do anything I want to, because I know how to take care of people.

One of my friends’ mother had a drug problem. She didn’t want to move in with her dad because that would mean her sister would have to go with her, and her brother would be put up for adoption. She would also have to leave our school and everyone she’s known forever. She would also cut, was antisocial, and had depression and anxiety issues. She taught me that being in our world is scary. And that it’s dangerous.

There was my cousin. She was molested by her brother when she was 12. He’s been gone for a long time, and I haven’t seen him in years. For all we know, he’s still selling magazines and vacuums in Nebraska. She taught me that no matter what you go through, you can always come out strong.

But then there was the abuse. From the time I was young, I have so many memories of hands picking me up by my shirt and slamming me against a wall, slapping me and beating me. But the words were the worst. The things that were said to me broke me down and made me into nothing. The words hurt worse than the knife. At least the knife let me get away. But the words were my torment. I always thought it was my fault. I always thought I’d done something horribly wrong and that I deserved it. It seemed like my abuser was almost looking for a reason to be angry. Looking for a reason to scream at me and beat me. And the abuse taught me that I was nothing.

My first love was in seventh grade. He was so much like me. We both loved music and we could have deep conversations and joke around too. He was sweet and kind, until we had to break up. It was sad, but there was nothing I could do about it. He lived an hour away. He taught me that there are people in our world worth living for, like the friends I have now. That’s one of the reasons, I think, that I never quite managed to kill myself. Because I was taught that I still had so much to live for.

My first dance teacher taught me how to live. From her I learned that just because you cannot dance now doesn’t mean you never will be able to. You are young, and I am here to teach you to dance. That is the same way with life. In life you will fall, but you will get back up on your feet and keep going. That is how it is in dance. You won’t give up because you fall on your turns. You’ll get back up en pointe and keep going, because dance is expression, and expression is everything. Life is like ballet. You will fall, you will get hurt, but sometimes, you manage to do things just right. Out of ashes come the strongest ones, and out of nothing comes the bravest. The people you see every day have struggles in their lives too, and they will keep going. Because it is part of the dance.

I have my life. In my life I have learned everything. I have learned to embrace myself and to doubt myself. I learned that I was loved and that I was weak. I learned that music is the best painkiller and that sometimes it’s easier to be someone else. I learned that I am small and afraid, and that I can take care of the people I love. I learned that our world is dangerous, but I also learned that you can come out strong from anything. I learned that I was nothing, but that being nothing means you can become anything. And because of my first dance teacher, I learned everything. I learned how to be a dancer, in any sense of the word.