SO YOU WANT TO BE A DANCER

If you dance to stay active

and don’t necessarily have any other reason,

don’t do it.

If you perform to simply end the season

and each performance feels exactly like the last, 

don’t do it. 

If you don’t spend all of your waking hours

simply wishing to be moving

don’t keep dancing. 

If you know that every single second

for the next few months

you will be in the studio working hard

and this upsets you,

don’t do it. 

If when you perform 

you can’t feel the hearts of others

opening up to you,

don’t do it. 

If you can’t make others laugh and cry

as you move across the stage;

you can’t get them to care 

about what you have to say 

don’t do it. 

they don’t care. 

and soon you won’t either. 

If every time you dance 

you can still feel your heart in your chest

not on your sleeve for all others to see

don’t dance. 

that’s not even dance anymore. 

If when you dance 

you can finally breathe, 

you give your heart to the world, 

you step off stage to the tears and smiles of others, 

you have been told you have changed the life

of a complete stranger,

and your soul is healed at the same time,

never stop.