By Anabel Costa
Creativity ebbs and flows. One day the paint brush won’t stop its trek across the canvas until the image is complete, or the shutter of the camera clicks until it captures just the right light. At other times, an artist is stuck and uninspired.
This happened to me with dance about a year ago during my second year at UC Santa Barbara where I was, for the first time in a decade, dancing without joy. I lacked the passion and drive that had always kept me alert and motivated throughout hours and hours of modern dance classes on campus or Nutcracker rehearsals in Santa Barbara.
I began training in ballet when I was nine, and later expanded to different modern dance techniques. Dance has been a huge part of my life, and although I didn’t plan on making it a career, I always knew I would continue dancing in college. But then, the repetition of ballet class bored me and I became complacent during the times I used to experiment and play. My relationship to dance had changed, and I was stuck.
I tried taking different types of classes, such as ballroom dance. I tried taking classes with different teachers, participating in various performances with unique choreographers—but none of it seemed to help. Instead of the familiar fire that used to fuel every jump and turn, I was left with nothing but a luke-warm ember, struggling to stay alight. The pain, discomfort, and insecurities that had previously found themselves overridden by joy and artistry, began to crawl back to the surface. Eventually, it was time for me to grapple with the idea of taking a break. I decided to stop all formal dance instruction at UCSB.
A year later, I find myself back in a university dance studio, chasing down the music and scarfing down choreography like a starved animal. So what changed? At first, opting out of taking dance classes was a relief. Suddenly I didn’t have to scrutinize my body in the floor-to-ceiling mirrors, or agonize over whether or not my feet were quite the right shape. All of my fears about quitting dissipated: I thought that without dance my body would fail me and become weak, but it never did. I thought my self-worth would plummet, but it never did. And I thought I would lose a part of myself when on the contrary, I began to know myself in new and deeper ways.
Still, despite the excitement and freedom I found at first in the absence of dance, I began to realize I missed it more and more every time I walked past a studio door, cracked open, the familiar thuds of the dancers and drums spilling out. I longed for the movement and the music, the muscularity and the artistry. I looked forward to the day when I could get back into the studio and remind myself why I chose to practice this art for so many years — and that’s when I decided to once again sign up for a modern dance class at UCSB.
A break, it turns out, doesn’t have to be a break-up. By taking time away from one of my oldest and deepest loves, I was able to give myself the space to discover new passions, such as writing for the Daily Nexus student newspaper, and getting involved in theater. I rediscovered forgotten creative pursuits such as drawing and painting. Sometimes it’s easy to get stuck in old patterns and habits, and it can take strength to make a change for ourselves. I took dancing for granted, and it took taking a step back to rediscover the art that I owe so much to.
As I write this, I’m marking Day Two back in the studio after my break, and I’m grateful I gave myself that time to realize what dance is for me; it doesn’t have to be the be-all and end-all of my life and personality, it can be a form of catharsis and a way to take care of my body. Now, I use dance as self-care.
So, to anyone finding themselves stuck and uninspired: Try taking a day off, or a week, or a month, or even a year or more. You might realize that you’ve moved past your art — whatever that art may be — and on to something better. Or perhaps the time away will reinvigorate your relationship to your art and remind you why you loved it so much in the first place.
Anabel Costa is a third year theater major at UC Santa Barbara who is pursuing a minor in professional writing. She wrote this for her Writing Program course Journalism for Web and Social Media.