Lee Ann Womack - I Hope You Dance

After spending the whole weekend with my daughter at a dance competition, I thought this song might be a good fit for today.

If you've never been to a dance competition, don't let what you see on Dance Moms scar you. It is not like that. Our whole dance company is crammed in a tiny room to change, there is no separate large rooms with all this space for each group, no you are packed in and sharing with everyone! There is no fighting and yelling at the director or anyone else or you are gone, and there is no reason to do that in the first place.

I watched my daughter dance, put all her emotions and heart into what she was doing. Leave it all on the stage at the mercy of the judges, and come out a better person for it.  She has been dancing for four years competitively now, and she is thirteen now. She has learned to be confident in herself and her ability, to be proud of what she has learned to do and to push herself to greater and better things. She is already thinking of college and what she needs to do to get into college, grade wise but even more importantly extra-circularly.   I have also seen her become more and more comfortable talking with older people and other people about what she does and what she enjoys. She is a more confident person as well as a dancer now.

More than anything thought, I owe all that to my daughter's dance studio. I was lucky in that I found a studio, with an owner and instructor that believed like me, and she holds the kids to high standards but she doesn't yell at them. She keeps them responsible, but she teaches them responsibility, values, commitment and so much more in the middle of dance.  I have been fortunate to find a studio like that, and I never want to have to let go of that for my daughter.

I hope that today, you each are able to step back and take time to think, to reach out and to take a step and dance. To move forward in life, don't let anything or anyone hold you back, but strive to become the wonderful person that you were made to be.