I have a strange relationship with the word, “beautiful.” It’s a word that means a lot to me, but I’m very careful about how I use it.
We all hear the word a lot, and it most often refers to the physical appearance of a person or scene. “She looks beautiful tonight.” But I nearly never use the word, “beautiful” to describe a person. Stunning, gorgeous, cute, pretty. I use those, but not beautiful – there is something sacred about that.
I’ve been trying to figure out why this word means so much to me, and all I can come at is the meaning I hold behind it. To me, something is beautiful if it is truly authentic and if it is universally human. As such, I don’t see physical properties as being beautiful because they aren’t universal. But words — I can’t tell you the number of times I have classified a book or even a turn of phrase as beautiful.
And I guess any art can be beautiful because art is the personal representation of something universal. Art takes something an artist experiences and distills it to its essence and then shares it with the world. Through the art of others, we can see what is most true about ourselves.
And all of this is a long way of introducing something I want to share with you all. TJ and I watch So You Think You Can Dance. When we first started watching, I didn’t think we would like it much, but we are hooked. It’s my favorite show and the only one I routinely get a chance to watch these days.
Last night there was a particular dance that touched me. The choreographer described it by saying the woman in the piece represented pure joy and enthusiasm and zest for life, and the man represented the negative forces in the world trying to pull her down. She was trying to live her life authentically and he was the voices of the naysayers trying to steer her form her path. I kept this in mind as I watched it, but after watching the piece a few times, it has grown to mean so much more to me.
See, when I watch this dance, I see my own struggles. I see myself trying to break free of the depression that seems to follow me around, and I see it always pulling me back in. Always a step behind. Sometimes hidden but never gone. Always sinister and dark and foreboding.
To me, this piece is art. The choreographer took her personal experience, found the universal in it, and now we all can see ourselves a little bit clearer because of it.
But another thing I learned from this piece was that even though I sometimes feel so very alone in my struggles, the fact that I struggle, in and of itself, proves that I am not alone in my afflictions. We all struggle. We all have a dark side trying to pull us in, whether that side is apathy, addiction, perfectionism, disability, or any number of demons that we all struggle with. To be human is to struggle.
And so I thank this choreographer for taking her experience and using it to show me myself in a bit clearer of a light.
And of course, I’m sharing it all with you below. I think you’ll enjoy it. This female dancer is trained in ballroom, and the male dancer is actually a martial artist which makes some of the moves really dramatic and interesting.
I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.